Craigslist and Other Big Names Back New Open Source Volunteer Project

There's little question that donating your time and talent to local volunteer organizations is a worthy cause but finding a place that needs your help isn't always easy. All for Good, a new open source project backed by big names like Google, Craigslist, AARP, and Habitat for Humanity, hopes to make it easier to pair people with the projects that need them.

"Inspired by the call of President Obama to engage more Americans in service, a group of individuals from the technology, marketing and public sectors came together to build an open source application currently managed by Google that allows you to find and share volunteer activities. All for Good lets you browse activities and find events based on your location or interests," reads the organization's Web site.

When you navigate to the site, All for Good displays volunteering opportunities based on the location of your computer's IP address, but you can search by type of activity (homeless, education, animals, etc.) if you prefer. You can easily change your geographical search location and even locate activities based on when they occur. Sign in with your Facebook, Google, or OpenID accounts to save your searches and information for future reference.

All for Good's lead engineers work at Google, which also hosts and manages the Web site. Whether the site is in alpha (as the logo indicates) or beta (as the About page claims), organizers still need help and volunteers from the open source community. Developers are welcome to grab the API app or request the open source code and get right to work pitching in to improve the project or the Web site itself.