Unrequested help

By unrequested help, we mean help offered with something for which we have not published a specific need. You are welcome to help us monetarily at any time by donating. There is a donation box at the top left of most pages for that. If, however you have skills, equipment, or anything else that you think could be of benefit to the society, you will be able to make a  "help offered" profile in your personal preferences (preferences link at the top of every page, once you're logged in).

The particular preferences item is called "Volunteering Preferences", and should be mostly self-explanatory. If you have not entered any preferences yet, you will be first led to a long entry form; it may seem daunting, but there is no need to fill it all, or all at once. If you have previously entered some preferences, you will be brought to a summary page first, but you can select the edit tab above it if you wish to make changes. The entry form asks for many specifics rather than just free-form comments in an attempt to allow database-like searches and automated matching with our help requests (described below).

Note that at the bottom of the form you may enter who you would prefer to have access to the information you enter. By default, the option to keep your information as private as possible is checked, but you may want to check at least the second option, which allows people who have been specifically authorized to look for help to access it.

Requested help

Help will continue to be requested in free-form as part of newsletters, project web pages, etc., to which you can usually reply by email, but there is now a database system that allows the Mars Society to formalize its needs and communicate them to Society members and the public at large.

All current needs are listed on the help needed page. These items will also be returned from searches using the search box at the top right of the site. If you click on the link for an item, you will see a page that describes what is needed in general terms, and a little table on the right that parametrizes the area the need is in. If we accept monetary pledges to satisfy the need, you will see a "thermometer" (progress bar) that shows how close we are to having enough pledges to just buy what we need. The main contact for any given need is the author, displayed right under the title at the top of the page. If you have any questions about the need, you can communicate with that person by clicking on their name and using the message form you find. A link to the help-needed item you were looking at will be automatically included in the message.

Offering your help

If you think that you can help us with something, click on the little plus sign next to "Expand to contribute", and you will see a form where you can enter a pledge or offer some other way to help. If you are not logged in to our web site, you will see "Login to contribute" instead next to the plus sign; at this stage in the development, it was easier to accept offer only from logged in persons, but if you expand that form, we tried to make it easy to either log in, if you already have an account, or to make one. Making a web account is free (but you will be given the option to become a paid member, which would help us a lot in itself). If you would rather not become a web site member, you can always send a message to the contact, as described above.

The form itself is simple. If we accept pledges, there is a text field to enter your pledge. This is only a pledge; we will contact you for payment only once we have accumulated enough pledges to meet the need. That way, if you were specifically interested to contribute to that need, you won't have to do so until you can be sure that your contribution will go towards it. The big text field is to explain how you are offering to help, especially if not in the form of a pledge. Just tell us what you are offering and we will contact you about it. The check box is to indicate if you would rather not be publicly recognized if you end up helping us with that item. Ultimately we will have an automated recognition list on the web site, but that aspect has not been implemented yet.

Updating you offer

Once you have saved an offer, if you visit that page again, you will see "Expand to see your offer" next to the plus sign (if you are logged in, of course). The form you will see if you expand  is similar, but the buttons at the bottom are "Update" and "Retract". You are free to use this form to change the amount of your pledge, add a comment, or change your recognition preference, or retract your offer entirely. You will also see the status assigned to your offer by the contact (which is initially "unreviewed"). You will also be able to see comments from the contact at some point, but that aspect has not been implemented yet.