There are many reasons we love to work with clients like Dell, Inc., not the least of which is that they genuinely want to engage and listen to their brand community. It is not unusual for Dell, Inc. to launch an application like IdeaStorm to take suggestions directly from the mouths of their community members, and then make changes to their company and products based on those suggestions. The next in the lineup of community applications is Community Pulse.

Community Pulse allows anyone to submit their thoughts on Dell’s products and business. Users don’t have to register. Each post is completely anonymous, making the process as simple as possible.

For this application, 160 topics were defined to encourage discussion among users. A user can make a post by choosing one of these topics and then submitting a compliment, comment, or complaint about the topic. The topic cloud on the site then displays each topic based on its general tone (the closer to the top of the page, the more compliments), the amount of people talking about it (the bigger the font, the more posts), and how recently its been discussed (the closer to the left of the page, the more recent the last post), allowing the user (and Dell, Inc.) to view a multidimensional graphic display of what people are saying.

We also built a Google Gadget that displays the topic cloud and latest posts, and allows users to see the tone over time (the pulse) of any topic.

Community Pulse is still in Beta, so feel free to go check it out and tell us what you think by making a post on the site under the “Community Pulse” topic!

The Productivity Suite is an application that was developed within our labs here at RD2. Productivity as it applies in our lives and in our work life has become more and more important, and the Productivity Suite is our attempt at finding a better way for people to become productive in their lives. The application centers around user-submitted blog posts, and also adds a collaborative element where users can submit kudos or offenses of their fellow teammates to encourage productive behavior. If you want to know more read our launch post.

When we started floating ideas around the office for the Productivity Suite there were quite a few people who were hesitant. As the application came together we realized that without a rule set, or some guiding principle that was easy to understand, the experience would be crippled by apprehension. As there will be many people submitting blog posts, and sending each other kudos and offenses, we wanted to be sure that these things were done in the most constructive way possible.

We decided to create a few simple rules that would allow people to get a better understanding of not just the functionality, but how the application was envisioned to be used. The content and atmosphere was key for this application to function, so by adding some helpful content we hope users will feel more comfortable using the site. These rules are located on the Productivity Suite site and are accompanied by helpful screencasts. I thought I should post them here for those interested.

If you have any suggestions for other parts of the site you feel need more explanation, let me know and I will create additional screencasts. Thanks, and enjoy!

Rules of the Productivity Suite:

1. Help spread knowledge
Help spread knowledge by making informative and interesting blog posts that deal with productivity

2. Support your team
Support your team by recognizing their efforts and good habits by giving them compliments (Kudos)

3. Discourage bad habits
Don’t let your friends and peers at work get away with bad habits. Help remind them of their mistakes by submitting an offense

4. Be balanced
If you think you can get away with only submitting offenses, beware. Helping people learn from their mistakes and complimenting others on their hard work is even more important. Keep a balance between offenses and kudos or your points might mysteriously reduce.

5. Don’t be a jerk
It’s a game but don’t abuse the system. Before you post a snarky article, write a sarcastic comment or give someone a ridiculous kudo / offense, ask yourself… is this good for the company?

RD2 recently worked with StoneGate Senior Care on a content management solution requiring many websites to be deployed within one master website. The challenge, all of them need to have autonomy while using the same system for publishing and maintaining content.

We’ve done this sort of thing before, but for very large companies, developing within “enterprise-class software” rather than leveraging the power of open source. StoneGate wanted to be able to scale beyond 50 websites with one content publishing system. Drupal is a perfect fit – except for one important thing – There was no available mechanism for deploying multiple sites within one system that is managed and maintained from one central source. So, we built one…

Now, StoneGate Senior Care is creating new websites quickly and easily using one system with “single sign-on.” New facility websites will be a popular thing for StoneGate. We received accolades from StoneGate’s marketing communications manager and the VP of StoneGate’s development arm for how easy it is to deploy and manage these websites.

Very soon we (StoneGate Senior Care and RD2, inc.) will be giving back to the Drupal community by making our Multi-Site Management module available for use with any Drupal 5.6 and 5.7 website. We’ve seen some great things happening in this community and very soon we can share more…

Today we are releasing a series of screencasts that introduce the Villages of Jackson Creek web site and the Multi-Site management module. We will be adding more screencasts each week to showcase the many features of Drupal that were implemented and customized for StoneGate.
Many thanks to StoneGate Senior Care for their support and many thanks to Ryan at Slant for a great user interface to make this come together.

With no further ado:

• Villages of Jackson Creek Tour
• Drupal Dashboard
• Introducing Multi-Site Management
• Single Site Setup
• Website Creation

What a beautiful sight to behold. Why, you ask? Well naturally due to the prospect that the new iPhone will be added to the store today.

The Apple World Wide Developers Conference begins in about 10 minutes (12 CST). Hopefully Mr. Jobsy will have lots of cool new Apple devices to talk about, most importantly the 3G iPhone.

Head over to Engadget for live updates. I would take on this task but I have another job I must attend to. After all the news breaks be sure to come back and let us know what you thought of the keynote and if the 3G iPhone will have an impact on the way websites are designed for mobile devices.

Monday productivity is sure to drop for the next couple hours.

- Eric
- Out

Maybe you’ve heard that Apple is making some sort of announcement today. Rumor suggests (and I sincerely hope) the announcement will be about the iPod line.

Currently the Apple store is down, which makes me think new product is going up (and we will know what that product is very soon).

The thing I love about Apple is that more often than not when new product is announced, I can go to the Apple store and buy it same day. That means that after a long day of hard work at RD2, my run tonight might be extra gratifying as I listen to The New Pornographers, Deerhoof, and The Go! Team on the latest portable music device.

Music is something that has always been a huge part of my life. One of the first memories I have is of my Dad picking me up from kindergarten after he was called due to my haphazardness involving the sharp corner of a table, and the introduction it had with my chin. You learn at a young age never to run with scissors, but I was never told not to run and jump towards tables. What this has to do with my early love of music is that I can distinctly remember the entire drive to the hospital, my dad horribly singing along to The Rolling Stones song, Satisfaction. I absolutely fell in love with classic rock from a young age, always interested in my Dad’s vast knowledge about the bands and the stories he would tell me of concerts he had been a part of.

I was lucky that my parents let me go to shows from an early age and this routine of seeing bands live has never stopped. My latest experience at the Cat Power show at the Granada will give an explanation as to why. Cat Power aka Chan Marshall, pronounced “shawn,” is a folk and blues inspired singer-songwriter. I had bought my tickets to the show a couple months in advance and when I arrived I was awe struck by the amount of people that had come to see her. I know her music is magnificent, that unique almost ethereal voice, low and raspy at times, struck me from my first listen, but to see this? The unique emotion emanating from everyone was unique and incredible. I could make out certain conversations among the clamoring crowd that gave me hints as to what I was about to experience. “Nothing else like it,” “Just wait, you are going to be blown away,” “She is so beautiful” to name a few. I waited with bated breath, the opening act a torturous delay of “satisfaction.”

When she made her way onto the stage the crowd ignited, no time was wasted as she immediately went into her first song. What I noticed from the start was her absolute happiness at being up there. Many bands have amazing showmanship, but there was something different about Chan, in her eyes you could clearly tell she was happy to be up there singing and performing, she was enjoying herself. The songs evolved from the static state they previously held on the records and became so much more. She pranced around, dancing and floating across the stage, the crowd smiled and laughed at times from her antics, focused intently on the free spirit in front of them. Before I knew what was happening, I heard a certain set of unforgettable blues chords kick in. Her voice low and dramatic she let out the first words to the song, “I can’t get no, satisfaction.” Boyhood memories of listening to Mick Jagger sing those famous words all came at me, her rendition scarily close to overturning the originals place in my mind. Shivers went down my spine at the beauty of the whole experience and when the show came to a close I couldn’t have been more satisfied. She explained that she was actually recording a live album there tonight, and due to her well documented perfectionist behavior wanted to replay a number of songs till she got them right. I was not surprised at all when I noticed nearly everyone stayed put to watch and listen again.

These experiences deserve to be passed down, so if you ever see Cat Power show up in your area, go!