Commuter Feed has garnished much critical acclaim, with over 100 writeups by bloggers including ReadWriteWeb, CNet’s Webware, Wired, Lifehacker, Daring Fireball, Chris Brogan, and Veronica Belmont. It has also won two different “Mashup of the Day” awards, and been featured in top slots in several major web design collections, such as CSS Remix and CSS Mania.

Commuter Feed was launched as an of experiment in user behavior, exploring the power of “micro-blogging” for mission-critical purposes with a kind of web-based civic monitoring. It was also Zenji’s first experiment with the Django framework, and was produced for less than the cost of a nice TV. Not too bad.

One of the things we learned with Commuter Feed is that the concepts of traffic reporting and mission-critical micro-blogging contain some over-arching “big-picture” problems that are difficult to solve, especially as a small team like Zenji. Global traffic reporting over a limited proprietary service is complicated. So to solve these problems, Zenji is preparing a few open projects to see if we can get the open source community involved in helping out. These big-picture solutions are what we’re forming as “Zenji Open Projects“.

Creative Direction

• Brainstorming, ideation and product documentation.
• Creative team planning, coordination and management.
• Interfacing remotely with client and India-based development team to syncronize project management.

Identity

• Market and competitive identity analysis.
• Company naming.
• Logo design, including full branding package and marketing collateral.
• Design of investor and partner presentations.

Information Architecture

• Planning and complete documentation including dozens of sitemaps, process flow and other charts.
• Communication of architectural documentation to development and management team.

User Experience

• Research, vision, wireframing and usability analysis across multiple generations of 100+ application screens.

User Interface Design

• Complete design of all pages from the ground up, across multiple generations of 100+ application screens.
• Designed custom icons and unique interfaces merging e-commerce with viral video.

Media Player Design

• Research, wireframing and usability analysis for 4 different flavors of Flash media player, including multiple generations of embedable e-commerce video widgets.

Front-End Development (minor)

• XHTML, CSS and AJAX development for select portions of Shopflick.com.

Auxilliary and Supporting Website Development

• Design and full development of temporary "Private Beta" registration system.
• Design and full deployment of multiple WordPress weblogs.
• Design and development of Seller and Filmmaker auxiliary web sites.
• Design and full deployment of user Forum using PunBB.

Development, SEO and Web Marketing Advisory

• Advisory on decisions regarding Search Engine Optomization.
• Advisory on front-end and backend development decisions.
• Advisory in marketing and development for social media networks such as Facebook and Twitter.

Andrew Motiwalla, Executive Director of GLA approached Zenji (then Ron Whitman Web Development) in late 2005 to plan the organization, architecture, and development of their new website. Zenji and GLA have had a mutually beneficial and friendly business relationship ever since.

“Zenji has been our web development partner since we started the company and they’ve been great at responding to our needs at each stage of growth - from a tiny startup needing a basic web site to more advanced functionality eventually. Most importantly, they’re dependable and actually take the time to really understand your business and figure out what is the best way to do a project.“

-Andrew Motiwalla, Executive Director
Global Leadership Adventures

The goal was simple: to create a website that explained the program to their target market - high school students, parents and teachers - without making the site a rehash of the old program’s website and paving the way for a new kind of youth study abroad program.

Zenji was responsible for the first two revisions of the site, as well as GLA’s robust student program enrollment application and management system, built in the CakePHP framework.

GLA Version 1.0 Website (2005-2006)

• Site framework - sitemap, wireframes and content guidelines
• Full site development - HTML, CSS, ASP, database
• Site integration with 3rd-party Customer Relations Management software (Salesforce.com)
• Design layout guidance and management
• User Interface design elements
• Dynamic (XML-driven) Flash photo slideshow design and production
• Professional photography retouching, optimization, and placement
• Internal staff area and 3rd party wiki setup and templating (Stikipad.com)
• Web server management (dedicated Windows IIS/ASP)

In early 2007, GLA determined that their previous incarnation on the Windows ASP platform wasn’t working out. This paved the way for a platform change and complete re-design, re-branding, and redevelopment of the site. GlobalLeadershipAdventures.com was re-envisioned to become a hip, “Web 2.0″ styled ExperienceGLA.com, and Zenji was there to assist.

One of the stated goals of the GLA redevelopment was to move over to a LAMP (Linux Apache MySQL PHP) environment. The move cut monthly hosting costs by a whopping $130 per month and paved the way towards the installation of a host of open-source PHP applications, previously not possible with their former dedicated Windows server.

In addition to a complete W3C Standards XHTML compliant redevelopment using PHP, ExperienceGLA also added on a new Flash video player as well as a robust social networking community for enrolled students and alumni.

GLA Version 2.0 Website (2007-2008)

• Design guidance and layout
• Flash video player specifications
• Flash video player backend using PHP and XML
• Full site redevelopment - standards-compliant XHMTL, CSS, PHP, MySQL database
• Modern Search Engine Optimization
• Domain and server migration from dedicated Windows and ASP to Linux and PHP
• Heavily modified and customized Social Networking Community for enrolled students and alumni using ELGG / EduSpaces open-source PHP software
• Internal company wiki using MediaWiki open-source PHP software
• Program journal blog system using custom modified WordPress installation.

Zenji’s final long-term project with GLA was to build an advanced student application, enrollment, and account management system using AJAX-enabled PHP and MySQL. This system has helped to advance GLA’s enrollment and account management abilities far ahead of the competition and place them at the forefront of an industry with a young “digital native” target market raised in the Web 2.0 world.