Announcement

The Operations Coordinator is the first point of contact for most communications at Redfin. You'll be responsible for handling many of the tasks that help keep Redfin running day-to-day. Especially, promptly replying to and maintaining positive relationships with clients and coworkers.

The Operations Coordinator is responsible for:

• Maintaining Redfin’s fresh, positive, and professional public appearance online and in-person
• Manage client contracts
• Invoicing
• Accounts payable & receivable
• Expense reconciliation
• Running payroll and other semi-monthly compensation processes (HSA distributions, contractor payments, retirement, employee reimbursements, healthcare, etc.)
• Depositing checks, tracking and submitting expenses
• Helping facilitate company communications
• Assist with employee, contractor, and client on and off-boarding
• Arranging company events ( i.e. retreats, weekly lunches, game nights, conferences, etc.)
• Analyze operations and suggest improvements
• Maintaining equipment inventory

Additional Duties:

• Updating Redfin’s company website blog & social media
• Looking out for the office - plants watered, food stocked, coffee and seltzer full, etc.
• Taking inventory and ordering office supplies as needed
• Assisting with distributing client & employee welcome packages and holiday gifts
• Preparing, organizing, and representing the company at events and conferences

Bonus points:

• Interest in web design and/or Drupal
• Technical writing experience
• Experience working in a digital agency environment

Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree and/or previous equivalent experience in a similar role
• Available to work in-person in the Portland, Maine office
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills
• Familiarity with Quickbooks Online or similar accounting service
• Superb organizational skills
• Attention to detail (please indicate whether you like cats or dogs or neither in your cover letter)
• A willingness to learn
• Self-motivated

If you are interested, please apply to our job posting and send a cover letter to: jobs [at] redfinsolutions {dot} com

About Redfin Solutions

Redfin Solutions, LLC is a web development and design company in Portland, Maine. We conceive, build, and support custom Drupal websites. Some of our current client niches are higher education (MIT, Dartmouth College, and the University of New England), non-profits (Community Learning for Maine, Scholars Strategy Network, Learning First Alliance). Redfin is not just another agency that churns out websites. We have long-lasting relationships with our clients and, hopefully, you.

We are a Drupal Association partner and help coordinate and sponsor Drupal conferences throughout New England. Our employees are active community members who contribute to the Drupal open source project. Redfin supports professional development opportunities and applicants should be motivated to learn.

Other benefits include: 100% company-paid health insurance premium, HSA company contribution, IRA matching, 4 weeks PTO, 36-hour work week, flexible work schedule, team lunch once a week, standing desks, seltzer & cold brew coffee on tap, annual company retreat, and more.

Redfin Solutions is an equal employment opportunity employer. We celebrate and support diversity for the benefit of our staff and clients, and highly encourage those from underrepresented groups to apply.

About you

You are a Drupal developer with a strong understanding of computer programming fundamentals and therefore don’t need a lot of mentoring in that area. You’re smart and can learn new technologies easily. You have excellent verbal communication, computer, and writing skills, which you use to focus on writing better, more efficient code. You’re also very comfortable investigating the tough issues and debugging them. Most importantly, you’re passionate about what you do and love sharing what you learn.

Full-stack Developer job description

You will work with team members and clients to troubleshoot and improve current and future back-end and front-end applications and processes. You will use your understanding of programming languages and tools to analyze issues, formulate more efficient processes, solve problems, and create more seamless experiences for users. You will be responsible for writing server-side web application logic, building new Drupal websites or improving existing builds, writing markup, and styling all of that work with modern CSS. Most work will involve writing PHP, Twig, and SASS to power our Drupal websites, but we also have React/JavaScript, and DevOps work that comes up from time to time, so experience or willingness in those areas is a plus. This position is open in our Support Department, which is responsible for creating solutions and producing satisfying results for our clients.

Full-stack Developer duties and responsibilities

• Be involved and participate in the overall website application lifecycle
• Focus on coding, debugging, and step debugging
• Collaborate with clients and co-workers (must be comfortable speaking and writing English)
• Define and effectively communicate technical requirements
• Provide training, help, and support to other team members as needed
• Build high-quality reusable code
• Develop functional and sustainable web applications with clean code
• Stay up to date with current best practices
• Participate in conferences and educational programs
• Follow new and emerging technologies
• Compile and analyze data, processes, and code to troubleshoot problems and identify areas for improvement
• Recording data and reporting it to the proper parties, such as clients or leadership
• Taking lead on small projects, as needed

Full-stack Developer requirements and qualifications

• Preference to those living in / willing to relocate to the Portland, ME, USA area
• 2+ years of experience solving problems with the back end with a programming language like Java, Ruby, PHP, or Python (PHP preferred), and front-end coding problems with HTML and CSS (SASS and Twig a plus)
• In-depth understanding of web development fundamentals
• 2+ years of experience with Drupal CMS framework
• Familiarity with front-end languages such as HTML, JavaScript and Sass/CSS
• Comfortable using Git
• Can type 30+ words per minute
• Bachelor’s degree in computer programming, computer science, or a related field
• Strong understanding of the web development cycle and programming techniques and tools
• Excellent project and time management skills
• Strong problem solving and verbal and written communication skills
• Ability to work independently or with a group
• Willingness to sit/stand at a desk for extended periods

The successful applicant will be:

• passionate about solving complex problems
• self-motivated (ready to dig into a web search to solve a problem)
• curious and ready to learn
• able to communicate clearly and effectively in person and on paper (with co-workers AND clients)
• able to adapt quickly to changing client needs
• committed to contributing to Drupal and the open source model

About Redfin Solutions

Redfin Solutions, LLC is a web development and design company in Portland, Maine. We conceive, build, and support custom Drupal websites. Some of our current client niches are higher education (MIT, Dartmouth College, and the University of New England), non-profits (Community Learning for Maine, Scholars Strategy Network, Learning First Alliance). Redfin is not just another agency that churns out websites. We have long-lasting relationships with our clients and, hopefully, you.

We are a Drupal Association partner and help coordinate and sponsor Drupal conferences throughout New England. Our employees are active community members who contribute to the Drupal open source project. Redfin supports professional development opportunities and applicants should be motivated to learn.

Other benefits include: 100% company-paid health insurance premium, HSA company contribution, IRA matching, 4 weeks PTO, 36-hour work week, flexible work schedule, team lunch once a week, standing desks, seltzer & cold brew coffee on tap, annual company retreat, and more.

Redfin Solutions is an equal employment opportunity employer. We celebrate and support diversity for the benefit of our staff and clients, and encourage those from underrepresented groups to apply.

To apply, please send your résumé and cover letter to jobs@redfinsolutions.com.

Drupal for higher education: a perfect match

Did you know that more than 70 percent of the top 100 universities in the world use Drupal to maintain their websites? In fact, open source content management systems are preferred by all higher education institutions, and the larger the institution, the more likely they are to use Drupal. 

There’s a reason (several, actually!) that Drupal is such a popular choice with universities and colleges. Higher education websites need to speak to a number of audiences—prospective and current students, faculty and staff, and alumni are just a few! Moreover, higher education websites need to represent a number of stakeholders—academic departments, athletics, facilities, advancement, and more! With all of these users and stakeholders, institutions need the ability to centrally control their brand, offer flexible solutions, and integrate with different software platforms and systems. Drupal’s robust open-source community ensures all this is possible. And of course, Drupal also has built-in accessibility, responsiveness, and SEO features to make every website findable and usable for all.

First, I want to thank everyone in the Drupal community for all you have done in the past to support each other and the Drupal project. I was fortunate when I started my Drupal journey back in 2011 to have been introduced to and embraced by the Drupal community right from the start. I have met so many incredible people who I now consider friends. My life wouldn’t be what it is today without so many of you. Thanks to the awesome community for that.

As one of the community-elected members of the Drupal Association Board of Directors, I am reaching out to the Drupal community for your support.

Please start by taking a few minutes to read the recent post by Dries Buytaert (founder and project lead of Drupal) and the recent post by Heather Rocker (Executive Director of the Drupal Association) regarding the uncertain times which the Drupal Association faces with DrupalCon Minneapolis due to the COVID-19 pandemic. These posts explain why it is so important for folks to step up now and help support the Drupal Association.

So how can the Drupal Community help?

What can an organization do?

• Join the DA’s Supporting Partner Program.
• Join other leading sponsors in committing your DrupalCon Minneapolis sponsorship funds regardless of the outcome of the current crisis by email sponsor@association.drupal.org.
• Make a Charitable donation.

What can an individual do?

• Join the DA as an Individual Member.
• Upgrade their membership level.
• Make a Charitable donation.

What can everyone do?

• Reach out to companies and organizations that you support that depend on Drupal and encourage them to join the Drupal Association as a Supporting Partner or to make a Donation. So many great organizations depend on Drupal for their websites and functionality, yet do not know that the Drupal Association exists or understand why supporting the DA is so important to the Drupal project.  (Template to potentially be used as a starting point for your email)
• Reach out to those in your local Drupal communities to encourage folks to learn about how the Drupal Association supports the Drupal project and why it’s important for everyone in the Drupal Community to help the Drupal Association during these uncertain times.
• Share this message on social media to help us reach as many folks as possible.

Thanks to all the incredible folks in the Drupal Community for your help. I look forward to seeing everyone online for now and can’t wait until we can meet in person once again. Stay safe and healthy!

Leslie Glynn
Drupal Association At-Large Board Member
Drupal.org - leslieg

As 2019 slows down, it’s time to show off the most exciting project we’ve been working on: the complete Redfin Solutions rebrand.

The previous Redfin Solutions brand was diluted and outdated. The brandmark was difficult to reproduce and didn’t translate well to small icons, which meant it was ineffective and unrecognizable. Some have even compared it to an orange Rorschach test. As a result, we were often faced with the question, "So what is Redfin Solutions?"

This year, we decided to fix all that.

Our goals were to represent the modern and powerful technology we use, secure our place within the Drupal community, and better reflect the core values of Redfin Solutions.

The complete rebrand is a two-headed beast, and since it falls outside our purview, we brought in reinforcements. For projects that require expertise in additional industries, we work with experts who we trust just as much as our clients trust us. We turned to Robert Levinson of Leverage Advisors for help creating a brand narrative, and we asked Justin Clapp of Clapp Designs to help design our visual identity. Since we have partnered with them before on our clients’ projects, we knew they would each deliver exceptional work.

Levinson’s objectives were to update and evolve Redfin’s brand position and narrative to express a clear vision for the future, excite the marketplace, and on-board and culturally align employees as we grow. “We got Rob involved because he is good at listening to us and our clients, and developing a message that speaks to what we do and what our clients are looking for,” CEO Patrick Corbett explained. Redfin Solutions needed to fully represent what we see in ourselves, as well as what our clients are looking for from us. 

To learn the different views of Redfin Solutions, Levinson interviewed our employees, partners, and clients. This took the form of 30 minute phone calls with clients, and a group interview with our employees and partners. All the clients' answers were anonymous in the final presentation to ensure honest insights. 

Some of the questions Levinson asked were meant to get a full grasp of what a new brand could reflect and do for us. He asked our clients and partners what car personifies Redfin and why. The most popular answers were Subaru Outback and Toyota Camry, but no matter the car, the reason was our reliability. In response to which store personifies Redfin, the answers were more variable, but the reason was consistently the quality of our services. Levinson used the interview answers to create a brand SWOT, which shows our Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats at a glance. This informed the brand narrative he created.

When Levinson asked what one word best describes Redfin, the common answers were experienced, reliable, and Drupal experts. One client even referred to us as “creative Drupal superheroes.” When he asked what we are best at, the overwhelming top two responses were developing Drupal websites, and providing support and education to help our clients with their website needs. Another client said, “I’d be screwed without them. They offer outstanding customer service, and I view them as an extension of my team.” Through this interview process, we learned that it is Redfin’s outstanding service and our attention to our clients that differentiates us from our competitors. Levinson used this point as the cornerstone of our brand narrative.

After gathering all the information, Levinson presented us with a new brand narrative for Redfin Solutions and strategic ideas for the future based off the SWOT. The brand narrative included key messages that are both authentic and aspirational, an elevator speech, key vocabulary, and tagline options. These are not copy or prose, but rather a strategic roadmap for how represent Redfin. Among the strategic ideas were to increase the Redfin Solutions social media presence to build awareness and help establish ourselves in the community, demonstrate thought leadership by offering more training sessions, and showcase our team to demonstrate the breadth and depth of our expertise. 

With a shiny, new brand narrative, Redfin Solutions needed a new look. In a kickoff meeting, we provided the direction and inspiration for Justin Clapp to rebrand our visual identity. Since we'd often heard confusion over why our fish logo was not red, the consensus was that Redfin was more “red” than “fin.” We decided that if we went with a brandmark, it needed to be reproducible, recognizable, and no longer resemble a Rorschach test. However, it did not need to be another fish. Redfin’s CTO Chris Wells explained that, “We wanted our look to catch up with where we are and where the technology is heading, and position ourselves as a recognizable leading agency in the Drupal community.” Redfin Solutions needed to appear modern, but timeless. We wanted to strike a balance between fun and friendly without seeming cutesy or unprofessional. 

After the kickoff meeting, Clapp heard our concerns, and he came back with two directions we could take. He presented us with an example of a brandmark and wordmark combination and an example standalone wordmark.

The inspiration for the initial brandmark was a combination of the Drupal drop and a fish fin. Clapp merged the classic drop shape with a red fin on the bottom and gave it a stunning orange gradient. We loved the idea, the color, and the connection it has to Drupal. It was close to representing Redfin, however, we worried about blending in with all the camps and conferences that use a similar shape, such as Design 4 Drupal. One slide caught our attention that featured the example brandmark with the red fin cut out of the drop. It deviated from the usual shape, and if you squinted just right, it looked a bit like a fish jumping out of the water. While we hadn’t meant to end up back on this path, this version felt familiar, yet still new and exciting. It was true to Redfin Solutions.

We asked Clapp to keep the same sentiment, but refine the shape and give us more options. In the meantime, we were so excited that we couldn’t stop creating new versions with our own ideas. A friend of Redfin Solutions, Pamala Chavez, even joined in the fun to create her own version. We sent that to Clapp and asked him to merge the two into one.

Clapp delivered in full. 

He gave us a spectrum that could be seen as a fish or a drupal drop depending on how you turned your head. We picked one that was modern and not too fishy. In a series of following meetings with Clapp, we chose brandmark colors, logotype, and logotype colors. By including the whole team in this design process, we were able to instill a greater sense of pride in the new look and ensure that it was truly representative of Redfin Solutions.

Clapp succeeded in creating a brandmark that represented our ties to Drupal, put more emphasis on the red part of Redfin Solutions, and still honored our old brand by tying in the orange gradient. At the end of the process, he provided Redfin Solutions with a new visual identity and a style guide for using it.

With both the brand narrative and the visual identity finished, there was nothing left to do except put them to work. Since building Drupal websites is one of our top skills, we could think of no better way to share the results of the rebrand than on our own redfinsolutions.com. During the annual Redfin retreat this past October, we took a few days to rebuild our website. It now reflects all the aspects of the rebrand and answers the question, “So what is Redfin Solutions.”

Redfin Solutions is your technology superhero who ensures that you and your brand shine.

At the beginning of October, Redfin Solutions received a nomination for the 2019 International Splash Award in the Tools & Apps category. We worked with Savant to create a custom Fixture Design Tool for their website, which we progressively decoupled from their Drupal website using React.

The Splash Awards will be granted at the beginning of DrupalCon Amsterdam on October 28th. We are excited to have our Project Manager, and recent nominee to the Drupal Association, representing all of us at Redfin Solutions. In the mean time, we will display Splash Award badge with pride.

Read the full case study to learn how why we chose progressively decoupling and how we did it.

It's almost time for NEDCamp, and I can't wait! Redfin will be presenting a session there on our toe-dipping foray into the world of "progressively decoupling" Drupal. Recently, I was on an episode of Talking Drupal to explore a little bit more about React and Drupal together--this should whet your appetite for the session at NEDCamp. Give it a listen! At the presentation, you can expect a deeper dive into some of the code and the real implementation that wires these two technologies together. I look forward to seeing you there!

Redfin is happy to announce that thanks to the efforts of vetchneons, we have at long last released a -dev version of the CashNET module for Ubercart in Drupal 7. CashNET is a payment processor used by a lot of institutions in the higher education realm.

We would love for any folks using Ubercart in 7 to test it out, so the module can be promoted to a stable release. 

And of course, if anyone wants to also port this to Drupal Commerce, they'd be more than welcome. :)

Head on down to the UC CashNET project page and give it a download!

Google seems to be slowly favoring their newer, more fully-featured, Data Studio over existing Analytics dashboard and reports. Recently, the "Add to Dashboard" functionality was removed.

According to Google's dashboard documentation, adding a report to a dashboard is being deprecated in favor of a "new Analytics interface." Perhaps the new interface will be a direct tie-in to their Data Studio vs. another, separate option to create dashboards, which has been somewhat confusing for our clients. 

While we at Redfin don't really yet have a full on base theme for every project, one thing we do use is our "bundler shell." This forms the basis of any Drupal 7 or 8 theme we build, and in fact, is really just the framework for the front-end (that is, this shell is useful outside of the realm of Drupal, actually).

First things first - here's the code.

Let's go ahead and begin the dissection...

The Gemfile

The Gemfile comes from Bundler, which is an amazing dependency management tool for front-end stuff, namely Ruby Gems. Here, we mention the repository we need, and which gems to get. You can then run bundle install in order to install the requisite version of gems specified in the Gemfile.lock. (If you're at all familiar with Composer, this should sound familiar, because Bundler was a huge inspiration for Composer.) Then, we can start our normal compass commands by adding bundle exec in front of them, and it will ensure you've installed everything correctly before it starts to watch the sass folder, and compile to the css folder. 

bundle exec compass watch

The 'sass' folder

Our Sass folder structure leans on a single but simple style.scss, which includes a number of things. 

Up top, we include any compass imports, followed by any external vendor imports, namely Formalize and Susy. Combining Susy with Breakpoint we can rapidly build responsive layouts that just make sense.

We use Chris Eppstein's sass globbing plugin to import an entire folder of partials with one line.

@import "folder/*";

In this way, we then allow the project to grow folders out organically. Typically we end up with folders like:

• nodes
• views
• paragraphs
• misc (or "components")
• regions

Even as I write this, we're discussing how to better standardize this list.

Configuration

The last thing to check out is the config.rb file. This is a standard sass/compass file that you need, but I do want to call particular attention to the last line, where we mention sourcemap=true.

This little bit of magic gives your Chrome Inspector (or other Dev Tool of choice) the ability to identify which line of the sass partial--not the compiled css--the styles are coming from, so you know right where to go to change them.

Leveling Up

The last piece of our front-end stack is Browsersync, which we'll cover in a future post!