Accepting nominations

[robbrandt]

This is exciting. An election extension is just what we need.

Can't figure something out though. How does a nominee accept a nomination? I was able to nominate myself, and then accept my own nomination. However I tried to accept a different person's nomination by using the Drupal masquerade feature, but access is denied. Is there a secret URL or token passed, or what?

[agileware-justin]

@robbrandt thanks for giving it a spin and the positive feedback :) Sorry for the slow reply, Github notifications for this repo were not set up.

However I tried to accept a different person's nomination by using the Drupal masquerade feature, but access is denied. Is there a secret URL or token passed, or what?

Honestly, not sure as have not tested using the Drupal Masquerade module at all. If it's not working, then my guess would be Masquerade is doing something that is incompatible with CiviCRM. The Elections extension does not do anything special when it comes to detecting user logins. Try logging in as the other user in a different web browser.

Feel free to dig around in the code and if you do find it's a bug in the extension then please submit a PR to fix it.

Have a great day!

[robbrandt]

I've given it some time a couple of weeks ago, and while it looks like a great start there are things there that would need change for us. I will submit bug reports or feature requests if it's something you're not aware of and will consider. Some minor PRs we could do but not some of the larger ones.

1. Vote tally method: we do straight up elections. We would need to be able to select that method, not instant runoff. Totally understand why you would do instant runoff if your client is in Australia, it's just not what we need.

2. Admin data entry. Admins need to be able to edit the candidate records. If it's there, I couldn't find it.

3. Candidate Bios. Each candidate needs to be able to submit a biography or CV. Or say what they want to accomplish in the society. In our society not everyone knows each other. A text area would be best but a link to another URL would work too.

4. Our bylaws require a "write in" option, and I don't see a way to do that.

5. No photos allowed. Apparently this allows racial discrimination.

[agileware-justin]

Vote tally method: we do straight up elections. We would need to be able to select that method, not instant runoff. Totally understand why you would do instant runoff if your client is in Australia, it's just not what we need.

Sounds like a great idea. Have the ability to change the voting method, per election.

Admin data entry. Admins need to be able to edit the candidate records. If it's there, I couldn't find it.

Candidates are Contacts in CiviCRM, so their Contact details are of course editable.

The custom fields used in the election are not exposed in the backend, eg. Nomination Comments.

Candidate Bios. Each candidate needs to be able to submit a biography or CV. Or say what they want to accomplish in the society. In our society not everyone knows each other. A text area would be best but a link to another URL would work too.

When you accept a nomination, you can post some comments which are recorded as "Nomination Comments". These can be displayed on the Candidate Profile page. We have some UI changes pending in another branch to make these more clearly visible.

Our bylaws require a "write in" option, and I don't see a way to do that.

No idea what "write in" actually means, sorry. Care to elaborate?

No photos allowed. Apparently this allows racial discrimination.

This sounds like it would be a configurable setting, per election.

You might want to join the CiviElections room on https://chat.civicrm.org/civicrm/channels/civielections

[agileware-justin]

Worth pointing out too that the Election TPLs can all be overriden quite easily if you want to change the layout, display custom fields and make other changes to the display.

[robbrandt]

Write in is basically an "other" option. So it would look like this:

President of the United States:
___ Micky Mouse
___ Bugs Bunny
___ Pink Panther
___ Write in ______________

Ideally this would be an option for a given office to allow Write In options. If that option is set, then the Write In option would automatically be added to the end. I guess a voter could select the write in candidate from a group of contacts.

[agileware-justin]

So "write in" is basically selecting from a list of other contacts, who are not necessarily candidates in the election (may not even want to serve in that position). That's a new one to me, but I appreciate everyone has their own unique requirements sometimes :)

[robbrandt]

Write in options are very common in the US. I've been involved with many non-profits and never seen an election without that option. All of our political elections have this option as well. It's considered a basic element of democracy to prevent elections where the candidates are controlled, as well as a safety valve when something happens to a candidate just before an election and there's no time to redo the ballot.

Most often it is simply a field to fill out and type what you wish, but in a CiviCRM context it would be nice to at least offer the option to present a list based on a group. That way, no one could write in a candidate that didn't qualify (i.e., being a member of the society).

[agileware-justin]

All good ideas. You might want to join the CiviElections room on https://chat.civicrm.org/civicrm/channels/civielections and broadcast your ideas there too.

[robbrandt]

Thanks, I did yesterday.