This page will provide a definitive archive of efforts to interface ODB with other applications and services commonly used by nonprofits.

The 1.0 version of ODB provides several built-in integration methods already, however the power of these techniques will really depend on contributions from other consultants and nonprofits who wish to 'give back' to the ODB community.

For now, we are going to just provide a list of some of the goals and efforts now underway:

1) Integration of ODB with PHPlist or Constant Contact

Goal: to allow one-click subscription and unsubscription of an ODB contact from an email newsletter service.

Progress: a script to execute a subscription action was created and posted in the phplist forums; google search on "LCsub.php" to find it.

2) Integration of ODB with an email advocacy software program or service

Goal: to allow names from ODB to be uploaded to "seed" and action allert, and then allow additional names and contact information to be merged back into ODB (possibly reviewed by a human) after the alert is completed

Progress: early versions of ODB provided an import specification that worked with the initial version of the web site citizenspeak.org

3) Integration of ODB with Accounting Software

Goal: to enable ODB to export payment summary data from a batch of contributions into Quickbooks.

Progress: None thus far.

4) Enhancements of ODB related to facilitate importing of Enhanced data

Goal: to enable ODB to more easily import data from a list enhancement service

Progress: None thus far.

5) Improving the process of importing externally generated data

Goal: To provide plug-ins to ODB to enable the software to be used to download data from various online donation services or web signup services/forms.

Progress: The 1.0 version of ODB has a new function in the main menu, accessible by right-clicking on "Mass Action". The function, called "Get External Data", assumes that the machine containing ODB has been configured with a script that will load the external data into a particular location that is accessible to ODB. ODB will then copy that data to the server and call up the import screen to actually perform the import.

6) Improve ODB's XML capabilities

Goal: Once there are other services providing data to ODB in an XML form, ODB should have some import procedures to handle this.

Progress: We have already built copies of ODB that include the XML libraries; however it is likely that most of the work on the XML importing will wait for the next version of ODB.