Adding new Scouts to existing Scoutbook events

[edavignon]

Updates are made to Scoutbook weekly. The BSA is putting resources into it. Since the purchase, the BSA has, among other things, significantly increased computing resources, costing significant $, implemented automated member update, synced advancement with ScoutNET, made Scoutbook the official advancement database of the BSA, added additional awards, updated many awards and advancement, fixed bugs, etc.

The BSA does not have unlimited $ to pour into IT. In addition to updating Scoutbook, they are working to retire ScoutNET, improve the training systems, creating new apps, replacing other legacy internal system with modern technology. This is not cheap nor quick.

The calendar will eventually be scheduled for updates, but while we are waiting for it to be updated, we are fortunately to have the extension.

[ErikOlson1]

@SteveCagigas

Sure, in two years with unlimited resources. As it is, BSA IT has a limited budget and resources that have to be shared among Scoutbook, my.scouting.org, Internet Advancement, and all the other internal BSA IT requirements.

You seem to be applying Dilbert’s PHB logic about projects: “Everything I don’t have to do myself is trivially easy…” So here’s your chance: If you don’t like how SB development is moving, write your own system to replace Scoutbook. You have until August 10, 2021 to present us with a robust, superior product written from the ground up. And it has to be bug-free and meet everyone’s requirements, even if they don’t bother telling you what they are. And it has to be free-as-in-beer and free-as-in-speech.

Nice Dilbert reference! I get it. I battle my business partner on that every week! Just because something seems easy, doesn’t mean it is. I realize it will take time and money to improve Scoutbook. I’m looking at it from a business standpoint though.

Time: BSA has had 2 years.
Money: BSA raised dues $1/month or $12/year last year. Multiplied by the 2.3 million active Scouts and 1 million active Adult volunteers mentioned on Wikipedia, that totals almost $40M/year. If totally dedicated to IT, that would fund almost 500 developers at $80K/year! I realize the full sum is not going to IT, but out of $40M/year, surely there is enough to hire 10 developers to improve BSA systems so that they are best-in-class OR outsource them to those that are. From an end-user perspective, it seems like none of that $40M went to additional IT or development staff to jump start product development. That’s puzzling to me.

I’m not a coder, or I might try my hand at it. I’m good at identifying features that need to be included in products and communicating that to developers and/or the folks that build the hardware.

And I don’t agree that it has to be free-as-in-beer or free-as-in-speech. I know we would gladly pay additional fees for Scoutbook if it solved our problems and I know others would too. There are many in our Council still paying for other solutions because they feel they do a better job than Scoutbook. Make Scoutbook best-in-class and you will attract all those paying customers!

[ErikOlson1]

@Stephen_Hornak

@ErikOlson1 - look up the Sandusky law. It has made the recharter process and adult applications a longer process.

Sandusky - The name says it all.

I Googled the law, but didn’t find it. No matter, I get the intention.

I get background checked yearly for various volunteer positions. It’s a royal pain.

I’m not trying to alter the Application or background check process at all, just trying to make the BSA signature gathering process easier. There’s no reason that couldn’t be done quite easily through Docusign.

[ErikOlson1]

@GaryFeutz

Extension help documents can be found there. As @Stephen_Hornak has mentioned - I am happy to help describe something better if it isn’t in the documentation and I can add it if I inadvertently missed it.

Gary,

MAJOR KUDOS TO YOU for writing this Extension! What a great piece of software! I just spent several hours playing with it and it truly adds an amazing amount of functionality to Scoutbook!

It must not have successfully installed several years ago when I tried it as the functionality didn’t appear in Scoutbook like it does now. What I would have given for some of this functionality over the last year!

THANK YOU for your code, especially as a volunteer!

[PaulHoeffer]

For context, I’ve been a full stack developer or development manager for 20+ years, all web application related. Saying “we can simply move to Salesforce” is just silly. Without seeing the actual backlog the team is working from, the number of full time developer resources that are on it, the skillsets of the team, budget, etc. etc. it’s easy to throw stones and just as pointless.

I’ve been using Scoutbook heavily for the past 3 years as a parent, den leader, and now Boy Scout committee member who lives/breathes in SB daily, and what I’ve been seeing is that they do keep releasing much needed features. The calendaring issue affects us all and is the biggest PITA of the tool, but there is an extension at the least and I understand that re-writing the calendar module is a high pri item in their queue.

Personally I’m thankful for the extension and the efforts of anyone who helps take positive action to make the tool easier to use and more productive. There is a lot of great advice on this forum that I’ve personally leveraged and saved many hours of my time, such as understanding that I can print out all the blue cards before summer camp vs. having to write them all out manually.

My $.02, you guys can keep throwing shade if you want…

[SteveCagigas]

Well said, @PaulHoeffer! Someone needs to cut and paste this response into every thread where people are complaining about Scoutbook changes. End users rarely see the man behind the curtains!

[ZacharyMcCarty]

@PaulHoeffer excellent synopsis. Doesn’t even touch on the database side and the work undertaken to first combine disparate, old, legacy databases before work can even begin on the front end GUI that we call ScoutBook (which even that is being re-written ala IA 2.0). Converting large legacy systems on a shoe-string budget doesn’t happen overnight. I am looking forward to the larger conversion as IA 2.0 shows the promise of a modern GUI that may bring many of the requests we have.

[jacobfetzer]

@PaulHoeffer

Saying “we can simply move to Salesforce” is just silly. Without seeing the actual backlog the team is working from, the number of full time developer resources that are on it, the skillsets of the team, budget, etc. etc. it’s easy to throw stones and just as pointless.

I’ve been using Scoutbook heavily for the past 3 years as a parent, den leader, and now Boy Scout committee member who lives/breathes in SB daily, and what I’ve been seeing is that they do keep releasing much needed features. The calendaring issue affects us all and is the biggest PITA of the tool, but there is an extension at the least and I understand that re-writing the calendar module is a high pri item in their queue.

Personally I’m thankful for the extension and the efforts of anyone who helps take positive action to make the tool easier to use and more productive. There is a lot of great advice on this forum that I’ve personally leveraged and saved many hours of my time, such as understanding that I can print out all the blue cards before summer camp vs. having to write them all out manually.

@PaulHoeffer Well said. We are pushing the BSA to prioritize calendar improvements sooner rather than later, but the BSA takes our input and makes their prioritization decisions. Also, once they start making major changes, it could take a while before they are ready for production.