Introduction
Time Bank is a web service for managing a time bank, in which users offer their time doing service in exchange for services provided by others users for the same amount of time.
You can see a demo of timebank here: http://timebank.wadobo.com The project page is http://wadobo.com/trac/timebank/
Dependencies
- Python 2.x >= 2.5
- python-virtualenv
- Has only been tested in Linux so far
Other dependencies can be installed with virtualenv.
First installation
Here we will detail the most simple way to get the application running. For a more detailed explanation about how to deploy a django, refer to: http://docs.djangoproject.com/en/1.2/topics/install/
First thing we need is installing the dependencies in virtualenv:
$ ./setup_env.sh
$ Now everytime we want to use the installed virtualenv, we can do the following within the directory containing the env/ subdirectory:
$ source env/bin/activate
After that, we need to configure the database (we use sqlite by default):
$ ./manage.py syncdb --noinput
Then create the admin user in the database:
$ ./manage.py loaddata admin-user.json
That's it! Start the webserver with:
$ ./manage.py runserver
Now you'll be able to enter to your own timebank in http://localhost:8000
Of course this is a very simple and local installation. We recomend using a web server like cherokee, lighthttpd or apache configure to use fast-cgi and django, and a more powerful database like postgresql. Django documentation explains how to do that: http://docs.djangoproject.com/en/1.2/topics/install/
Send email updates
If you want users to receive email reminders about unread messages or pending transfers, you should add a cron task that visits every day the following url: http:///tasks/send_email_updates/ .
This can be done adding a timebank.sh script to /etc/cron.daily/ with execution permissions as the following:
#!/bin/bash
wget http://<tuservidor>/tasks/send_email_updates/ -O /dev/null
Translations
Timebank has internationalization support and is translated to multiple languages. In order to make these translations available in your installation, you need to compile the translation (.po) files:
$ ./manage.py compilemessages
Settings configuration
The settings.py file contains the default configuration for the project. You shouldn't modify it; any settings configuration you need should be added to the local_settings.py file.
Most of the variables in settings are self-explanatory and are documented in django: http://docs.djangoproject.com/en/1.2/ref/settings/ Notably some new setting var that we have added is OWNERS, which contains a list of emails addresses similar to MANAGERS and ADMINS. Emails about non-error events happening in your timebank will be sent to OWNERS: a new user has been registered and is awaiting approval, for example.
This is useful to separate those who maintain the server and do application development, the tech people (MANAGERS, ADMINS) and those in charge of the time bank doing administration tasks at the user-level (OWNERS).
There are some more settings non standard in django in the settings.py file, quite self explanatory, but you can ask us if you need help with them. See Contact seccion for that.
Contribute
We would be happy to consider any additions or bugfixes that you would like to add to the project. Please send them to us.
If you find a bug or would like to request a feature you may do so at the issue tracker for this project:
http://wadobo.com/trac/timebank/newticket
Note that you don't need to be a developer to be able to contribute to timebank: You can also help us adding or maintaining translations, testing the releases or improving the wiki. Don't hesitate to contact with us if you want to help, your collaboration will be much appreciated.
Contact
Should you have any doubt or problem please contact us sending an email to timebank-users@wadobo.com which is the development mailing list of the project.