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App for sacrament meeting program.

Posted: Tue May 14, 2013 10:10 pm
by melcox
[*]I'm not sure if this the right forum for suggestions, but maybe someone could forward this. I'm the meetinghouse librarian for our building, we have four wards meeting in our building. The greatest expense in library budget is paper, each Ward prints a Sacrament program and sometimes a weekly Relief Society program, why not develope an app for smart phones and tablets that would make these programs accessible, cut down on paper use.
Thanks, Mel Cox,Utah Jordan Willows Stake, Jordan Willows 3rd Ward, emel54@hotmail.com, 801-787-1624

Re: App for sacrament meeting program.

Posted: Tue May 14, 2013 11:58 pm
by jdlessley
The Announcements & Policies forum is not the correct forum. I moved it to the appropriate forum.

The forum is user-to-user support. We can discuss this but we do ot have any connections to make recommendations. Instead you can use the feedback link found on the LDS.org home page. This feedback link is also found on many other LDS.org pages but not all of them.

Re: App for sacrament meeting program.

Posted: Wed May 15, 2013 6:30 am
by Gary_Miller
It would seem that the developers would have much more important things to do than develop an app for the Sac Meeting Program.

Further more I don't think it would cut down on paper that much anyway.

Re: App for sacrament meeting program.

Posted: Wed May 15, 2013 9:31 am
by gregwanderson
My question is, how do you distribute the electronic version of these printouts? Are we talking about something that is automatically sent to LDS Tools or an app that is only dedicated to the Sacrament Meeting program/bulletin?

Here's what I would suggest (which can happen right now with tools currently available). The individuals who prepare the Sacrament and Relief Society programs for print-out could, as a final step, just make a PDF version in addition to a hard copy. Upload that PDF version to the Ward Newsletter tool at LDS.org. Pesto! Anyone from the ward can have access immediately on their computer, tablet, smart phone, etc.. Otherwise, make an email list for those who've expressed an interest and send a mass email with this PDF as an attachment.

It would take some effort to make people aware of this process and get them in the habit of accessing the electronic version of the print-out... but it might be easier than convincing people to put another app on their electronic device for this purpose.

Re: App for sacrament meeting program.

Posted: Wed May 15, 2013 10:10 am
by aebrown
mrrad wrote:It would take some effort to make people aware of this process and get them in the habit of accessing the electronic version of the print-out... but it might be easier than convincing people to put another app on their electronic device for this purpose.
That's certainly a great short-term suggestion. And you could also create a QR code for the link to the Newsletter article and display that QR code somewhere that people entering the sacrament meeting could see and quickly scan.

If you have a single Newsletter article that you simply update each week, then that QR code wouldn't have to change, and people could also simply bookmark that article on their mobile device's browser, which would provide another simple way to get to the weekly bulletin.

Re: App for sacrament meeting program.

Posted: Wed May 15, 2013 11:23 am
by Gary_Miller
All these suggestions would just clog up the network more than is already happening.

Re: App for sacrament meeting program.

Posted: Wed May 15, 2013 11:38 am
by gregwanderson
But we're saving paper (and the planet!) :)

Re: App for sacrament meeting program.

Posted: Wed May 15, 2013 12:06 pm
by aebrown
Gary_Miller wrote:All these suggestions would just clog up the network more than is already happening.
That might lead to different decision made in different units. Our network is not at all overtaxed, and so a few more hits on the Newsletter on LDS.org won't hurt. But I could see how in some buildings the impact of more people accessing LDS.org via the wireless network might cause a problem.

Re: App for sacrament meeting program.

Posted: Wed May 15, 2013 12:38 pm
by Mikerowaved
A simple PDF like that could be hosted on a local computer avoiding having to use the Internet to access it.

Re: App for sacrament meeting program.

Posted: Wed May 22, 2013 2:01 pm
by jasonfitt
Honestly, not many would look at it if it was available online, an app, or hosted on a local computer...at least not in our ward. Many don't have smart phones, or aren't as technically savvy as others. For tablet users, we also don't give out our password for our Wi-Fi network because it would slow it down considerably.

However, they could include something like that in the 'LDS Tools' app. It already has the calendar available. Since you can post your newsletters to LDS.org, they could add Sunday Programs, and add that to the app. I just don't know how many people would really view it to make a big difference in cutting down on paper.