Events Calendar (music calendar)

Development of a truly worthwhile application arises from needs of an organization and the resources available.

The WBGO Events Calendar (also known as the music calendar) was comprised of a list that the Marketing Manager would update a couple of times a month. It turns out that all he was doing was emailing a list generated by an Access database to the Web person. The actual work was being done by the Events Coordinator.

When I took over the Website and had the Web Server in-house I was working a lot with ASP. So I made a page that connects directly to the Access Database and pulls up the data for the day. I even made a little calendar that lets people look ahead at the events.

After this was done, however, this section was destined to become very popular – as it is one of the only Jazz and Blues listing in the NY/NJ metro area. This meant that the updates to this listing now needed to be consistent and timely. Once a week, I would replace the server database which added the new content to the calendar. While the process was great, it still taxed the Events Coordinator over one entire day to update all the requests that came to her. A more efficient process could not be in place at the time.

Over the years WBGO established a great relationship with NJ.com who even helped WBGO stream online in the beginning. Years after this process was established, I came to know of siLive.com – owned by the same parent company – who was compiling similar lists for a much broader spectrum of events. I was able to establish a relationship and a possible partnership where our Events Coordinator would be the final authority on what goes up in the ‘Jazz and Blues’ listing (WBGO had more listings than silive.com at the time).

The biggest hurdle, by far, was the integration of their data with WBGO.org’s website. I had to learn the use of variables within their custom application, modify the SQL and create custom templates in addition to creating integration components using AJAX and PHP on WBGO.org.

To further enhance the experience, I created a Google Maps integration for the venues and another for listing all the events from a single venue.

A couple of weeks back I was thanked personally by the Events Coordinator for helping free up her time to do the other things that she enjoys doing.