CHALICE Plus

By

Yaffey Software

Development

435 Walhalla Road

Columbus, OH 43202

(614) 268-6353

Introduction

CHALICE Plus is a congregation management program that has the following features:

l Runs under Microsoft Windows™ (starting with Windows 95).

l Easy-to-use, modern Windows interface.

l Keeps track of congregation members, friends, visitors, children, and others on a household basis.

Households can have one or two adults with any combination of last names.

A child can be entered in more than one household.

There is a free-form, searchable notes area with virtually unlimited space.

l Prints mailing labels or listings for various categories of persons (members, friends, committee members, children, etc.).

l Prints newsletter mailing labels.

l Prints a directory of members (other categories such as friends may be included). Children are listed with their parents. If a household has two persons with different last names, the persons are listed under both names. Example:

Jones, John and Smith, Mary.

...

...

Smith, Mary and Jones, John.

l Prints a telephone listing of members and other categories.

l Prints a monthly report of new members joined, visitors, member name, address and phone number changes, etc.

l Displays statistics on demand (such as the number of members).

l Tracks pledges and payments to a virtually unlimited number of user-defined "funds" (Operating, Building, Music, etc.). Payments may be "batched" and entered by an “envelope number” for quick entry.

l Prints fund statements for all participants or just one household for one fund or for all funds. Statements may be printed for late payers, on-time payers, or for everyone. Households may elect to NOT receive a statement if they wish. Statements can be printed for any range of dates. Statements can include the sum of payments or a detailed list of payments.

l Prints a pledge status report.

l Prints a pledge comparison report.

l Prints a list of voting members.

l Prints receipts for donations of $250 or more.

l Provides both adult and child religious education class registration and tracking. Detailed information is kept for each child (allergies, siblings, parents, etc.)

l Stores committee and organization information and allows printing of lists and labels. Stores names of persons interested in joining a committee.

l Stores information on skills and occupations and allows printing of lists and labels.

l Allows exporting of information to a word processor.

l Records visitation information.

l Built-in Help facility.

l Multiple multi-level password protection

l Multi-user, network ready.

Program Background

Why CHALICE Plus ?

I developed CHALICE Plus for the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Columbus when it became clear that there were many different sets of out-of-sync data scattered around various members’ PCs. There were mailing labels stored in a word processor, pledging data in a spreadsheet, committee information in a text file, etc. None of the management systems that were currently available seemed to fit the bill.

CHALICE Plus has been in use for many years and has passed the “office administrator test”!

Development Platform

The development platform for CHALICE Plus is Microsoft Visual Foxpro™, an excellent tool.

Availability and Pricing

CHALICE Plus is now available for a one-time charge of $1 per member. The definition of a member is left up to the buyer.

Personal Background

I left AT&T Bell Laboratories (now called Lucent) in 1989 and have been an independent software developer since then. I have a BS degree in Computer Science from Ohio State University. I have developed many complex software systems for businesses in the Columbus area and references are available upon request. When I’m not developing software, I play banjo and bass with various old-time and bluegrass bands, and teach banjo, bass and guitar. My web page: http://home.columbus.rr.com/cyaffey.

Installation

1. Place the CD in the CD reader.

2. The setup program should start automatically. If it does not, open the My Computer icon on your desktop, open the CD (often drive D:), and double-click on the Setup application.

3. Follow the prompts in the setup program. Note that you can simply press your return key at each prompt.

Running the Program

IMPORTANT NOTES:

1. You must be a fairly competent Windows user.

2. Your monitor resolution setting must be 800 X 600 or better.

3. Make sure the task bar is NOT set to “always on top”.

After running the setup program from the CD, you can run the program by clicking START, PROGRAMS, CHALICE, chalice.exe. The password is initially set to 123456 and can be easily changed (see Passwords).

Once the program starts, press F1 to read the HELP documentation (see Online Help).

ALWAYS BACK UP YOUR DATA!!!!!!!!!!!!! See Data Backup.

Households

CHALICE Plus groups adults and children into "households". This works much like an actual house with people in it. It is a two-step process. First, you build the house. Then, the people move in. In CHALICE Plus, you first create a household record, and then you add adult and child records to it.

Adding a Household

Click the ADD button at the very bottom of the household form. Put in all relevant information under the HOUSEHOLD INFORMATION title (see “Fields” below). Be sure to fill in a 'Mailing Label Name'. Skip the 'billing statement name' for now (see Pledging). If the Newsletter checkbox is checked, the household will appear on a newsletter label (see Adding an Adult). If the Directory checkbox is checked, the household will appear in the directory (see Directory and Adding an Adult).

When you're satisfied with the entry, click SAVE. If you decide not to enter the household, click UNDO instead of SAVE.

Note that the cursor skips to the zip code field after you tab past the address fields. This is a “feature” – not a “bug”! When you type in a previously entered zip code, the city and state will automatically be entered for you.

After entering a household, you may then enter adults and children (see Adding an Adult and Adding a Child). Note that you should ALWAYS enter at least one adult record in every household to enable easy searching – even if the household record is for a church or organization.

Editing a Household

To edit a household’s information, click EDIT. After making changes, click SAVE. To void changes, click UNDO instead of SAVE.

If the household contains a member, and if you’ve changed a telephone number, name, or address, when you click SAVE you will see a message asking you whether you want the changed information to appear in the monthly report (see Reports). You would usually “Put Change in Monthly Report”. However, if the change is minor, changing RD to ROAD for instance, select “Do NOT Put Change in Monthly Report.” Note that you can disable this feature in the General Information form under the Maintenance menu.

Removing a Household

To remove a household and all information associated with it (adult records, child records, pledging information, etc.) click on DELETE. Do this with extreme caution!!! In general, it’s best to NOT delete households containing members or former members. If a member has resigned or moved, change their TYPE field instead of deleting the household (see Adding an Adult and Editing an Adult).

Fields

Here is a description of the fields in the Household Information section of the Household form. Mandatory fields are bolded.

• MAILING LABEL NAME – the name(s) as they will appear on newsletter and directory mailing labels.
• ADDRESS 1 – Household address.
• ADDRESS 2 – Household address (optional).
• CITY – Household city
• STATE – Household state
• ZIP – Household zip code. Note that once you enter a particular zip code, the city and state that you enter will be saved. The next time you enter a new household and enter this zip code, the saved city and state will be filled in automatically.
• COUNTY – Household county (optional)
• NOTES – Free form household notes.
• BILLING STATEMENT NAME – The name that will appear on billing statements if a person in the household is pledging separately (See Pledging).
• NEWSLETTER – checked if the household should receive the newsletter. When newsletter labels are printed, a label will be generated with this household’s mailing label name. If you add a MEMBER to the household, this will be automatically checked.
• DIRECTORY – checked if the persons in this household should be listed in the directory (see Directory). When directory labels are printed, a label will be generated with this household’s mailing label name. If you add a MEMBER to the household, this will be automatically checked.
• DATE CHANGED – the date a change was made to the household record (automatically updated).
• DATE ENTERED – the date that the household record was created (automatically entered).
• AUXILIARY FIELDS – Three text fields that can be used for additional data. The captions for these fields may be set from the Auxiliary Field Captions form under the maintenance menu.

Adults

Adding an Adult

Adults are added in the upper left area of the form marked “Adults in Household”. Click the ADD button underneath the grid that's in that area. Enter all relevant information in the “Person” form that appears (see “Fields” below). IMPORTANT: be SURE to enter both a first and last name and a 'Type'. Note that you may add additional types to select from (see Add/Edit/View Types under the maintenance menu). Click SAVE on this form. Repeat this step if there is another adult in the household (maximum of two adults allowed). If you add an adult with a type of MEMBER, the Newsletter and Directory check boxes will be automatically checked.

Editing an Adult

To edit an adult’s information, click the VIEW/EDIT button underneath the grid in the “Adults in Household” area. This will bring up the “Person” form. After making changes, click SAVE. To void changes, click UNDO instead of SAVE.

If the adult is a member, and if you’ve changed a telephone number, name or type, when you click SAVE you will see a message asking you whether you want the changed information to appear in the monthly report (see Reports). You would usually “Put Change in Monthly Report”. However, if the change is minor, select “Do NOT Put Change in Monthly Report.” Note that you can disable this feature in the General Information form under the Maintenance menu.

Removing an Adult

To remove an adult and all information associated with him or her, click on the delete button underneath the grid in the “Adults in Household” area. Do this with extreme caution!!! In general, it is best to NOT delete adult members or former members. If a member has resigned or moved, change their TYPE field instead of deleting their record.

Fields

Here is a description of each field of the “Person” form. You should ALWAYS at least enter a name and a TYPE. Mandatory fields are bolded.

• FIRST – First name and middle initial of the adult.
• LAST – Last name of the adult.
• TYPE – Adult’s type (MEMBER, FRIEND, VISITOR, etc.). This field should ALWAYS be entered.
• HOME PHONE – Home phone number.
• WORK PHONE – Work phone number.
• CELL PHONE – mobile phone number.
• JOB – Adult’s job.
• EMAIL – email address (see Email).
• ORIGINAL JOIN DATE – optional date for recording a previous join date (rarely used).
• JOIN DATE – Date the adult joined.
• DATE OF BIRTH – birth date.
• DATE ENTERED – Date that the adult record was first created (automatically entered).
• DATE CHANGED – Date that the adult record was changed (automatically entered).
• DATE TYPE CHANGED – Date that the TYPE field was changed (automatically entered).
• NOTES – Free form notes for this adult.
• VISIT NOTES – Notes that may be entered after a visit.
• LAST VISIT – Date the adult was last visited.
• NEXT VISIT – Date the adult will be visited.

• AUXILIARY DATE FIELDS - Four date fields that can be used for additional data. The captions for these fields may be set from the Auxiliary Field Captions form under the maintenance menu.
• AUXILIARY TEXT FIELDS - Six text fields that can be used for additional data. The captions for these fields may be set from the Auxiliary Field Captions form under the maintenance menu.

Children

A child may be added to multiple households. If the parents have divorced and are listed in separate households, a child may be attached to both household records.

Adding a Child

To add a child to a household, click on the ADD button underneath the grid that's in the CHILDREN area in the upper right area of the form. Enter all relevant information in the “Child” form that appears (see “Fields” below). The last name and all address information from the household form will automatically be entered and may be overwritten. Be sure to enter both a first and last name! If the child has already been added to a household, their existing record will be added at this point (a new record will not be created). If this is the case, it is IMPORTANT to enter the child’s name EXACTLY as it is in the former record. Click SAVE on this form. To void the addition, click UNDO instead of SAVE. Repeat this step for other children in the household. Note that a child MUST be entered here prior to registering them for religious education (see Religious Education).

Editing a Child

To edit a child’s information, click the VIEW/EDIT button underneath the grid in the “Children” area. This will bring up the “Child” form. After making changes, click SAVE. To void changes, click UNDO instead of SAVE.

Removing a Child

To remove a child, click on the delete button underneath the grid in the “Children” area. If the child is associated with another household, the child’s record will remain with that other household after deletion.

Fields

Here is a description of each field of the “Child” form. Mandatory fields are bolded.

• FIRST – First name of the child.
• LAST – Last name of the child.
• ADDRESS 1 - Household address.
• ADDRESS 2 – Household address.
• CITY – Household city.
• STATE – Household state.
• ZIP – Household zip code.
• PHONE – Home phone number of an adult in the household.
• NICKNAME – Child’s nickname.
• SIBLINGS – Child’s siblings’ name(s).
• BIRTHDATE – Child’s birth date.
• ALLERGY – List of allergies the child may have.
• NOTES – Free form notes.
  
  

Committees

Adults may be added to multiple committees or interest in multiple committees may be indicated.

A list of committees must first be entered using the “Add/Edit/View Committees” form under the maintenance menu.

To add or delete an adult from committees, click on the “COMMITTEES/GROUPS” button underneath the grid in the “Adults in Household” area. A form will appear that will allow you to choose committees that the adult is a member of or interested in joining. To assign the person to a committee, click on the committee name in the left-hand “Available” area and then click on the > button. Or, you can simply double-click on the committee name. The selected name will appear in the “Current” area in upper case.

If you check the “interested in joining” checkbox first, the selected committee will appear in the “Current” area in lower case.

To remove an adult from a committee, select the name from the “Current” area and then click on the < button. Or, simply double-click on the committee name.

Note that you may create a new committee while assigning the adult to existing committees. To do this, click on “Create New Available Committee”.

Interests

Adults may be added to multiple skills/interests.

A list of skills/interests must first be entered using the “Add/Edit/View Skills” form under the maintenance menu.

To add or delete an adult from a skill/interest, click on the “SKILLS/INTERESTS” button underneath the grid in the “Adults in Household” area. A form will appear that will allow you to choose skills/interests that the adult has. To assign the person to a skill/interest, click on the name in the left-hand “Available” area and then click on the > button. Or, you can simply double-click on the name. The selected name will appear in the “Current” area.

To remove an adult from a skill/interest, select the name from the “Current” area and then click on the < button. Or, simply double-click on the name.

Searching

There are many ways to search for a household, an adult, or a child.

A household record may be searched for by clicking on the “Mailing Label Search” button, the “Address Search” button, or the “Billing Statement Name Search” button. For all of these, any part of the thing being searched for may be entered. For instance, entering “road” in the address search will bring up a list of all addresses with “road” in them. The search is NOT case-sensitive.

An adult may be searched for by clicking on the “search by last” or “search by first” buttons in the “Adults in Household” area. Similarly, a child may be searched for by clicking on “search by last” or “search by first” buttons in the “Children” area.

Mailing Labels

Mailing labels may be generated for individual adults or for households. Individual labels show only one person on the label instead of all adults in the household. All are printed using forms under the “General Reports/Listings/Labels” menu item.

Individual Labels

Persons By Criteria

The “Persons By Criteria” form allows very flexible printing of labels (or listings) for individuals. You may select from any of the following criteria:

1. Type.
2. Various dates (date entered, date changed, date type changed, joined date, or birthdate).
3. Whether or not they get the newsletter.
4. Whether or not they appear in the directory
5. State.
6. zip code.
7. Contents of “person” notes.

Selected Persons

Labels may be generated for specific persons by placing an “X” next to their name in a list.

Members By Zipcode

A set of labels (or a listing) of members in a particular zip code may be generated.

Committee Membership

A set of labels (or a listing) of persons on a committee or committees may be generated.

Skills

A set of labels (or a listing) of persons having skills/interests may be generated.

Household Labels

Labels that include all adults in a household may be generated using the “Newsletter/Directory” form. The name on the label will come from the “Mailing Label Name” field of the household form; i.e., John and Mary Smith. You may restrict the labels to households with certain text in the household notes. If you select Newsletter, you will get all households that receive the newsletter. If you select Directory, you will get only those households that are included in the directory. This will usually be members and friends.

Directory

A directory of adults (and children) may be printed. Choose “Directory 1” or “Directory 2” under the “General Reports/Listings/Labels” menu item. (Directory 2 is a newer version that will include up to 5 adults in a household and has a cleaner layout. It also has a 12-point font option.) You may choose to include all households with the “Directory” checkbox checked, members only, or members plus one or more other types (such as Friend, associate member, etc.). You may optionally include email addresses, work phone numbers, or joined date. The directory may be printed with 8 or 10-point type (12-point with Directory 2). It may also be printed to an ASCII text file, which could then be reformatted if desired. If the adults in a household have different last names, they will each appear with the other in their respective alphabetical places.

Reports, Listings, Statements

1. Most of the forms that print labels can also print a listing (see Mailing Labels).
2. Financial reports and statements (see Pledging).
3. Room schedules (see Room Schudling).
4. Directory (see Directory).
5. RE listings (see Religious Education)
6. Telephone list. Select “Telephone Numbers” from the General reports/Listings/Labels menu. Numbers may be printed or exported to a text file for any type or all types of adults.
7. World Magazine. A listing of member information required by the World Magazine for updating their circulation information.

Exporting Information

Data may be exported from many forms in a common format. The format will be comma-separated, quoted fields suitable for importing into word processors for mail merge, spreadsheets, or other databases. Example:

“John”,”Smith”,”123 High Street”,”Columbus”,”OH”,”43215”

You may use the default text file for the exported data or enter a file name of your choice. The name you enter must end with a .txt extension. If you leave off a folder prefix (such as c:\tmp) the file will be found under c:\chalceiplus.

Pledging

CHALICE Plus provides a full-featured module for handling all aspects of pledging.

Funds

An unlimited number of funds may be created. This is done via the Fund Maintenance form under the financial menu item.

To enter a new fund, click on the “ADD” button and then enter the appropriate fields. Mandatory fields are bolded.

1. NAME of the fund.
2. GOAL amount.
3. CHAIRPERSON.
4. TOTAL AMOUNT DESIRED.
5. START and END dates.
6. NAME of the corresponding fund for previous year (mandatory if there was one).
7. NOTES (optional).

Pledges

Adding a pledge

NOTE: you must create at least one fund before you can enter pledges.

To enter a pledge, open the form “Pledges/Payments” from the financial menu.

1. Select the household by searching for an adult in the household by clicking on “search by last” or “search by first”.
2. Select the fund by clicking on “Select fund to work with”.
3. Click the ADD button near the bottom of the form.
4. Enter the amount pledged.
5. OPTIONALLY enter the date pledged, payment method, credit card number, expiration date, and “when paying”. These fields will be quite helpful when managing funding, but are not required.

If you enter a credit card as the payment method, be sure to enter the credit card number and expiration date. There is a built-in card number checker that will display a message if the number is invalid. The expiration date field is free form.

Some households do not want to receive statements. Check the “do not send statement” box to implement this.

Deleting a pledge

A pledge may be deleted by clicking on the DELETE button. Doing this will delete the pledge information for this household as well as any payments made to this pledge.

Editing a pledge

To edit the pledge information, click on the EDIT button. After making changes, click SAVE or click UNDO to remove the changes.

Adults pledging separately

The adults in a household may pledge separately. To set this up, do the following:

1. In the original household, place the name of person A in the BILLING STATEMENT NAME field.
2. Create a new household and place person B in it. Set their type to Alternate/Pledger. Place their name in the BILLING STATEMENT NAME field. Set the address fields to be the same as in the original household. Make sure the DIRECTORY and NEWSLETTER boxes are unchecked.

Payments

Payments may be made to pledges in two ways, via the “Pledges/Payments” form, or via the “Quick Payment Entry” form. Before any payments may be entered, a batch must be opened.

Batch Administration

Payments are made into a “batch”. This groups the payments and provides security against inadvertent changes. When you first install, batch number 1 will be open. In order to use payment information in some of the financial reports, the batches they are contained in must be closed. Payments in open batches may be edited or deleted. Payments in closed batches may not be edited or deleted. To administer batches, open the Batch Administration form. This may be done directly from the financial menu, from the Pledges/payments form, or from the Quick Payment Entry form. Operations on batches include:

• OPEN
• CLOSE
• VIEW PAYMENTS – open or closed batches.
• EDIT PAYMENTS – open batches only.
• PRINT PAYMENTS – open or closed batches.
• PRINT SUM – open or closed batches.

Note that you may view and print payments from ANY closed batch. To select one, click on SELECT BATCH TO ADMINISTER and type in a batch number.

Envelope numbers

Each household is automatically assigned an “envelope number” that may be used to quickly enter payments (see below). A list of these numbers may be printed by selecting “envelope numbers” from the financial menu.

Entering a payment

There are two ways to enter payments.

Method 1

1. Select the Pledges/Payments form from the financial menu. (HINT: you can also bring up this form while viewing the household form by pressing ctrl-p. Press ctrl-h to return to the household form.)
2. Select the household by searching for an adult in the household by clicking on “search by last” or “search by first”.
3. Select the fund by clicking on “Select fund to work with”.
4. If a pledge has already been entered, and a batch is open, click on ENTER PAYMENT.
5. Enter the amount, reference (such as check number), date (defaults to today), and person entering.
6. Click SAVE to save or UNDO to remove payment.

Method 2

1. Select the Quick Payment Entry form from the financial menu. This form allows multiple payments to be quickly entered. You enter some common information first and then you begin entering payments by envelope number (print out the envelope number list before starting).
2. Select the fund by clicking SELECT FUND TO WORK WITH.
3. If a batch is not open, click on BATCH ADMINISTRATION.
4. Enter the first few letters of the reference field – usually “Check Nr.”.
5. Enter the paid date (defaults to today).
6. Enter the person that is entering the payments.
7. Click on BEGIN ENTERING PAYMENTS.
8. The Enter Payments form will open. Enter an envelope number belonging to a household that has made a pledge (see Envelope Numbers), enter the payment amount and the reference suffix. Click on RECORD THE PAYMENT AND CONTINUE or click on CLOSE.

Editing a payment

Payments in open batches may be edited via the Pledges/Payments form. After selecting the household and the fund, click on EDIT PAYMENT. A list of payments in the open batch will appear. Select the one to be edited by double-clicking on it and then make changes as appropriate in the form that appears.

Deleting a payment

Payments may not be deleted. Offsetting payments may be added instead (enter a payment of –10 to remove a payment of 10 dollars.)

Reports

Statements (deluxe)

The “deluxe” financial statement is very flexible.

• You can print statements for any period of time, and you can include individual payments and/or a sum of payments for a range of dates.
• Separate statements can be printed for separate funds.
• Statements can be printed for all households or for a single household.
• Statements can be printed for only late payers, or for only non-late payers.
• A message may be appended to the statement.
• Statements will NOT be printed for any household that has the “no statement” box checked (see the Pledges/Payments form). This can be overridden if desired.

Statements (monthly)

The “monthly” statement is obviously meant to be sent monthly. It is not as flexible as the deluxe statement, but is very suitable for routine statement printing.

• Separate statements can be printed for separate funds. The statement month can be selected.
• Statements can be printed for all households or for a single household.

• Statements can be printed for only late payers, or for only non-late payers.

• A message may be appended to the statement.
• Statements will NOT be printed for any household that has the “no statement” box checked (see the Pledges/Payments form). This can be overridden if desired.

• Payments greater than the pledge may be displayed as a negative number or as a zero balance.
• If the balance is zero, you can choose to print the statement, not print the statement, or print only if the last payment was in the month the statement is being printed for.

Statement of Contributions

The statement of contributions shows ALL payments made between the entered dates for ALL funds. The printout displays each fund, all payments made to it, fund sub totals, and a final overall total. This is suitable for mailing to households for IRS purposes.

Payments for One Day

This report will display the details (fund, payment, reference, batch, household) of each payment entered on a specific day. It is very useful as a crosscheck.

All Fund Info for Household(s)

This report shows amount pledged, total paid, amount remaining, payments made with the date paid, reference, and batch number.

Fund Status

This report lists each household, amount pledged to the selected fund, the amounts given this year, this month, and for the prior year. Balance owed is also shown.

Envelope Numbers

This report lists each household along with their “envelope number” (see Entering a Payment, Method 2). The list may be sorted by number or name.

Receipts for $250 or More

This statement prints a receipt for any payment that is equal to or greater that the entered amount (default is $250). It does NOT print a receipts for TOTAL payments – only for individual payments.

Compare Pledges

This report compares the amount pledged for two funds for all households containing a selected type of adult (member, friend, etc). If desired, it also shows the contents of the household notes based on a search string.

Voting Members

This report lists households that have paid a certain amount either between certain dates or to certain funds.

Members who have not pledged

This report lists members that have not pledged to the selected fund.

Members who have paid nothing

This report lists members who have not paid anything or have paid less than the selected threshold amount between the selected dates.

Pledge Cards

This report prints out pledge cards for all members. It can also print blank cards.

Credit Card Numbers

This report lists credit card information for all who have pledged to the selected fund.

Archive

A fund and all payments to the fund may be archived. To archive a fund, select Archived Fund Maintenance under the Financial menu item. To be safe, be SURE to back up all data before doing an archive. A fund may also be unarchived using this same form.

Religious Education

Child

Grades

The grade is equivalent to the child’s grade in their non-church school. IMPORTANT!! Before registering ANY children, you must go to the Add/Edit Child Grades form under the Education menu item and set up the grade structure. You may view the current structure by clicking on FIND. To change the structure, select the grades one at a time and edit them appropriately. Note that it is EXTREMELY important to enter the Next Grade Name field.

Classes

The class is the name of the child’s class in the church school. IMPORTANT!! Before registering ANY children, you must go to the Add/Edit Child Classes form under the Education menu item and set up the class structure. You may view the current structure by clicking on FIND. To change the structure, select the classes one at a time and edit them appropriately.

Registering

A child must be entered through the household form before they can be registered. Once they have been entered through the household form, you may register them by selecting Register Children under the Education menu item. After opening this form, select the child to be registered, click on EDIT and enter pertinent information. You MUST select a school grade and a religious ed class in order to register the child.

Advancing

You may advance all children to the next grade and class by selecting Advance/Unadvance Children’s class and grade from the Education menu item. For purposes of “starting over”, you may also “unregister” all children using this form.

Reports

List Child Classes

This report lists the children in each class selected along with the teachers name.

Parent Labels

This prints labels with the names of the parents of the children in the selected classes/

Registered Children Listings/Labels

This prints a listing or labels with the names of the registered children. It may be restricted by birth date. Phone numbers may optionally be included.

Children by School Grade

This prints a listing of registered children and the fees that have been paid for them.

Adult

Add/Edit Adult Classes

This form allows adding, editing, and deleting classes for adults.

List Adult Classes

This report lists the adults that have registered for classes (registration is done through the Household form)

Minister Visitation

This module provides a secure method for recording visitations. The minister may enter the date, person visited, type of visit and free form notes. The password used for this is known only to the minister,

Room Scheduling

This module provides a method for scheduling room use. You can add rooms to be scheduled, and add, edit, and delete events that use the rooms. Additionally, you can delete old events by entering a range of dates. A schedule of events may also be printed on the printer or printed to a file.

Email

Each adult and each child may have multiple email addresses. The addresses are entered, edited and deleted via the form for the adult or the child. Each address may be set to “do not publish” to prevent them from printing in the directory.

Adult addresses may also be edited and entered via a form accessed from the maintenance menu (Add/Edit Member Email Addresses).

Email addresses may be exported and imported via the maintenance menu (Import Email Addresses, Export Email Addresses). Exporting addresses to a file will allow you to copy them from the file and then paste them into your mail program.

Importing addresses will allow you to initially populate the database with email addresses.

Online Help

When no forms are open, pressing F1 will bring up a list of help topics. If any form is open, clicking on HELP will bring up the same list. If a form is open, pressing F1 will bring up the help topic associated with that form.

Multiple PCs

Chalice Plus may be used on multiple PCs without buying a special license or paying additional fees.

Networked

If the PCs are in a network, you install Chalice Plus on one PC called the “server” and you install only chalice.exe and config.fpw on all the other “client” PCs. Here are the steps to follow:

1. Designate one PC as the “server” and load Chalice Plus on it. Make the c:\chaliceplus folder shared.
2. One each “client” PC, copy chalice.exe and config.fpw from the server into a folder called c:\chaliceplus.
3. On each client, map the drive letter F: to c:\chaliceplus on the server.
4. On each client PC, edit config.fpw so that the default line becomes:

DEFAULT=F:

Non-networked

If you wish to use Chalice Plus on more than one PC and the PCs are not networked, you must be careful to preserve data integrity. Basically, if you want the PCs to be in sync, you have to copy ALL files in c:\chaliceplus back and forth except chalice.exe. Note that if the files have been copied to PC 2 from PC 1, you cannot make any changes to the data on PC 1 until the files from PC 2 are copied back in.

Data Integrity

Desktop database applications such as Chalice Plus are susceptible to data damage. Your data can be damaged by power outages, power brownouts, power surges, and by someone turning off the PC while Chalice Plus is running.

There are other causes as well. If you suspect this has happened, run "clean data" from the maintenance menu.

It is also a good idea to install an Uninterruptable Power Supply (UPS)

And it is VITAL to always have a good backup of your data. You should routinely copy the contents of c:\chaliceplus to some backup media such as a zip disk.

Data Backup

As mentioned above, it is critically important to ALWAYS do backups of Chalice Plus data. I recommend that you make a backup after making any substantial changes to the data. It is also a good idea to make daily, weekly, and monthly backups. I also recommend that one copy is kept off site.

Passwords

Chalice Plus ships with all passwords set to 123456. You may change any of them at any time by selecting Password Maintenance from the Maintenance menu. If you have logged in as the supervisor, you do not have to know the existing password for the other categories in order to change them. You use the supervisor password as the “old” password.

Maintenance Menu

General Information

This brings up a form that allows you to change general information such as the name of the organization, address, phone number, etc. It also allows changing the fiscal year start month and day.

Add/Edit/View Types

This form allows adding, editing, and deleting the types assigned to persons. CAUTION: changing or editing a type will NOT change the type fields in the person table! The form will not allow you to edit or delete the MEMBER, VISITOR, or FRIEND type.

Add/Edit/View Committees

This form allows adding, editing, and deleting committees and groups.

Add/Edit/View Skills

This form allows adding, editing, and deleting skills and interests.

Delete Visitor Records

This form allows deleting VISITOR persons and their households with entry dates older than the date typed in on the form.

Check for Duplicates

This lists persons for which there are two or more entries in the data.

Reindex Tables

Chalice Plus maintains a set of indexes that allow the program to easily search and sort information. These indexes are kept in files that have a cdx suffix. These files can get corrupted by power failures, power surges and brownouts, and by someone turning off the PC during an operation. If this happens, you might notice that some households have disappeared, or that there are suddenly duplicates of some people or households. Reindexing will normally fix this. On a rare occasion, you might have to restore all files ending in .cdx from your backup and then reindex.

Pack Tables

When you delete something, the information in the data tables is not actually removed. It is simply marked internally as deleted. Packing actually removes the data marked as deleted thereby reclaiming some space.

Error Log Administration

This form shows information associated with any errors that have occurred.

Clear Error Log

This feature removes all error log information.

Password Maintenance

There are six different passwords that may be assigned.

• Supervisor

All privileges

• General – editing privileges

View, add, edit, delete non-financial information

• General – read only

View non-financial information only, no adding editing or deleting.

• Funds – all fund privileges

View all information, but only add/edit/delete financial information.

• Funds – enter payments via envelope number

Only enter payments via the Quick Payment Entry form.

Colors

Certain forms such as the Household form, have colors added to some background areas. This feature can be toggled on and off here.

Clean Data

This feature removes “orphaned” records and reindexes and packs the data tables.

Member ID Numbers

The World Magazine report displays the ID numbers of members. This form allows quick entering of the Ids.

Using With Microsoft Access™

If you wish to create your own reports and labels, you can link to the Chalice Plus data tables using Microsoft Access. I can provide the necessary Access .mdb file for this.

Updates and Support

Updates are sent via email when available and are free. Support is also free via email or phone call.

Error Handling

Chalice Plus records any errors that occur using the following data tables:

Errorlog.dbf

Errorlog.fpt

Errors are very infrequent. If one should occur, call or email me. I will probably want you to send me the two files for inspection.

Demo Version

A demo version of Chalice Plus is available. It works exactly like the non-demo version except that you can only enter a few households and funds.

Appendix 1 - Household Form

Appendix 2 - Person Form

Appendix 3 - Pledge/Payment Form

Appendix 4 - Listings/Labels by Criteria Form

Appendix 5 – Newsletter/Directory Labels Form

Appendix 6 – Data Schema