AlphaH4x0r: How to redesign a transactional government digital service without writing a line of code

[lippytak]

Here's how to apply for Free and Reduced Price School Meals in SF: https://schoolmealapp.sfusd.edu (see some images below). Try it out yourself (but don't submit) by logging in with username = test123123 and pass = test123. Every district in CA has their own janky online process, built FOR FREE by their existing food vendors as a value-added service. There are actually some pretty large consequences for these poor designs AND some new CA legislation trying to fix them, but that's for another time...at the end of the day this application process is like many others. It's the simplest transactional gov service (aka Gov Web Form).

AlphaH4x0r

• Build a nice landing page with Instapage
• Use Typeform to collect the required (what is??) data via a nice(er) and mobile-friendly web form
• Use Zapier webhook to send new Typeform entries through the Parsehub API with a JSON starting value
• Use Parsehub as the write API for the legacy app (it basically uses web driving). It's worth noting here that the CAPTCHA on https://schoolmealapp.sfusd.edu doesn't actually do anything...literally nothing!
• Send Typeform data to Intercom via Zapier
• Use Intercom for live chat support + custom automated emails
• Send Typeform data to Texrtit.in via Zapier webhook
• Use Textit.in for text message campaigns where useful
• Front for team SMS/email support throughout

Moving from alpha to actually-a-real-thing-in-the-real-world would look something like this:

• Use GovCloud instead of Typeform for data storage
• Build a custom application to offer a better UX
• Make all districts work through one app
• Handoff Front accounts to the gov staff that already do the processing/support
• Need a good backup process for failed submission (probably due to bad input data leading to Parsehub failures)
• Make it a sustainable business...EZ-PZ! How about $100k / year from CA DOE + $10k/district fixed setup + $10k-100k / district / year depending on size? Sounds good to me!

Anyone want to hack on this @alanjosephwilliams @tmaybe @daguar ? I'll bet we could have a working alpha in a day or 2-3 hack nights.

[tmaybe]

see also

[lippytak]

Since we'll need to embed the Typeform + Intercom chat widget into the landing page we're probably better off with a custom page we can host on GH pages.

Good open source landing page: http://ironsummitmedia.github.io/startbootstrap-landing-page/

By StartBootstrap: https://github.com/IronSummitMedia/startbootstrap

[alanjosephwilliams]

are we breaking the no-code principle with a landing page??

On Sat, Jan 9, 2016 at 2:05 PM, Jake Solomon [email protected]
wrote:

Since we'll need to embed the Typeform + Intercom chat widget into the
landing page we're probably better off with a custom page we can host on GH
pages.

Good open source landing page:
http://ironsummitmedia.github.io/startbootstrap-landing-page/

By StartBootstrap: https://github.com/IronSummitMedia/startbootstrap

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[lippytak]

We're definitely pushin it! Don't think we can get around setting up a static HTML page though and the builders are all way more complicated/don't support full screen iframes like we need for Typeform embeds.

[daguar]

You could avoid it if you're okay with the Typeform URL being exposed; live-chat also seems to be potentially less useful depending on who's "running" the thingy.

[daguar]

(I like abiding by the No Code™ principle, and DNS itself is even pushing it a tiny bit.)

[lippytak]

hrmmmmm! no live chat?!

[lippytak]

also if we have a couple static pages on GH then maybe it actually qualifies for the challenge thing :)?