I am taking college classes again. I suppose it wasn’t fun enough the first time, so I’m getting a second Bachelor’s degree and plan to get a Master’s after that. Thankfully, this time around I don’t have to worry about living in the dorm or what’s going to be served in the dining hall (although the food at Maranatha was, by and large, really good. And I’m not just saying that because my wife was the cook).

Am I crazy?

Why would I go back to college when I already have a full-time job (which happens to incorporate two other full-time jobs)? Well, it is not because I have nothing else to do. An opportunity has been graced to me that I don’t believe would be wise to overlook.

How is this possible?

When my great-aunt passed away in 1989, she was generous enough to set up a trust fund for myself, my brothers, and some other people with the intent of providing funds for higher education. I took advantage of this in part during my undergraduate study. I also started to use it for grad classes, but during my first semester my wife and I moved to Illinois and began the ministry that we currently have.

My grandfather, Bill Post, was the executor of the trust. He passed away two years ago, which was a sad time for me. After that, his lawyer became the executor of the trust and it was made known that funds would be there for all of the beneficiaries until my youngest brother turned 25.  Well, that’s a few years from now and my mom encouraged me to take advantage of the opportunity.

Where am I going?

So I started looking at many different options. I needed to find a full-time school that was accredited. I didn’t wish to quit working, so I needed to find something that would work with my schedule. I looked into online classes for ministry training and nothing I found met my qualifications. I looked into classes for musical training, and again, nothing met my qualifications. I looked into classes for technology and found Western Governor’s University.

WGU has a unique approach to online education. Classes are very flexible – you go at your own pace. When life gets busy, you can slow down a bit, and when life is a little slower, you can accelerate your education. They also accepted my credits from Maranatha – I am so glad I went to an accredited college. They also offer industry-recognized certifications.

What am I taking?

For the last year, I have been working on a B.S. in Information Technology – Network Administration. I have earned certifications from CIW, CompTIA and Microsoft. I have 37 units that transferred, 32 completed, currently working on 12 and have 40 to go (7 more classes).

What am I going to do with this education? Well, I have already put many things into practice here at our church and school. Since I have the same (often more) certifications that our old computer techs have, and I don’t charge, I have been able to save us hundreds, if not thousands of dollars for the school. I have implemented learned strategies to save on costs and provide for necessary technology. I have also have met needs for other local churches and individuals. I hope to expand that in the future and see what happens. One step at a time – and I have some other, larger, and more important steps coming in the near future, which I will write about next time.

Our church’s website recently needed an overhaul. Here are 5 things I learned when I set it back up.

1. Using the Thesis Theme for WordPress is the way to go

At first, the Thesis Theme seems a bit bland, but its power is understated. It is a framework designed for easy customization, professional layout, and incredible SEO. I formerly used professional themes that were ready-made, but they were expensive and difficult to customize, especially when the website needed a refresh.

Thesis is incredibly simple to use with its power lying in the simplicity of just two files, custom.css and custom_functions.php.  There is no modifying of core files, ever. This is an incredible time saver. It also allows the website to be extremely flexible.

I have also sped up the site itself by using Thesis. Packing my site with large amount of plugins wasn’t necessarily bad, but the need for many has been eliminated with Thesis, which allows for far faster load times.

Speaking of speed, I’m not sure you can change a layout any faster than you can with Thesis while keeping consistency. Select how many columns, their width, click the save button and you are done. There is no digging through endless CSS code trying to get everything to line up perfectly. It just works.

The only thing that I don’t like about Thesis is the name of the “Save button.” The first thing I do when using it on a new site is to change its name to something more appropriate. That is the one caveat I can think of.

I would also like to give a small disclaimer. If you decide to purchase Thesis and do so by clicking on one of the links above or here, I receive a small portion that will go towards fees for this website.

2. Analytics are important

Using Google Analytics takes less than a minute to start and provides all of the nitty-gritty details of how visitors interact with your website. What page they go to first; how long they stay on each page; where they came from; and what they are looking for are just some of the things that you can see.

After you have tracked user habits for a good amount of time, it becomes obvious what areas of your site need to be adjusted. For example,  if most people are looking for the church calendar and it is currently buried beneath other pages in your site, make sure that you put a link on the front page.

Analytics can also help make sure that your website is targeting the correct keywords. That is, make sure the words you use on your site are the words that people looking for your site are using to get there. This is all shown clearly and simply in the analytics.

3. Good images show professionalism

There are a few options here. You can take the pictures yourself, find someone who can, or search for good stock photos. I highly recommend investing in stock photography. There are plenty of good, free and inexpensive sites available such as EveryStockPhoto, flickr, Google image search, stock.xchng, iStockphoto, and gettyimages. Make sure that you only use images you have permission to use. Remember that a picture is worth a thousand words – so make sure the pictures on your website speak thousands of good words.

Another reason that I especially like to use stock photos on a church website instead of actual photos of church members is that they will last. What happens if a family moves or you take a great picture of a child, but the parents don’t want it published on the web? Pictures of actual pastoral staff would be appropriate, as would a gallery of pictures from a church event that was maybe only available to church members. Discretion is key.

4. A good design is wonderful, but not as important as good information

The first impression a visitor to a site will have is that of design. Make sure your design is appropriate for your site. More importantly, have some good information. Google, Facebook, Twitter, et. al. did not make it to the top because of their fancy graphics, but because of their content. Sure there is a certain design element to each of those sites, but people do not stop going to Facebook because of the new designs that are rolled out.

5. Easy navigation is crucial

Sometimes I forget that not everyone in the world thinks the way I do. When designing a site, I know where all of the information is located and how to get there because I put it there. The problem is that the site visitors don’t know where the information is unless it is in a place that makes sense to them. Yes, there is a search box, but my goal is that people never have to use it because it is clear where to find the information they are looking for. Think about navigation like a site visitor, not a web developer.

Bonus Tip  – Make sure you have a good hosting service

We had been using a cheap service for over five years.  But, you get what you pay for. There were many times when the server was down and our sites were unreachable. I know that this can happen from time to time, but the service provider was unreachable and eventually became rather unhelpful. I looked at the competition and realized that we were also paying far too much for our service.

So the quest was on to find a new hosting service that was reliable, affordable, ran on linux and supported open-source. I found that Dreamhost was the best option for us. I was able to find a coupon that gave a good discount, and am now able to make my own coupon codes to pass on to others.  If you decide to go with Dreamhost, hopefully these can be of help to you. The promo codes are in bold.

FIFTY0FF – use this for $50 off 2 year registration

FREE4LIFEDOMAIN – use this for free lifetime domain registration

I am also considering doing some freelance work to setup a website for you or your ministry. I would be able to give a much larger discount off of your hosting. If this is of interest to you, you can contact me and we can work out any details.

I love helping people. I am also very fond of technology. One of the blessings I have is helping people in our church and school when they are having computer troubles. Sometimes, the problems are serious and really do need someone with experience and understanding. Most of the time the problems, however,  are very simple to fix. In fact, if I were to write out some instructions, anyone could solve many of these problems on their own.

Is it plugged in?

I cannot count the  times that people have come to me with a “broken” computer that simply was not plugged in. Check to make sure that  physical connections are plugged in, and plugged in correctly, Most connections are color-coded, so it is difficult to mess things up.

Have you turned it off and back on again?

There is a reason that tech support will ask you this question on the phone. Sometimes, the problem will take care of itself after a reboot. If not, it can help narrow down what the real problem is.

Have you performed basic system maintenance?

So many people think that their computer has been infected with a killer virus because it is running slow. This might be the case, but if you haven’t been doing some basic maintenance, it could be as simple as cleaning up some junk files and defragmenting .

I recommend a few programs for such tasks. The first, if you are using Windows, is CCleaner and can be downloaded here. Download, install and run it with its default settings. It will clean out all those junk files from your computer safely. It can dig a little deeper if you select extra options. Just remember,  as far as you are concerned, there is no going back. There are also options for disabling programs from loading on startup. I recommend that you don’t use the registry cleaner. Even though you can make a backup, I have found it can sometimes do more harm than good. You should run CCleaner once a month or so.

The second program is made by the same company as CCleaner, called Defraggler and can be downloaded here. Again, let it do its thing. This process can take a long time and will really slow down other programs on your computer, so it is best to let it work overnight.

The third program you should have running is an anti-virus program. Here are my recommendations: AVG Free or Microsoft Security Essentials. Pick run, set up a schedule for it to do a full scan once a week, and let it work in the background.

Make a backup of your data

Computers are man-made devices that will fail. Make backups in many ways and make them often. Get a USB drive, make CD backups, store things online. Your important files are important. Keep them safe. Especially make a backup just before you are about to change anything significant on your computer. I’ll write an article later on a good backup routine that works for me.

Do some research.

With discretion, Google is your friend. There is a good chance someone else has experienced the problem you are facing now.

Don’t be afraid.

It is just a computer. What’s the worst that can happen? You won’t lose your data since you’ve backed up regularly. I have learned more by breaking and fixing things than just my daily, normal computer use. Learn from any mistakes and realize the computer as a tool that can work for you.

As a youth pastor, it is necessary that I keep in contact with teens and their parents about events and activities. I have used Ofuz for the last 9 months or so to keep my contacts (youth group) organized and be able to communicate with them easily.  In the near future, I will post exactly how I use Ofuz.  Simply, I use it in a similar way that people use Constant Contact, but there is much more functionality than just that. It is capable of project management, invoicing, time-tracking, collaboration, web forms and more.

It is in beta, so it is a little rough around the edges, especially when it comes to design, but as a project that will soon be open-source, I know that it will only get better.

Has anyone else been using Ofuz? If you have used it, plan to use it, or use something you consider better, let me know in the comments.

My earlier post on how we migrated to using Linux raised some questions. Some wondered why other churches, schools and Christian ministries did not do this (though there are many that have). Others wondered how they could do it themselves.

If I were to visit another church, Christian school, mission field, or other ministry for the purpose of upgrading their technology and moving to open source software, here is  a basic outline of what I would do. Hopefully, you can use this as a guideline for doing this in your own organization.

Assess what you already have

Many times, people do not necessarily need to upgrade to the latest and greatest hardware. Especially in places where money is tight, reusing hardware you already have can be a great savings. A 10-year old computer running a modern operating system is possible and easy with Linux.

Along with that, I would need to know what infrastructure is there. Is there already a network in place? Are the buildings already wired? What servers, if any, are there? What is the current backup strategy? What type of printers are you working with?

Are  there any proprietary programs that your ministry depends on? If so, some thought is going to have to go into how to export and import that data into another program. In some cases, there just isn’t an open-source alternative. In an instance like that there are options such as dual-booting, virtual machines, WINE or keeping a computer as-is solely for those programs.

What are your goals?

Technology is a tool. I can use a really expensive sledgehammer to put a nail in the wall so that I can hang a picture, but because it is expensive doesn’t make it the right tool for the job.  You may not need the latest and greatest computer out there for what you plan to do. But, you need to know what it is that you plan to do.

Do you really need to be playing those graphic-intensive 3D games on your computer at church? Will you be recording services to digital audio? Will you do any video editing at all? Will you be using a projector? How many computers do you want and where do you want to put them? You need to have an idea what you want to do with the computers in your ministry not only now but 5-10 years from now. Have a vision, or you will be disappointed.

Explore your options

One wonderful thing about Free and Open Source Software is that there are numerous options. This can be a two-edged sword, though! What works for others may or may not work for you. Ask questions and do research.

One thing that is consistently at the top of my list is the support and the community that surrounds the project.  A good community is good assurance for the integrity and lifespan of any program. Linux itself would not have survived if it weren’t for the incredible community that has grown since its humble beginnings in 1991.

Speaking of support, if you haven’t already done so, it may be a good idea to enlist help from others who have done this before. As helpful as people are on the internet, or even a phone call, nothing beats having someone there in person to help when you are having trouble.

Setup a schedule

Once you have some goals in place and have settled on what your needs are, you need to schedule a time to put your plan in action. Will it be a gradual roll-out or will it be done all at once? Do you have a plan for backing up files and importing them to the new systems? I would make sure that it was done a time that would be the least disruptive. Communicate with those whom the migration affects. Don’t delete the pastor’s sermon notes just before he goes to print them!

Do it!

At this point the only thing left is to execute the plan that was developed. Download the distribution of your choice (I use Ubuntu, but there are many, many others that may fit your needs better), burn the CD, stick it in your computer, boot it up and follow the prompts. You may get stuck at some point in the process, – don’t be afraid of asking for help.

These are some rough guidelines for switching to Linux and open-source software in a ministry, or really, any other setting. I would like to flesh this out into a nice flowchart or more detailed checklist at some point in the future. What did I miss? What other areas would you focus in on? If you have suggestions or even helpful criticisms, let me know in the comments.

Like many other people, our church and, more importantly, our Christian school, ran the Windows operating system on all computers. We have about 15 computers in classrooms in addition to our computer lab of 25 computers. They were not the greatest computers to begin with – Pentium 3, 8GB HDD, 64-128 Mb of RAM – but that soon changed. We were given a large donation of 65 Dell Optiplex GX260s one year ago. Still not up to today’s standards, but a huge improvement over what we had and adequate for our current needs.

The problem

We had a problem, however, in our licensing. A number of years ago we purchased a 100-volume license for Windows 2000. This would still be good for our new(er) machines, but Windows 2000 is terribly outdated and unsupported. It then became a matter of stewardship. Should we outlay a large sum of money for XP which would soon be replaced by Windows 7? Sure, the hardware cannot handle 7, but it would eventually be replaced and the cycle would start again. We are a small ministry, not a large corporation that can afford to keep up with the costs and offer our students a quality education at the same time.

One of our computers running Ubuntu showing a 3d desktop cube

Our solution

There had to be a responsible alternative. And there was. The answer was found in the Ubuntu Linux operating system. Now, there are many variations (distributions) of Linux, but I have been using Ubuntu since 2006 on my personal computers.

So what is Ubuntu and why was it the solution to our problem? To quote from their website, “Ubuntu is an operating system built by a worldwide team of expert developers. It contains all the applications you need: a web browser, office suite, media apps, instant messaging and much more. Ubuntu is an open-source alternative to Windows and Office.”

Ubuntu resolved our situation in the following ways:

Cost

This is the most obvious benefit – Ubuntu is free. It does not cost anything but the time to download it, burn it to a CD and install it. The installation is straightforward and simple. It took my about 20 minutes to completely format and install for one machine. I could then clone that machine and copy it to others – or since CDs are so cheap, I was able to burn and install multiple copies at once.

This is a large part of where stewardship came in. With the large cost of licensing no longer an issue, we are now able to save that money and begin investing in good hardware. We are now at a place where we can move forward instead of trying to keep our heads above water.

Freedom

We now have the ability to use our machines in whatever way is most beneficial. When I want to install a new program I type in a simple command – aptitude install name of program and it is done. The best thing about the freedom with the software is that I am not limited by licenses in the ability to do good to my neighbor.

We can also run many Windows programs directly on these computers through an application layer called WINE. We do this for our Rosetta Stone Online Language Learning program that our students use for foreign language. We run the Windows version of Firefox so that the microphone is recognized and supported. We could run MS Office 2003 which we have licenses for, but there is no need to do that since Ubuntu comes with OpenOffice.org, a compatible office suite.

Security

Linux is inherently a very secure operating system, but the open-source model on which it, and other software is built, keeps it secure. Anyone can look into the source, find a bug and fix it. With software under a constant peer-review, errors and bugs are constantly being fixed and new features implemented. Although stable, none of it ever becomes stable. As a system administrator, I love the feeling that I am working with data and systems that are rock-solid. By the way, we don’t run anti-virus software on these computers because Linux is currently (virtually) impervious to viruses.

Ease of use

Wait, isn’t Linux that for super-geeks? In fact, in many ways Linux is extremely easy to use. When students arrived on the first day of school, they were excited that the old CRT monitors were replaced with new 15″ LCD monitors. They intuitively found where applications were (especially the games) and were able to get right to work. In fact, our only problems this year have been hardware-related issues.

Accountability

Students just can’t seem to get away with much when I can constantly monitor their desktops with iTalc, fix problems with ssh, and check logs easily. I don’t play “Big Brother” with them, but they understand that we are trying to keep them accountable and helps foster an atmosphere of responsibility.

Support

I was very comfortable using Linux on the desktop, but I had many questions when implementing Linux in our lab. My questions were posted at ubuntuforums.org and quickly answered. The people were very friendly and helpful. There was even one gentleman who realized I was close in proximity and called me on the phone to walk me through some things. He offered to come over, but I had my problem solved by then. The Linux support was so good, they even helped me with problems on the Windows machines we had left! We haven’t yet had need of paid-for support, but I know it is always there as an option.

Linux is not for every person or ministry, but I encourage you to consider it. At the very least, consider implementing open-source solutions in your ministry. For most proprietary, paid-for applications there are free open-source alternatives – no matter what operating system you use. For us, the benefits were obvious: we have future-proofed our computer lab by not being locked into a vicious licensing cycle, we can use the money we saved on software and concentrate on upgrading our hardware, and we now teach our students concepts about technology instead of particular applications so that they can benefit no matter what college or career they enter after graduation.

Has Linux or other open-source software been beneficial for you or your ministry? Do you have further questions regarding our switch? Leave any comments, questions, or criticisms in the comments below!

Hopefully, you are using Firefox or at least one of the other good web browsers out there (read: anything but Internet Explorer).  One of the best features of Firefox is its extendability through the use of Add-ons.  Here are some that I consider essential for what I do almost every day.

Adblock Plus

Why aren’t you using this already? Seriously, Adblock Plus has to be the best thing that was ever put on the Internet. I can (almost) fearlessly browse the web and not be afraid of what inappropriate ads might show up on what should be an otherwise good website. If something does slip through the cracks, I simply right-click and select Adblock Image. For those sites which I feel safe and would like to support, I can selectively allow ads to appear.

Evernote

For this, you have to actually be using the Evernote service, but if you have ever wished you could save and organize anything from the web, our desktop or even iPhone in one place for later use, you will appreciate this. It organizes notes, webpage clippings, photos, screenshots and more for you. This addon makes clipping things from the web just that much easier.

Weave Sync

Imagine yourself browsing web at home and then going to your office computer, pulling up Firefox and all of your bookmarks, browsing history, saved passwords and tabs from your home computer are right there waiting for you. That is the goal of Mozilla’s Weave Sync addon. It also syncs your passwords between devices. For password syncing I previously used Xmarks, which is still a great addon – especially if you use different browsers. But with Weave, that functionality is included, plus more. Weave uses its own server to sync with by default, or you can follow their instructions for setting up your own.

ProCon Latte

In addition to other web-filtering solutions, ProCon Latte is a nice little addon that “can filter any kind of material (pornography, gambling, hacking, cracking, etc…), it can also block all traffic, making sure that only desired websites (set in the Whitelist) can be accessed, and includes a profanity filter, all *like* a parental control filter.”

WARNING: It is not foolproof and can easily bypassed – so make sure you have other precautions in place.

Google Redesigned

I use Google’s services on a daily basis. I almost always have a tab with my Gmail account open. Our church & school use Google apps for our domain. Staring at a bright white screen just isn’t good on the eyes and the Google Redesigned add-on elegantly alleviates that problem by using CSS to change the look of Google’s services on the fly.

AutoCopy

Most of my computer work is done on Linux (Ubuntu, specifically), but there are occasions that I use OS X or even Windows. One of my favorite features of Linux is that I can highlight a selection of text and it is copied to the clipboard – no Control+C or Right-Click > Copy or (event worse) Edit Menu > Copy. It is just done! Then a simple middle-click will paste my selection. Unfortunately other operating systems do not implement this feature. AutoCopy takes care of this on those machines (at least for the web).

Better Gmail 2

Sometimes things in Gmail don’t work quite as you may want. Better Gmail 2 compiles some of the best Greasemonkey scripts out there for you so you can have great features like hierarchical labels,  file attachment icons, hiding spam count, showing the unread message count on the favicon, and more.

Greasemonkey

You may be wondering what those Greasemonkey scripts I mentioned above are all about. This add-on may be a little harder to understand, because on its own it does absolutely nothing. It needs scripts to make it work, but it functions in a similar way to Better Gmail 2 and Google Redesigned by using scripts to modify your web experience on-the-fly. In fact, before Google Redesigned became its own add-on it was a couple of different Greasemonkey scripts. So, where do you get these wonderful scripts? The largest source is over at Userscripts.org where there are thousands of these scripts to enhance your web experience.

Zotero

When doing any type of research, including sermon preparation, it is best to cite, document, and organize your sources. Zotero does this effortlessly. It extracts bibliographic information from websites which can then be cited in your word processor like MS Word, or OpenOffice.org. The interface is very intuitive and allows you to search through and organize your saved items. Some of its functionality is duplicate with Evernote, but there are definite differences in purpose between the two.
My list is by no means definitive, so leave a comment about which extensions you use that weren’t included or which ones you may think should be dropped from the list.

I can easily imagine using this for sending out quick updates and messages to teens and parents. Just set up a list in your contacts containing all those that you want to send mass text messages to or add numbers one by one. This may end up being very useful. Just mind the cost that this imposes on those you are texting.

And, if you need an invite for Google Voice, let me know in the comments. I have 3 left!
via Lifehacker

Xiphos (formerly known as GnomeSword) is a Bible study tool written for Linux, UNIX, and Windows under the GNOME toolkit, offering a rich and featureful environment for reading, study, and research using modules from The SWORD Project and elsewhere. It is open-source software, and available free-of-charge to all

I have used Logos Bible software, e-Sword, as well as other Bible study software in the past. Logos especially is a very good program. The only problem is that on an assistant pastor’s budget, it costs a large sum of money. I have to constantly be aware that I need to be a good steward.

Xiphos, on the other hand is open-source software. Simply, that means I am allowed to go into the program code myself and modify it to behave how i wish it too and use it in the manner I wish. I am legally allowed to share the software, and even encouraged to do so! And for the my bottom line – it is free. Free as in freedom and price.

This is my go-to resource for Bible research and study. I can also easily copy verses to put on handouts and tests in classes. Let’s see how it works.

Getting Started

In the module manager (Edit > Module manager) you can add your source from the list. Since I am not living in a persecuted country, I added all of the internet (remote) sites. Then, refreshed my list and chose my Bible texts, Commentaries, Dictionaries, etc. for installation. There are many resources available, including a fair number of maps from the Xiphos repository.

Workflow

The layouot is extremely customizable and each area can be easily resized by clicking and dragging.  In the standard view of the Scripture passage you are looking at, you can scroll through the chapter you are in plus one verse before and one verse after. Sometimes this isn’t enough to get the context, but chapters are easy to change with the dropdown list above. You can also open different passages in new tabs. This makes working with multiple passages very easy and effecient. Speaking of effeciency, the search is one of the fastest I have used in a Bible study program.

There are a couple of options for keeping one’s own notes within the program itself. There is a personal commentary as well as a “studypad” which is essentially a trimmed down text editor. It took me some searching to figure out how to use the Personal commentary. You have to right-click on the Personal commentary in the Module Panel (the one with the tree-view). Then, the studypad opens and you can make your notes. After saving, your notes show up in the Commentary view.

It isn’t quite perfect . . .yet

Overall, this is a great program, but it is not without its shortcomings. A great feature to be implemented would be opening Libronix files (Logos’ proprietary format). Many preachers, myself included, have purchased Libronix files. It would be wonderful to incorporate them into Xiphos and expand its capabilities. I am sure this program imporves as the developers are busy resolving features between the Linux and Windows versions and improving other features.

Have you used Xiphos? What do you think of it? Leave your thoughts below.
Download Xiphos here