CiviCRM Community Forums (archive)

Hi,

We are planning to implement a system to build embeddable progress bars and widgets based on the entities provided by CiviCRM - like Contribution pages, mailing lists etc.

The new widget creation interface will be similar to current CiviCRM widget creation interface for Contribution page. We plan to implement this as a new extension to CiviCRM.  Using the new interface user can create progress bar which draws value from a formula including values from one or more contribution pages, rather than being tied to a specific page. The formula allows user to enter an arbitrary starting amount, goal amount, and current total raised.

For example, for the progress bar we'd like to display the total raised by one contribution page, as well as 10% each of two other contribution pages, plus an arbitrary starting amount.

Also this new interface allows to create campaign widget which may contain image or text or donate button or progress bar (created above) or newsletter subscription field.

Workflow:
1. CiviCRM user clicks the button to create a new widget or progress bar
2. If it is a progress bar, create the formula that defines the current amount, and also set the goal amount.
2. If it is a widget, select the campaign and elements required.
3. Edit the embed code generated as required, for example to change style (Only for CiviCRM user. Not for end-user, who embed the widget in their site.)
4. Preview the final item.
5. Publish it by copying and pasting the embed code onto a Web site, and also distributing the embed code to people who will embed it on their own Web sites.

We wish to contribute back this work and to be maintained further. What will be the preferred mode of development?
In CiviCRM extensions, we found native modules and CMS modules. We use CiviCRM with Drupal. Will it be better to implement it as a Drupal module which uses the CiviCRM api to get the required data or implement it as a native CiviCRM extension?

Hi Totten,

We decided to build the Widget Creation Interface as native CiviCRM extension since it is worth developing competencies in building extensions for CiviCRM and as you said there isn't any heavier crossover between our Civi code and another Drupal module, as we only deal with Civi data and UI.

Also, thanks a lot for your valuable suggestions.

Hey jagadees_zyxware,

Nice work - it would be great if you wanted to blog about this so bring your work to a wider audience - maybe include a couple of screen shots and a smaall tutorial to help people understand what you have done.  You might also think about including that in the extension documentation (or copying it from the documentation if it exists already).

Cheers,
Michael

The civiwci extension is updated with various bug fixes and feature additions. A blog post regarding this is published at http://www.zyxware.com/articles/4506/zyxware-contributes-civicrm-extension-for-free-software-foundation-fsf-membership-campaign
The extension is currently used by FSF for their annual fundraiser campaign. You can see the progress bar widget at https://my.fsf.org/donate and http://fsf.org

Thanks for pointing out the mistake. Corrected and tweeted. Please feel free to cross post the article on CiviCRM blog. Thanks for the support and guidance. We want more people review the code and help us improve the extension.

Thanks,