CrowsNest Update

Now that our entire focus is set on CrowsNest, we are coming along quite nicely.  When we left off, we were incredibly close to the app being complete, or rather, complete for a first release.  We have spent the last couple of months getting the final touches in place, and fixing a few bugs that cropped up in the interim.  Unfortunately one of the items was a pretty major one, and has taken a ton of time to implement throughout the entire system.

Over the past few months, the following updates have been made to CrowsNest:

• Fine tuning the answer portion, allowing for any number of answers up to 5
• Consistency in how answers are numbered/lettered
• Internal customer separation fixes
• Improved Time Zone functionality
• Multiple Category creation based on comma delimited entry
• Media attached to questions, now includes audio option
• Fixed a bug where “I don’t understand this question” data was not being recorded
• Improved filtering options
• Fine tuned how the scheduling operates, now has a strict time vs. only by date
• Made the Country field a drop down to force consistency
• Fixed a bug where all 5 answers were numbered, even if there were fewer than 5 specified

One of the enhancements that we want to get online as quickly as possible, and prior to public release, is the built-in Help Desk.  We view this as a critical feature for both ourselves and the customer.  Currently, dealing with support issues via email has been adequate, but for tracking purposes it is a nightmare.  This way, every issue or piece of feedback is tracked and stored in the system itself, allowing for better communication and ensuring that items do not slip through the cracks.

Another feature we want to get started on as soon as possible, is the update of the interface.  We will be modifying the visual aspects of the system to more fully utilize jquery and ajax functionality.  This will definitely enhance the customer experience, as well as make using the system a bit easier and nicer to display.

We are also fine tuning our pricing structure, and will post more on that in the near future.

New Testimonial

We received this testimonial from Joe Venuto:

Mobile Consulting, Inc. and MIGEW.com

“Mobile Consulting needed to reinvent our website and Michigan’s Global Entrepreneurship Week needed to develop one. Merlee and Chris of MutinyWare exceeded my expectations with their work on MobileConsultingInc.com and MIGEW.com. Both sites secured everything we were looking for. Working with their team was a pleasure. They are professional, knowledgeable, efficient, informative, creative, and completed the projects ahead of schedule. I look forward to developing my professional portfolios with MutinyWare. Thanks Merlee and Chris!”

Joseph Venuto
Mobile Consulting Inc.
Michigan Global Entrepreneurship Week

 

Tags: design, development, Mutiny Designs, testimonials, website

New Mutiny Designs Launch – MIGEW.com

We just completed the site design and development for the Michigan Global Entrepreneurship Week initiative.

We met Joe, the owner and founder, at an Ann Arbor Spark meeting.  We had worked on his company website for Mobile Consulting, Inc, and he asked us to setup a site for MIGEW as well.

Joe had already had a design layout for migew.com, and we discussed how best to set up a website on short notice.  After some consideration and discussion, we recommended that the site for migew.com be a WordPress blog.  This would enable the site to be setup quickly, would allow for quick and easy updates, and also automatically incorporate a content management system.  By customizing a WordPress template to match the originally desired design, we got the look that Joe was hoping for.  Also, by utilizing some WordPress plugins, we were able to gain the functionality that he was looking for as well.

Please feel free to check out MIGEW.com and see how you can participate!  Also take a peek at our design services and portfolio at Mutiny Designs.

Tags: design, development, Mutiny Designs, website, wordpress

New Mutiny Designs Launch – MobileConsultingInc.com

We just completed the site design and development for Mobile Consulting Inc. Mobile Consulting is a company that provides a service to help you lower your cell phone costs. By negotiating ethically with your current carrier, Mobile Consulting can lower your monthly cell phone bill, as well as save you money on device and plan upgrades. Mobile Consulting offers a 100% money back guarantee with their services

We met Joe, the owner and founder, at an Ann Arbor Spark meeting.  We got to talking, and matched up our needs, resulting in MutinyWare being selected to complete the design and development of the website.

When coming up with the design for mobileconsultinginc.com, we wanted the site to be bright, bold, friendly and welcoming. By utilizing fresh, bold colors and graphics, we have achieved this goal. We also customized their blog to match the site, and reworked their logo slightly to co-ordinate as well.

Please feel free to check out Mobile Consulting and their services. You can save money on your cell phone bill as well! Also, don’t forget to visit Mutiny Designs to see some of our work, and what we could possibly do to boost your online presence.

Tags: design, development, launch, Mutiny Designs, website, wordpress

Domain Decisions

Decisions, decisions. Trying to manage and formulate the best strategy for domains, names, sites and so forth for multiple products can be a challenging one.

We have decided to use sub-domains of the mutinyware.com primary domain to setup our products’ website and application on. After some debate and research, we came to this conclusion for a couple of reasons. One is integration. We plan on having all of our apps be capable of complete integration with the others, and can easily foresee a future where clients may be subscribing to more than one app. Having all of these under a single domain makes this a little less painful. The second consideration was branding and SEO. By keeping all of our products under the MutinyWare umbrella, we are better able to consolidate branding efforts, as well as SEO.

Previously, we had setup individual product domains, such as mw-crowsnest.com and mw-quartermaster.com. We have now transitioned these to crowsnest.mutinyware.com and quartermaster.mutinyware.com. Hopefully this will make things easier both for us in administration and branding, and also for our customers. This should make our SEO efforts and rankings more relevant to all, instead of to a single product.

If anyone has any feedback on this conclusion, please don’t hesitate to let us know.

PS – what do the feet have to do with this post? Nothing really, I just like the feeling and the photo

Tags: domains, sites

Lessons Learned

We all talk about lessons learned, and mean to keep track of these things, but the unfortunate thing is, we rarely do. I know for myself, I always think….”Oh, I will definitely remember this!”. Then, a couple years go by and we hit up against the same issue, and the familiarity is there, but the solution is long gone. So we end up searching our files for the exact place where we encountered and solved the issue in the past, and going online to find the solution….again.

In programming, this can be a disastrous waste of time and energy. Hours upon hours can be spent trying to fix the smallest of problems. And yet, we still fall prey to this problem.

So, in order to attempt to keep up with these things, we have created a sub forum on the MutinyWare forums to log this type of information. Not only will it help us to keep these issues and solutions in a place where they can easily be found, but hopefully, they may help others who encounter the same problem.

You can view the Lessons Learned forum here.

QuarterMaster Introduction

We have a product in development called QuarterMaster Property Management.  It is a system to help property management firms manage their websites for their main company, as well as for each individual community.

QuarterMaster came about when a Cambridge Partners, Inc. requested a basic content management system to manage some facets of their websites.  This is a client that I have had for several years, one that I manage the regular maintenance on and last year, had completely redesigned and rewritten all of the sites.  Needless to say, as we were working out the details for their requirements, we ended up creating a system that was much, much more than they had bargained for.  We can’t be accused of doing things half-assed!  Thus, QuarterMaster was born.

The system is being used by the Cambridge Partners site right now, and has been for the past several months.  Currently the system is only handling portions of the website data, those that are directly related to the properties and their details.  The textual content and layout of the site is still being maintained manually.  Ultimately QuarterMaster will manage all of the content on a site.

Currently, QuarterMaster handles the following features:

• Create and manage individual properties
• Create and manage individual models (floor plans)
• Create and categorize all of your amenities
• Manage pricing
• Manage locations, contacts, URLs
• Create and manage custom neighborhoods
• Amenity value assessment
• Create, manage and schedule specials
• Apartment search functionality
• Leads management
• User management
• Changes to the QuarterMaster system updates your site immediately
• Integration with your existing site

If you have any questions, or are interested in using QuarterMaster for your own property website(s), please don’t hesitate to contact us.  As we move forward with development, and have a public demo and beta system in place, we will post updates here.

Tags: community website, development, property management

CrowsNest Update

We are making excellent progress on the CrowsNest application!  We have completed the private launch, first release, and are working on finalizing some significant changes that were made to the base functionality of the system.  By the first of July we are looking at opening up a beta program for the Assessment portion of CrowsNest.

If anyone is interested in participating in the beta of the assessment system, please contact us.  The assessment system is geared towards creating and delivering online assessments/tests.

Primary features of the assessment system include:

• Ability to create a question bank
• Ability to show images with individual questions
• Ability to categorize your questions
• Ability to add custom proficiency levels to your questions
• Create manual/custom assessments, save in bank
• Create random assessments using the generator
• Ability to define grading systems
• Ability to assign point values to individual questions
• Automatic scoring/grading
• Assign time limits to an assessment
• Customize and assign documents to an assessment
  • Invitations
  • Instructions
  • Case Studies
  • Closing Notes
• Ability to group multiple assessments into a “Course”, save in bank
• Schedule assessments/courses
• Skip question functionality
• Timer functionality
• User Management
• Customer Management
• Review Scorecards
• Terminology customization
• Interface customization

Tags: CrowsNest, development, News, software, update

For Mothers…

Well, we are at Mother’s Day.  And of course, being a mother, happy mom’s day to me!  And even more so, to my own mother…who is still the biggest help and lifeline of my life.

My mom was just here visiting me for 4 weeks last month, and as usual, she spoiled both my daughter and myself outrageously.  Now, not to say she spoils us materially…but with taking such good care of us while she is here, and the daily Tim Hortons run.  I have also discovered, that as ridiculous as this sounds, I sleep like a baby when she is here.  On the flip side, she does get me to do all of the icky stuff that I have procrastinated on since her last visit.  When she leaves I always have a full freezer, clean house, and all of my mail taken care of

On this last visit however, something new occurred.  We went out for drinks at the local pub!  Now, this is something I have never, ever done with my mom.  Neither of us are drinkers, and neither of us are in the habit of going out to bars.  However, I have noticed over the last several years, that my mom enjoys music.  I know, seems like a silly discovery doesn’t it?  But, she has become quite exposed, and I must say, very accepting of what my daughter and I listen to.  Soooo….twice, yes twice, while she was here, we went out to listen to live music and have a few drinks.  And go figure, we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves!

Now….next visit, she is coming down to go to a Nine Inch Nails concert with us.  She wonders if she will be the oldest person there….but damn, she is looking forward to it!

Happy Mother’s Day Mom!  And of course to all of the mothers and grand-mothers out there.  None of us would be where we are without you.

Launch of MyOddFamily.com

I just recently completed a blog customization and logo design for MyOddFamily.com.  My Odd Family is a blog about a family, that considers themselves to be decidedly odd.  Written by Katybeth Jensen-Ruscitti, who is also the owner of CampRunAPup.com, the blog promises to be a frank, entertaining and humorous look at the life inside an “odd” family.

An excerpt from the first post:

“ODD:  left over, remaining, separated from, somewhat more than, irregular, unusual, unordinary, or (my personal favorite)offbeat.

Some people are destined for fame or fortune, or perhaps their family genes pass down a talent for singing, painting, or learning languages.  My family has passed down the gene for oddness and a talent for Pig Latin. Now, you may be able to escape fame or fortune, or deny a talent for singing or painting, but if the Gods have gifted you with the “odd” gene, your fate is sealed.”

Do check it out and read the rest of the post and more at www.myoddfamily.com and enjoy!  Also be sure to check out the rest of my designs on MutinyDesigns.com.