Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: What data system CRM are you using? (Yochai Gal)

[Cindy Harris (cah329a]

Rachel Carson EcoVillage has spent the last few months evaluating Mosaic
and Gather. We didn't perceive much difference in functionality, but there
is a distinct difference in usability. We have two visually impaired
members, and testing Mosaic was so frustrating that it drove one of them to
tears. Gather, on the other hand, was mostly accessible to a screen reading
app. Our visually impaired member went through Gather with a fine-toothed
comb and made a list of accessibility challenges that needed to be
addressed, and the developer has been very helpful on that front. This
makes sense, since designing for accessibility actually makes things easier
for every user.

Six weeks ago we invited everyone in the community to get in and play with
our Gather demo instance, and we used Zoom breakout rooms to do small-group
demos during a members meeting. The feedback was great, so we are moving
forward to get final approval to set up a live instance so that we can
start customizing with real data and preferences for calendars, meals,
rooms, Google Drive access (for minutes and other documents), and (of
course) personal info, and be ready to roll when we move in next fall. We
haven't yet quite figured out how to deal with financial transactions, and
we expect to have to add access to "outside" applications for things like
car sharing and perhaps inventory. But, by and large, it looks pretty good.

Gather is not perfect (its user interface is ok, but could be a bit more
intuitive), and it won't do everything we need. But it does have a good
interface to add additional applications as "tabs" on the user menu, so
we're going to give it a try.

Cindy Harris
Facilitator, RCE Platform Helping Group
Pittsburgh, PA
==============

> Date: Tue, 26 Nov 2024 12:46:52 -0500
> From: Yochai Gal <yochaigal [at] gmail.com>
> To: cohousing-l [at] cohousing.org
> Subject: Re: [C-L]_ What data system CRM are you using?
> Message-ID:
>         <CAFmGPcJ6Y2mwp2Kbj32EWd=_nt_xw9VRXyuj=j8x9V=
> xHxYaSg [at] mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
>
> Yael,
>
> Lots of folks on this list live in communities that use Gather
> <https://info.gather.coop/> and Mosaic <https://mosaicsoftware.org/>. Both
> are open source, both have free and hosted versions.
>
> On Tue, Nov 26, 2024 at 12:43?PM Yael Bat-Chava <yael.bat.chava [at] 
> gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > Hi all,
> >
> > Hudson Valley cohousing (in formation) is looking to start using a data
> > system for our contacts, events, etc. We know a lot of communities use
> > HubSpot, and we?re curious what other systems communities are using. What
> > pros and cons are you seeing?
> >
> > Thanks!
> >
> > Yael
>
>