Kuali: A Community Source Initiative

A Concept Whose Time has Come

Barry Walsh: Indiana University

Software Sourcing Options…

Risks

Benefits

•Control of destiny•Leverage of $$•Ecology of innovation•By, For and Of HE •???

1970-80s 1990 2000

Build Build orBuy

Build,Buy, or

2010

“Borrow”

Early Successes

Common Open Source Attributes

Developer Driven Individual Effort Dominates

“Community source describes a model for the purposeful coordinating of work in a community. It is based on many of the principles of open source development efforts, but community source efforts rely more explicitly on defined roles, responsibilities, and funded commitments by community members than some open source development models.”

…. from www.sakaiproject.org

Community Source Projects

“Community source describes a model for the purposeful coordinating of work in a community. It is based on many of the principles of open source development efforts, but community source efforts rely more explicitly on defined roles, responsibilities, and funded commitments by community members than some open source development models.”

…. from www.sakaiproject.org

Community Source Projects

Some Attributes of Community Source

Subject Matter ExpertsTendered Resources

Date Driven DevelopmentShared Governance

Our focus today

Formation: Participants’ Volunteer Modes

Middleware(Apache)

Application(Kuali/Sakai)

Operating System(Linux)

Institutional

Institutional/Individual

Individual

Three Critical Stages

Harmonious Execution

Harmonious ExecutionFormation

OngoingSupport

Scope

Funding

Governance

Formation:

Formation

Formation: Choose Partners Judiciously

• Like-minded Institutions– Shared vision

• Functionally

• Technically

• Ya gotta WANNA!!

– Synchronized institutional clocks• Within reason

• Long term commitment:– Beyond Project?

• Tolerance for ambiguity

Formation: Creating the resources

• Defined Contributions– Cash or Tendered Resources– Tendered to Board– For Duration of Project

• Qualified Resources– As Judged by Peers

• Functional• Technical

• Grants

Harmonious Execution

Harmonious Execution

Harmonious Execution

Harmonious Execution: Personal

• Good behavior begets good behavior. – If you seed the core development team

with good, well behaved people... they attract good, well behaved people.

– The weaklings and bullies just don't fit in and don't hang around.

– Likewise, well-behaved commercial partners set high bar for future behavior of commercial partners. …Carl Jacobson

Harmonious Execution: Personal/Team Dynamics

CSFs:• Park ego at door; pick up on way out!

– Most of the smart people on the project work somewhere else!

• Bring brain!• High Emotional IQ…Good Thing!!

– Superstar developers do not always make the best players here; but…it is not always an issue

• Aretha Franklin…….R.E.S.P.E.C.T!– For other’s qualities– For other’s campus or personal cultures

• It’s a Team Sport!– “Individuals” need not apply!!

Harmonious Execution: Logistical

• Co-location is optimal but unlikely• Don’t skimp on the F2F opportunities• Always-on Video• Virtual-Meeting Software

– Webex, Breeze, LiveMeeting, etc.– Prototype sharing/demonstration

• Collaborative Software– Sakai, JIRA, Confluence etc.

• Time Zones!!!• Animal House!!

Harmonious Execution: Overhead

• Remote sites – Team makeup/leadership– Work Allocation

• Time-Zones

Harmonious Execution: Technical

• Usually Not Research Projects

• Sometimes span multiple years

• Standards– Architectural– Platform– Development– Version Control– Repository

• Balance Agility and Execution

Ongoing Support

OngoingSupport

Scope

Funding

Governance

Ongoing Support: Funding

• Community Source Requires Defined, Tendered Resources

• Commercial partners A good thing– Long term sustenance?

• A "grant-funded project" is different from an "open source" project.

Ongoing Support: Scope

• Scope Creep– A grant is a contract and an agreement to

accomplish something. – If the grant money was received to "paint it

red" and the community wants to "paint it white"... it will be red as long as the grant is driving the bus.

• When the community process kicks in, they can paint it white. …Carl Jacobson

Ongoing Support: Scope--The Rules of the Game

Sco

pe

Tim

e

Resources

TheReality

Triangle

You MayPick Any

Two

I Get the

Other ☺

Ongoing Support: Governance

• Strong community is more valuable than strong governance. – Early stages: a little more hands-on?– Later: Zen?

• "Inclusive" is better than "exclusive“– largest possible community;– accept free-riders;– welcome commercial partners;

• Open-open licensing encourages inclusion and therefore the largest possible community.

…Carl Jacobson

FoundingPartners

InvestmentPartners

Community Partners

Governance Evolution

Indiana: Enterprise Systems…today

Vended

• Student (PSFT)• HR/Payroll (PSFT)• Room Sched (Ad

Astra)• Physical Plant

(MMS)• Imaging (OnBase)

Home grown

• Course Management

• Financials• Portal• Workflow• Decision Support• Research Admin

Enterprise Systems…future

Vended• Student (PSFT)• HR/Payroll (PSFT)• Room Sched (Ad

Astra)• Physical Plant

(MMS)

Community Source• E-Portfolio (OSP)• Course Management (Sakai)• Financials (Kuali)• Research (Kuali)• Endowment (Kuali)• Workflow (Kuali)• Portal (u-Portal)• Imaging? (Fedora)• Decision Support?

It’s not about religion.

Future?

General Ledger

Chart of AccountsGrants Management

Accounts ReceivablePurchasing/AP

Capital Assets

WorkflowBudget Construction

Today’s Integrated Financial Suite

Standards BasedCore Technologies

Modular

SOA

http://Kualiproject.org.

• Kuali Financial Systems :– Community Source– Comprehensive financial information system for

higher education– Any Carnegie Class institution, from Community

College to R1 institutions– Indiana University is 8 campuses

• 2 R1 campuses• 6 smaller campuses

– Seal of Approval of NACUBO• ‘Advocatis Diablo’

What is it all about?

New SystemDesign ?

Indiana Financial System

RefactorThe

Technology

Limited Enhancements

Defined byFunctional

Council

Why are we doing this?

• FIS functionality

• 10 more years.

• FIS technology base shaky – 12 year old technology (2 tier C/S)– Vendor support ???? – Loss of Control ?

IU’s Options ?

• Retooling the FIS alone – Time– Ongoing support and costs

• Buy PSFT Financials?

• Partner with like minded colleagues– Share costs– Get enhancements faster

• Others have looked at the FIS– Mostly positive. – Several are investing in Kuali.

• For reasons ranging from cost to control of destiny, collaborative efforts such as this are becoming more common among our peer institutions.

Project Costs

• $7.4 m total project cost

• 72+ person-year effort

• Core partners:– $500,000 $2,000,000,

• depending on Size and Carnegie Class

• >$4,400,000 from Founding Partners– Cash or tendered personnel resources

• March, 2005: $2.5m grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation

Founding Partners

• Currently have Six Institutional Founding Partners

• NACUBO is also a Founding Partner

• rSmart is a Founding Partner

What are we actually going to do?

• Client Server J2EE platform– Modular architecture; SOA?

• Work being done by Founding Partners and other approved investing partners

• At IU, it will be delivered through OneStart/uPortal

• Kuali will work with the Kuali Enterprise Workflow© engine.

Timeline

• Project calls for 36 months to do the development.– Phase I: Baseline system in 12 months– Phase II: Full System within 27 months– Phase III and beyond: Within 36 months

• Enhancements not done in initial project

Governance

• Kuali Board– Voting member from each Institution– NACUBO and rSmart– Chair from Indiana– Extended Board

• Project Manager– Developers from each Institution

• Functional Council– Members from each Institution– NACUBO and rSmart– Subcommittees

Accomplishments to date

• Core Partners have tendered their pledged resources • Several Functional Council Retreats

– Refine requirements– Prioritize enhancements in scope

• Several Technical Council Retreats– Define overall technical architecture

• J2EE, SOA, XML

– Create Kuali Nervous System

• Developers have created the first working transactions

• Purchasing/AP modules already in production at IU

Next Steps

• Continued Functional Council meetings– SME’s working with development teams– Continuous prioritization and iterative

development

• Six development teams working on specific functionality– Initial release will be deployed in Q2, 2006

• Kuali Research Administration (KRA)

• Kuali Endowment Module (KEM)

Questions?