Ecologik founder, Jon Eynon, went to college to study fish, but fell into computers-- hook, line and sinker! The computer boom was just starting as he was beginning his Masters in Biology, and his astute advisor guided him into the burgeoning field. He began to wear shoes to work, and learned how to talk tech to non-techies—something he’s very good at. Luckily, he was always surrounded by a large group of early adopters who gave him free rein at solving problems. He doesn’t believe in: “You can’t do that.” If he can't do it he will find someone who can. A small firm with a wide net of resources.
EcoLogik has been involved with Heritage Environmental Services for many years (we redid their now super cool logo). We were approached in 2019 to help them sunset an antiquated internal system for tracking chemical samples that come into their labs for testing. Over the next two years EcoLogik stepped HES through a series of exercises aimed at understanding what they wanted to keep and what they wanted to add to the new program, titled Elements.
Once requirments and functionality were set, EcoLogik reached out to Buckeye Innovation for help with the technical aspects of the program. With their speciality of working in the cloud and building single-page applications (SPA), Elements was formed over a year of Agile sprints. Once formed, EcoLogik worked with HES staff in creating PowerBI reports and reducing their need for weekly spreadsheets. Today, Elements is a shining example of collaboration between a large organization and sub-contractors.
Watershed report cards are assessment and communication tools that have been used around the world to compare ecological, social, and/or economic information against predefined goals or objectives. Similar to school report cards, watershed report cards provide performance-driven numeric and letter grades to effectively integrate and synthesize large, often complex, information into simple scores that can be communicated to decision makers and the general public to help guide community activity and public policies.
By using Advanced Custom Fields (ACF) inside a WordPress shell, and with a touch of jQuery, an interactive report card was created, allowing users to click on watersheds or indicators. SVG files, created mostly by JacksonSky, were manipulated in real-time, with colors changing to indicate a grading scale. View the Report Card in action!
The Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant came to Jackson Sky Design for a complete redo of their web presence. EcoLogik was involved in the conversion of the buoy data program to the new website. The "TwoYellowBuoys" are located on Lake Michigan and record lake chemicals and physical data. EcoLogik reconfigured the collection of the buoy data, which comes to a server via XML every 10 minutes and is intercepted via a cron script. Using an XML parsing script in PHP, EcoLogik provides real time charts and graphs to the website. Charting and graphing are done using ajax calls and the Highcharts Javascript Library. It is estimated that the TwoYellowBuoy pages received over 100,000 views last year alone. View a Buoy.
The Yellow Buoys is a perfect example of the collaboration that occurs between JacksonSky and EcoLogik. Yes, you can have great design and great technology in one location.
EcoLogik was involved in the first online iteration of the Hoosier Riverwatch program. The program began in 1996 to increase public awareness of water quality issues and concerns by training volunteers to monitor stream water quality
Ecologik, Jackson Sky, and Buckeye Innovation teamed up with Riverwatch to upgrade the site to newer technologies. Data entry became easier on mobile phones and staff at IDEM have an admin portal to manage the roughly 120K individual tests. The shining star of the upgrade was the Search and Visualize tools created by EcoLogik. Citizens of Indiana can now easily look up water quality scores for locations across the state.
Prospective students know their interests but struggle to match them with the right major and translate their choice into a viable career. To solve this, RHB—a higher ed marketing consultancy with more than 26 years of experience working with colleges and universities—developed an interactive solution.
Ecologik and Jackson Sky teamed up with RHB to build The Major Key from the ground up. A database system was developed for quick response with the user experience. Click-and-search words were tracked in a dashboard, so universities could have quantitative data about the all searched terms and majors. The site was fully responsive, and intense jQuery coding was done to interact with the mySQL data engine.
Jon does far more than extend development capacity—he’s a can-do problem solver whose resourcefulness is only matched by his sense of humor.
The Mattison Corporation (TMC) is an association management firm that specializes in managing non-profit associations. TMC offers part time services for associations that would normally not be able to afford the cost of a full time staff. With the growth of TMC and acquisition of more organizations, it was clear that no out-of- the-box solution existed for coordinators to track membership dues.
EcoLogik was tasked with developing a solution to track dues, committee membership, membership types, and invoicing for all TMC associations. TMC staff were spending wasted hours using isolated Excel sheets to track contacts and dues. Countless meetings between TMC and EcoLogik led to a specialized dues and billing solution that has reduced hours spent by staff and increased confidence in membership data.
Jon’s great at thinking through all the possible scenarios when beginning a new project and isn’t afraid to learn new methods to achieve a desired outcome. He treats projects like a true partnership to ensure that everyone is happy with the final product.
The White River Alliance and the Tippecanoe Watershed Foundation teamed up in 2010 to implement this unusual social marketing strategy designed to increase awareness of the impact daily life choices have on water quality. The focus began in Indiana but is now spreading across the country. Users can pledge to make choices that protect our water. Choices continue to grow as new partners expand the range of actions.
EcoLogik teamed with Jackson Sky to create this unique online experience. A robust admin portal (think WordPress and Facebook) was built where content can be entered by partners and viewed by users.. Pledge data is easily stored and farmed. To date, over 10,000 pledges have been made nationwide. EcoLogik's background of biology/fisheries science made communication with the client seamless.
I love working on website projects with Jon! He is extremely creative, knowledgeable, and patient - a rare combination in this field!
Dr. Tavel is a family-owned business operating 21 store locations across Indiana. Each store offers a range of eye health services that help patients correct and protect their vision. Dr. Tavel stores also carry a large selection of designer frames and fashion-forward eyewear.
Dr. Tavel asked Jackson Sky to redesign its website to include a powerful Store Locator. Jackson Sky leaned on EcoLogik to implement this. Using a generic third party WordPress plugin, we were able to build a filterable and sortable experience. Users not only search in the closest zip code, but can also find stores based on Hours of Operation, Spanish-speaking staff, and walk-in availability. The altered plugin leans heavily on jQuery to filter and sort data without the need to call the server over and over, giving the user a much faster experience.
When it comes to custom maps, Jon is our go-to guy. So when Dr. Tavel needed a robust store locator, we knew Jon’s jQuery skillset and problem-solving abilities would be the perfect fit.