[CS-FSLUG] ICCM

[Greg Slade]

 > Tell me about their Linux/BSD usage. How extensive is it? How did
 > they get involved in that?...

I'm afraid these questions are based on a fundamental misconception. 
ICCM is not an organisation. In fact, you could say that ICCM, in and of 
itself, doesn't use Linux, or Windows, or Mac, or anything, because 
ICCM, in and of itself, doesn't even exist.

(Well, okay, I guess you could say that ICCM uses whatever operating 
system Yahoogroups runs on, since most of the year, ICCM exists in the 
form of a set of Yahoogroups mailing lists. Oh, and the web site. The 
year that I went, ICCM was hosted at Abilene Christian University in 
Texas, and I believe the web site was hosted there at the time, so you 
could say that ICCM was running on VAX/VMS at the time.)

Basically, ICCM is a talk shop for missionary techies from a bunch of 
different agencies. Each agency has its own strengths and challenges, so 
getting together and talking things over allows us to learn from each 
other, and hopefully spread good ideas from one agency to another, so we 
all end up using "best practices". (Although sometimes an agency's 
internal culture, or previous tech decisions, will constrain which 
solutions can be implemented.)

Probably the biggest single challenge to wider implementation of Linux 
on the average missionary's computer boils down to the lack of a single 
application, or class of applications: a contact/supporter/donor 
management tool designed for the individual missionary to keep track of 
their own donors. I know of several tools for Windows which allow the 
missionary to download a comma-delimited file of donations from the 
agency's financial system each month, and then crunch the numbers. (How 
many people gave to my ministry last month? What was the average giving 
per donor? What's the average amount of donations each month over the 
past 12 months? Is the trend up or down? Am I meeting my budget on a 
regular basis? Who's new? Who's stopped giving? Do I need to go out on 
deputation soon? Can I replace my computer this year?) I know of a few 
applications like this for Windows, but none at all for Linux. (Or Mac, 
for that matter.) There is no other single application which would have 
as much impact in terms of convincing missionaries to consider using 
Linux than this.

Greg

-- 
Greg Slade
I can't remember if I'm the good twin or the evil one.