Category Archives: Opinion

Off Topic – Praise for Evohosting

Opinion

This is completely off topic but I want to shower my web hosting provider with praise. Why now? Well no particular reason other than I have been thinking about doing it for a while. When I lived in the States I had my website on one of the big providers. It was OK but when I ran into problems they could not fix it, they left me waiting and my site was down. It left a bit of a bad feeling.

I now have my website with Evohosting and have done for the past several years. The contrast could not be different. I am not quite sure how large they are but they give the impression of being very personal. In my previous hosting their emails would be signed off as “support staff” or something equally generic and impersonal. With Evohosting I know the names of those that contact me. Their response times to queries are always very fast and I have yet had a problem that they could not help solve. I am not sure about how much these things should cost but they have always struck me as being very competitively priced for the packages that they provide and certainly for the service that they offer.

In a world where people rant and have a go at bad service Evohosting is a refreshing change. Thanks

Raiser’s Edge Book

Not Code, Opinion

I have just seen a new book about to be released called:

Fundraising with the Raiser’s Edge: A Non-Technical Guide by Bill Connors. Bill was my first inspiration to go into business with The Raiser’s Edge when he was a consultant at Blackbaud and visited the Jewish Community Federation of San Francisco where I worked at the time. He really inspired me to take my development work further. I have never met anyone with a better knowledge of The Raiser’s Edge and fundraising combined and no doubt this will be reflected in his book.

From Amazon.com

or

From Amazon.co.uk

Most definitely a recommended read.

Small improvements that I like about Blackbaud Enterprise CRM

Not Code, Opinion, , , , , , ,

Blackbaud Enterprise CRM (eCRM or BBEC as it seems to be called interchangeably) is enormous. It is a big change to The Raiser’s Edge but then that is not surprising as it is not actually the replacement for The Raiser’s Edge 7. It is an application way beyond RE 7. Nevertheless you cannot help comparing the two as long as there is no RE8 to compare to. As a software developer it is a whole new paradigm. Of course even if you know how to develop software customisations for BBEC you still need to know how the program works from a user perspective. That is why I am not only learning a new development environment but I am learning a whole new program. Some of the concepts are very similar, some are different. As I learn I have come across some quite small changes that, for whatever reason, fill me with a “wow that’s great” feeling. These are not earth shattering improvements but just things that I am sure people will appreciate. So this post is dedicated to the small differences. Continue reading Small improvements that I like about Blackbaud Enterprise CRM →