Kinection 101
Objects
In Kinection, an object is an individual section of data that relates to other sections. There are seven objects: projects, volunteer profiles, opportunities, organizations, wait lists, groups, and registrations. These objects are interconnected and form the core structure of the volunteer management system.
The three primary objects are volunteer profiles, projects, and opportunities, which serve as the main pillars of the application.
The seven objects can be broken into three different categories: primary, secondary, and other. The three primary objects are volunteer profiles, projects, and opportunities, (we call them the Three Pillars). The secondary objects (waitlists, groups, and registrations) are the connective tissue between the primary objects. Organizations is its own object category that will play a larger role in the future as MDS Regions and Units begin using Kinection for their own projects.
Waitlists
The Waitlist object is really unique in that it provides the Golden Ticket or early access to opportunities based on their entry on the waitlist. Waitlists are a powerful connective tissue between Volunteer Profiles and Opportunities.
Object Statuses
Five of the seven Kinection objects have statuses and these statuses either help make something visible to Kinection users OR relate to scheduling.
Visibility
Object statuses that impact the visibility of the items all share the same four statuses:
- Draft
- Open
- Private
- Closed
The following objects use visibility statuses:
- Projects
- Waitlists
- Opportunities
Scheduling
Object statuses that impact the connection between volunteer profiles, groups and registrations. There are five different scheduling statutes:
- Pending
- Invited
- Approved
- Denied
- Canceled
The following objects use visibility statuses:
- Groups
- Registrations
User Types
There are four unique classifications assigned to users within Kinection, that is used to define a users access levels, permissions, and capabilities.
Unclaimed
All volunteer profiles that are manually added to Kinection by an Admin default as an unclaimed user type. The profile stays unclaimed until it is claimed by a User by utilizing the same email address as the profile to create an account.
User
A user type that is given to any profile created in Kinection that a person is able to login to the application. These accounts have access to the User backend options/experience.
Leadership
A user type that is manually given to an account by an Admin. These accounts have access to the user backend experience as well as the ability to view and sign-up for Leadership Volunteer opportunities when logged in.
Admin
A user type that is manually given to an account by another Admin. These accounts have access to all three distinct backend experiences (User, Leadership, and Admin), and is the most powerful user type in Kinection.
