Alternate speakers and Moderators

[billysundar]

Is there a plugin/feature that is available in OCS which will help plan for alternate speaker and allowing users registered for the conference to moderate sessions?

[jmacgreg]

Hi billysundar,

Nothing like that yet, I'm afraid.

Cheers,
James

[billysundar]

Jim,

Is there a plan in the works to support the alternate speakers and moderators for moderating the session? This will be a very good feature to have.



Billy.

[jmacgreg]

Hi Billy,

Not at the moment, no -- but if you want to flesh your idea out a bit more, I can either advise on some current possibilities, or add the idea as a feature request for future versions. Currently, OCS doesn't do much in terms of conference management while the conference itself is happening -- some thoughts to this effect would be welcome.

Cheers,
James

[billysundar]

Sorry, Did have a chance to post a reply back. We have installed OCS in our site and currently working on a single sign-on with Joomla to keep passwords in synch. Most of our conferences have alternate speakers identified in case one of our regular speakers is unable to make it. We found a work-around by creating a phantom track called alternate track and assigning speakers to the track.

The conference sessions are moderated either by another speaker or someone who is attending the conference. Once the programme schedule is published, it would be nice to have a feature which allows for speakers/other members attending to conference be able to volunteer to moderate a session. The moderator is responsible for making sure, the conference room is in order and introduce the speaker etc.

Another area, which would be of great help is to be able to create a personal calendar based on the schedule of events. This would allow for better management of room capacity and attendees to plan their conference sessions better.

We currently create a grid manually..e.g http:// www.idug.org/conference/CD/EU09/grid.html

Our goal is to be able to create this grid in a automated fashion from the OCS tables.

[jmacgreg]

Hi Billy,

You might want to see the following thread re: Joomla integration: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=4671, and possibly even contact Jamie to see how he's doing with Joomla integration.

Regarding the option to have users volunteer as session moderators: an interesting option, but one we likely won't add in the near future.

Regarding the personal calendar option: we responded to your request here viewtopic.php?f=13&t=4873 with a bug report; it's been deferred from 2.3, but may appear in the future.

Cheers,
James