Show-ee

http://www.pfsf.org

Give us some background on some of the members of your team and the company that you work for.

Flaxen, a design and development company consisting of locations in Boulder, CO and Gainesville, FL, as well as expanded virtual staff around the country, develops websites and other design/advertising-related products for clients of all sizes and disciplines. As we develop web applications, our goal is to balance good design, the best possible user experience, and a stable yet flexible architecture.

The team that contributed to this site is made up of myself, Matt Green - lead developer and designer, Matt Stauffer - secondary developer, Amy Cox - information architecture and content developer and Kelly Norris - copywriter.

Tell us about the site. What vision were you trying to fill for the client?

Partnership for Strong Families is a non-profit welfare service organization in North Central Florida. Prior to the redesign they hosted completely separate sites for each of several departments, with the organization’s meaningful content distributed across the different sites. They asked us to create one consistent site to bring the departments and content together.

They wanted their web presence to be inviting yet professional, and needed it to appeal to every demographic—their audience includes young foster children, families or individuals looking to adopt or foster, partner agencies, partner families, and a network of providers.

The client required that all content be managed by multiple members and departments with different levels of access and permissions. They needed a solution that provided a seamless workflow and approval process that saved them time and resources as well as removed their dependency on a 3rd party for updates and ongoing maintenance.

Was there a specific reason why EE was chosen for this project? Why?

Other than EE being our go-to development tool overall, there are a few reasons why it is the perfect fit for this project. EE is the only platform that can provide the flexibility that the site required. By using EE and other 3rd party add-ons we were able to simplify the process of managing member groups and eliminate the high learning curve for the many members and departments who will have administrative access. There are other powerful CMSes out there, but none could even come close to providing all of those features together in one. Also, using EE we can build in such a way that the site is scalable without compromising the necessary separation between design and content.

What add-ons were used? and why?

Datagrab - We used Datagrab to import content from their previous calendar application and their staff directory. They use an external application to manage for the staff directory so we have Datagrab running on a schedule to import the external application’s automatically uploaded CSV files.  Datagrab does a great job on repeating updates (like our daily import), comparing and updating existing entries and adding and deleting changed entries.

Backup Module - Although we use cron jobs to back all of our databases every night, then local crons to download them, we like having the option to manually log into the control panel and back up there as well. Also, this provides the client peace of mind that they can back up just in case.

Solspace Super Search - We used Supersearch for the general site search. The search results are conditionally displayed in category by channel. We also needed it to create the staff directory search, which uses custom field searches using dropdown menus.

Structure - This module was perfect for this job. It handles all of our navigation, breadcrumbs, and page management (which is significant, as the site currently has over 100 pages). We prefer Structure over other navigation and page solutions because it requires the least amount of steps for adding content and has the lowest learning curve for clients. It also provides a simple solution for us to display a public sitemap.

Matrix - We used Matrix fields in cases where it made more sense to keep repeating content within a single edit page, rather than adding listings using Structure entries. The “Heart Gallery” adoption board is an example of this.

Playa - We try to use native relationship fields when possible, but in cases where we need multi-selects we have to use Playa, and we love it for its amazing UI and ease of use. One example of where we used Playa is for the different sidebar elements. For each page the client can drag and drop from a list of all sidebar elements (filled from a different channel) which they’d like to include or exclude from the sidebar on that page.

Wygwam - Yea I know, Brandon Kelly is awesome for developing the last 2 I have mentioned, and he also developed Wygwam. We use it for the content areas on every page. It enables the client to easily embed video, add documents, links, images, and any content formatting for each page.

Freeform - All of our contact forms use Freeform paired with Freeform Anti-spam.

Channel Files - This was another great module for this project. It adds a channel and a page-type for adding documents to an entry, which easily manage and display the list of documents as a tabular list. The best example is the forms page (in the top blue bar). We used channel files with categories to display multiple categories per page; if a page has no categories it will display the documents conditionally in another format. Partnership has a high volume and diversity of forms, and Channel Files was a perfect fit for providing them the form and document management structure their site requires.

Flexible Admin - Flexible Admin allows us to customize the CP menu bar on a per user or per member group basis. This was an absolute requirement, due to the number of members and member groups who will be accessing the control panel. We needed to make it as simple as possible and hate to say “just ignore that button”.  For most members, we set their home page to Structure and provided one other navigation item for changing their username and password.

What difficulties did you encounter? How did you address them? Was there a particular add-on that got you out of a bind?

The way we originally coded the sidebar manager (with Playa) would have required us to manually go to every single page and add every single sidebar element for every page (and do it again for ever new page). We wanted, instead, to have all of the elements shown by default, and just drag to hide. Brandon Kelly, the developer of Playa, helped out with some ideas for how to accomplish this.

We also needed a solution for a writer/editor approval-based editing process (like Publish Plus, but it’s only currently available for EE1). We ended up building a custom solution. When a lower level member makes edits it sends the admin an email notification and the status is set to pending. The admin must approve the addition or edit and only they can publish it live. There is also a draft preview mode for each page of the site so they can view their editing process before publishing it live. We believe EE really could use a good commercial add-on, or the ability to do this much more easily. It’s a feature that’s requested by many of our clients, and an add-on to do it would save us a lot of time.

Other Add-ons

Channel Files, Flexible Admin

Company: Flaxen Design

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