Tag Archive for: community

2013 Mifos Summit Recap

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Amid the hustle and bustle of the summit, we shared a couple of posts recapping the vigor and vitality of the opening days of the summit.  Now that we’ve all settled back into our day-to-day routines, we want to look back on the 2013 Summit, rekindle that energy, and map out what lies ahead for 2014.

IMG_2833First off, a tremendous thank you to Paul Maritz, the lead sponsor of the summit as well asGoogle’s Open Source Programs and the ThoughtWorks Social Impact Program who came on as silver-level sponsors. Their financial contributions made possible the scholarships to bring so many delegates to the summit and the selection of such a world-class city and venue in Jaipur. A huge thank you to Amit Jain, and all the staff of Digamber Finance for welcoming us to Jaipur as the local host guiding all the preparations and assistance during the summit that made it such a memorable event.

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Reflections on Day 2 of the Summit

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One striking takeaway, I’ve seen at this year’s summit which shows the evolution of the project moving towards a true community is how hands-on and engrossed all audiences at the summit have been with the Mifos X product and platform itself.
Being together face to face has helped to heighten this participation even more. This all speaks to how valuable this gathering is and how important our local chapters will be for enabling this at a regional level on a more frequent basis. Training. Training. Training – we need to double down on it for users, Specialists, and Developers alike.
Summit Day 2 013

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Google Summer of Code 2013 – End Poverty. One Line of Code at a Time

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gsoc-2013This summer you’ll have the ability to change lives – three billion of them – one line of code at a time.The Community for Open Source Microfinance (COSM) and it’s Mifos X project will be participating in Google Summer of Code for the third time. Mifos X is an open source technology platform for enabling financial inclusion to the poor. Google Summer of Code is a global program sponsored by Google that offers students stipends to write code for open source projects.  Students accepted to the program will spend their summers coding from June 17 to September 23rd and upon successful evaluation receive a $5000 stipend provided by Google. For full details on GSoC, read the FAQ and browse the program timeline – student applications open April 22! You can apply from our organization page.

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ThoughtWorks HSP team gives Mifos X community a solid footing to grow from

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I’d like to give a big thank you to the ThoughtWorks HSP team. Their team has only been a part of our community a few weeks but it seems like they’ve been with us for years. They’ve helped us at a critical time in the launch of Mifos X to our developer community. They’re putting the infrastructure in place to guide a smooth transition to our community-driven development model on top of the Mifos X platform.  

Here’s a guest post from Gurpreet on what’s been keeping them busy so far.

Recently, folks from ThoughtWorks started contributing to Mifos X as part of their Humanitarian Software Program (HSP). HSP is a ThoughtWorks initiative to help Humanitarian Open Source projects by channelizing beach and volunteer time of ThoughtWorkers. Gurpreet & Deepali from the HSP team at ThoughtWorks work full-time in connecting ThoughtWorkers to Open Source projects adopted under the HSP Program.

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ThoughtWorks HSP team gives Mifos X community a solid footing to grow from

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I’d like to give a big thank you to the ThoughtWorks HSP team. Their team has only been a part of our community a few weeks but it seems like they’ve been with us for years. They’ve helped us at a critical time in the launch of Mifos X to our developer community. They’re putting the infrastructure in place to guide a smooth transition to our community-driven development model on top of the Mifos X platform.  

Here’s a guest post from Gurpreet on what’s been keeping them busy so far.

Recently, folks from ThoughtWorks started contributing to Mifos X as part of their Humanitarian Software Program (HSP). HSP is a ThoughtWorks initiative to help Humanitarian Open Source projects by channelizing beach and volunteer time of ThoughtWorkers. Gurpreet & Deepali from the HSP team at ThoughtWorks work full-time in connecting ThoughtWorkers to Open Source projects adopted under the HSP Program.

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Specialist Spotlight – SolDevelo

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We like to focus in on our Specialists every once a while, recognizing their contributions and providing a more personal glimpse into their organization and team. This time around we’re taking a closer look at SolDevelo. SolDevelo has been playing a crucial role as the technical stewards of the Mifos 2.0 codebase. Head over to the COSM blog to read about each member of the team and what their plans are for Mifos in 2013 including continued expansion of their hosted service, MifCloud.

FINA and MFC launch Mifos in Laos

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fina_mfcAnother one of the markets where Mifos has gone untouched is Laos.  FINA in coordination with the Microfinance Center of Laos is setting out to change that.  As of the Mifos 2.3 release, the software has been fully translated into Lao by FinA and MFC. Localizing Mifos into Lao is only one of the barriers that must be overcome. Kakhaber and his team are working to address the gaps to support the various forms of microfinance practiced by the MFIs, village banks, projects, and associations throughout Lao.  FINA is strongly committed to providing this region access to open source software and open access to financing resources for the poor.

To promote Mifos and help MFIs learn about the services available to them, the Mifos Lao language website has been launched at http://lao.mifos.biz. The website was designed by FINA and translated into Lao by MFC. Please visit the Mifos Lao portal for a tailored experience to learn about how FINA can support your Mifos needs in Laos.

Quipu Technology leads first Mifos Deployment in Latin America

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Latin America is home to one of the most vibrant and mature microfinance sectors in the world. Many MFIs could benefit from our technology and we could learn from the many pioneering MFIs throughout the region. Unfortunately because of language barriers in both our documentation and virtual community collaboration, the Mifos presence in Latin America has been limited to date. That is beginning to change as Quipu Technology and other service providers expand throughout the region.

Quipu Technology recently went live with the first Mifos deployment in Latin America at Fundación Inversión y Cooperación.  Under the umbrella of “Qloud Inclusion” concept for an “Integral Vision of Microfinance for Social Inclusion”, Mr. Oswaldo Lechuga, General Manager of Quipu, is looking to expand across Peru and deliver technology and consulting services throughout Latin America – we’ll detail their plans in a future post with more on Quipu Technology. Oswaldo Lechuga and Milagros Mendoza recounted their experiences deploying Mifos at Fundación I y C in the questions below.

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Mifos 2.4 (Vinolia I) is Live!

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Since the community has transitioned in leadership from Grameen Foundation to the Community for Open Source Microfinance, we’ve been pushing full speed ahead on development driven by user feedback. Mifos 2.4 (Vinolia I) directly responds to this feedback, aiming to solve the major pains felt by the community and to take Mifos one step further in ease of use and going hand-in-hand with your business processes.

SolDevelo has been the guiding force behind ongoing development and once again has done a stellar job, shipping another timely release, stewarding community contributions, and developing long-requested new features.  When we’ve asked you what causes the most pain in Mifos – the answer is almost always reporting or accounting integration.  This release addresses those critical gaps by embedding Pentaho reporting directly in Mifos and including an integrated module for simple accounting support. Mifos 2.4 also smoothes out other core functionality through streamlining mobile money integration with KopoKopo, strengthening the loan workflow, increasing efficiency through support for transfers, improve handling of GLIM loans, and better control over historical transactions. Here’s a quick list of the major features with a detailed overview and screenshots of each feature.

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Outreach on the Ground – May 2012

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Head over to the COSM blog for this past month’s Outreach on the Ground blog series. For May, we’re featuring stories exploring the theme of product and service development.  MFIs have a myriad ways towards delivering financial services to the poor.  We’d like to share details on the approaches of various Mifos users:

  • Housing and Water Purifier Loans at Grameen Koota
  • Transitioning to the MwaK program at Nuru
  • A Closer Look at Lumana – Rainmakers interview with Sammie Rayner
  • Missions of Hope International funding entrepreneurship through coffee