After two and a half years of using our development code name of “Falcon,” our new product has been given its real name.

 MissionConnect^TM

MissionConnect was submitted by Skip Strickland in our “Name This Software” contest. Skip is the Director of Mission and Ministry in the Rocky Mountain Conference of The United Methodist Church. Thank you, Skip, for your excellent submission; a $25 Starbucks card is on its way! And thanks to everyone else who submitted a suggestion. We loved reading them.

When I spoke with Skip about his submission, I learned that his choice was influenced by the Latin term “Missio Dei,” which means “sending of God” or “sent by God,” and is being used within some circles of the church today.

We believe “MissionConnect” reflects “Missio Dei,” while projecting its own meaning for our software. Here are some of our thoughts.

 Mission - a sending, or a dispatching. Often used within the church to reflect the sending of people to do the work of God.

 Connect - to join, or to bind. Being connected to each other and to the organization of the church enables God’s people to achieve more than they could each achieve individually.

We think of the many ministries operating within the concept of Missio Dei because of the Church; from local food banks, thrift stores and job fairs to the sending of missionaries and work teams all over the world. None of this could happen without God’s people being connected. Within The United Methodist Church this has frequently been referred to as “the connection.”

We of GSS will miss the name “Falcon.” We had grown fond of it, and a number of you had too, judging from the number of people who responded to our contest with “I like the name “Falcon.” But it was never a permanent name and it doesn’t describe our product, and so it will soon be relegated to the internals of our program code and database schema where it will likely live on for a good long while.

An old African Proverb says, “If you want to walk fast, walk alone. If you want to walk far, walk together.”

It is our hope, our dream, and our goal that MissionConnect will help our customers connect the people of God to each other and to the Church, so they can walk together in order to accomplish God’s mission.

Al

We have just uploaded the latest beta version of Falcon: Center! to our distribution website. It contains the long awaited Charges & Appointments function, as well as the Compensation form. You may download Falcon: Center! at http://TryGSS.com.

We invite you to help us Name This Software in a separate blog post here.

This version of Center! is our release candidate for the first live release and replacement of the MissionBase core product to a customer. We know it may receive a little more tweaking, in terms of bug fixes and usability, as some of you continue to put it through the paces. And we hope you do just that (see “Bug Us For Some Coffee” in the sidebar). But in terms of functionality, Center! now contains what we intended for its first live release and a good bit more. Here is the scoop on this release.

Center! now is comprised of all the database management functionality contained in a basic MissionBase installation (without additional modules).

Three other apps (”applications,” or programs) will be packaged with the first live release of Center, comprising a software suite to replace the MissionBase basic system. These will be:

Main
A login/security module that will validate users and launch the other apps.

Communicate!
A replacement for the MissionBase “Labels & Lists” function. Communicate will not only offer mailing labels and exports, but also mass emailing of communications and combination output of both mass email and labels for those people for whom you don’t have email addresses in your database.

Report!
A reporting app that will be the launcher for most of the reports that will be available from the database.

Other apps will be developed to do the functions currently contained in the MissionBase add-on modules. The first two targeted for release will replace the Cabinet and Event Registration modules. Center will feed data back into the MissionBase database to enable these functions to continue to operate within MissionBase, while the core functions of database management will be done in Center!.