Introducing CiviGoat: The World's First Open Source GRM

Published
2013-04-01 08:08
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Proper GRM tools can make all the difference in the success or failure of your herd. As many developers have found, working with a proprietary goat resource management system can seem simple in the beginning, but customizing it to your herd's specific needs can feel like eating brambles. With the new CiviCRM extensions framework and easily digestible API 3.0, developers can dig in and produce at an unprecedented rate.

CiviGoat Alpha, the world's preeminent GRM, has just launched onto the fertile open-source landscape. Let's get right to the questions.

What's a GRM?
That stands for Goat Resource Management.

Does it integrate with the equine and/or bovine retinal scanner I already use at my ranch?
Not yet, but community contributions are encouraged. Find us on IRC.

Does it scale well?
CiviGoat can manage goats of all sizes. It supports multiple herds, inheritance, questionable paternal relationships, and more.

Do goats need managing?
Herding cats is nothing compared to this. But with the right tools, productivity is bound to increase. With CiviGoat, you're now able to engage and track your goat constituency online. How do

I know if CiviGoat can manange my goats?
Each goat herd is different - some need more hoof holding than others. Please contact one of our expert training providers to help set up a training program for your goats. (Oats, hay, and old cardboard boxes not provided.)

Can I check it out?
We're previewing CiviGoat for today only at the demo site.

I've dreamed of finding a livestock management solution that will solve all my problems for free and is super easy to use for even the most onery ranch hand. Is that CiviGoat?
Definitely that could possibly be possible.

How does CiviGoat compare to other enterprise-class, proprietary livestock management solutions?
With open-source CiviGoat there are no licensing or software fees. CiviGoat is released under a public license, so it's supported by a community that actively develops and matains CiviGoat. Installation, configiuration, training, upgrades, bug-fixes, vaccinations, maintainance, and hay are not included.

Is there a mobile version?
We're working on that. CiviGoatMobile is in the early gamma stages of development, but the goats keep eating our phones.

I tried it and it doesn't work, what now?
Please reproduce the problem on the demo site and file an issue or better yet, patches welcome. (Not you Patches, down girl! Bad goat! No goats on the table!)

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Comments

Stoob, this is fantastic. Are you planning to open-source the code for this? I'd love to contribute where I can. For example, I have a client who's struggling to relate TCCPMPG (tin-cans-consumed-per-month-per-goat) with annual cheese yield. I'm sure they can be persuaded to contribute some resources in that direction.

We currently have a report that relates SCPYPG (socks-consumed-per-year-per-goat) that I think could be adapted to your needs, after you cross reference cheese production as a goat-reference-field.  The code is available publicly already, didn't you find it?  It's super easy, just fork-pull my SVN github patch matrix and download to your local, then run the 5 scripts included in the tarball and BAM! you're done, after you refresh your browser.  But watch those permissions!

... and wants her own DRM ASAP. However she's reluctant to open-source her kibble.

Stoob we have a requirement for tracking damage done by goats - for example - how many of the neighbour's trees have been ringbarked by the goats, laundry mastication damage and garden anilihation. Ideally this would need to integrate with CiviAccounts - any progress on this front? I may be able to get sponsorship for the feature from the neighbours of all the goat owners we deal with

Anonymous (not verified)
2013-04-01 - 23:46

 

Wow, word spreads quickly! A herd owner interested in using CiviGoat to manage his rare breed contacted us and wanted to know if CiviGoat has any plans to integrate with the Google Nose API. According to him Salesgoat.com recently announced that they will be aggressively marketing a tight mobile integration enabling Goat-to-Goat searches via Google Nose, still in beta, but I get a strong scent that they are onto something. The herd owner wanted to know if each unique goat-butt scent can be matched in CiviGoat against the Google Aromabase to tag each goat record for faster flock lookups and better goat base segmentation.
 
As a herd owner who was an early adopter and had seen greener days on the aging BlackGoat Raisers Hedge before it was eaten bare, he wanted to know if the CiviGoat project is a real thoroughbred solution compared to Red Goat GRM or Core GRM, which only allow technologies to interbreed amongst closely related technologies.

Does it work with Canadian goats? The goat tax applies even to the non-profit goat sector (NGO's). Also we spell goat differently - there's an extra "e" on the end that is both silent and invisible.

Really? I always thought you Canadians spelled goat the same as us but pronounced it "goot"?

Seriously? Manage Goat Constiuency Online? At first I thought this was real then I said no way, then I said maybe?!

For those that did not have time on April 1 to check out the demo, here are the screen prints. (Hopefully no actual goats or kids were harmed or their privacy violated without their full consent during testing.)