Uploading forms and files to Scoutbook

Scoutbook New Scoutbook Feature Requests
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We need in Scoutbook the ability to upload various custom forms and documents, for example “a campout packing list”, custom Troop permission form, “Philmont travel instruction”, “New Scout Parents’ Guide”, and so on.

Each Group and custom groups need a Troop folder for uploaded docs. The Philmont docs folder does not need to be shared with the whole Troop.

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@CharlesNash - doc storage has been asked for many times, but since most folks are unaware that there is a cost associated with enterprise storage and the BSA has limited resources I would not ever suggest that this will happen. Most units leverage existing storage based on google accounts and the like. Please feel free to use those resources and leverage links in messages and unit forums. And certainly do look at the cost or redundant highly available and flexible enterprise storage.

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Years ago our Troop tried to implement communications using various adhoc tools like Google Docs, Google Groups, Google Calendar, Yahoo tools, etc. Several problems occurred. New members and their parents to quite a whilevgetting used to all these communications tools and often times just gave up. As different adults and youth leaders arosevthe would change to different free tools and them the Troop had to struggle align with these tools. As there are many different tools being used there is constant frustration in the Troop communications. The big benefit of a tool like Scoutbook is that ALL the Troop’s communication is in one tool and everyone know the information is in the tool. If we have to go outside Scoutbook to solve our communication needs one has to wonder why use Scoutbook at all.

Now BSA National and the Councils are concerned about two deep leadership in Scouting communications. Our Council DEs now have logon access to our Troop Scoutbook account. Whenever solving communication problem by using a second adhoc web tool, that makes a problem with two deep leadership.

You mentioned the cost of online storage was a problem. Why don’t unit that want Scoubook folders simply pay for them. We paid a subscription for our previous Troop communication tool and it eas not a problem.

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@CharlesNash - I guess you were not following my statement about storage costs. The scoutbook.scouting.org is a singular platform hosted on redundant servers. In order to do storage it has to match that design and redundant on-line and backed up storage is not inexpensive.

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The BSA has previously stated, via the folks from SUAC, that they do not intend to provide cloud hosted storage. It’s been frequently requested, so @Stephen_Hornak is just reiterating the position the BSA has taken.

What I’ve found works relatively well is to post relevant documents (via links) in the Scoutbook unit discussion forums. That at last allows a central target for finding the information, and permits whomever is the current “person in charge” to link to the data wherever it is currently located.

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@CharlesNash - if you wish you can work through this

mind you need to know the base number of scouting units and a base amount of storage.

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I am guessing that Scoutbook shoild not have merged with the rest of the Svouting.org ecosystem.

I am coming the position of being a user that had such convenient features like online folders, but now we cannot use folders.

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@CharlesNash - scoutbook never had online folders and was privately owned which in itself would imposed its own limitations on storage. I think I will end my effort here as it is of no value to you.

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We do a couple of things to mitigate the problems you mentioned, and it’s working pretty well for us.

  1. We have one storage location for all of our online documents. Any service would work for this – we’re using Box, but that’s only because I have a free 50 gigs of storage there that was sittiing unused.
  2. One of our committee members works with our youth Webmaster to make sure that all the online documents are correct and available.
  3. We make heavy use of the url links in Scoutbook messages, calendar entries, and our Troop forum to connect to the documents on Box, so the documents are only a click away.
  4. We keep an index of the commonly-used documents in our Troop forum, so anyone can access them easily.
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And following with that group of suggestions that @SteveCagigas has made, we also post documents on the unit web pages as needed. There is a public shared folder on the unit g-drive that is embedded in our g-sites that will reflect any changes made in that shared folder in g-drive. No need for parent scouts or leaders to log in if links are done properly… all they need is to log into scoutbook or browse to the web page.

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