African Virtual Open Initiatives and Resources (AVOIR): a network for capacity building in software engineering in Africas United Nations workshop for African parliamentary information systems Cape Town June 27-30, 2006 Prof Derek Keats Executive Director Information & Communications Services, The University of the Western Cape
African Virtual Open Initiatives and Resources Build human capacity through the collaborative development of Free Software Develop and support Free Software Innovation in African higher education institutions Do so by uniting scarce and dispersed skills towards a common purpose Deliver world-class, innovative software and services in the process Create an ecosystem to promote and strengthen innovation through transactions taking place within the ecosystem
Creating Human Capitol
Principles supporting ecosystem building only Free Software processes, tools, mindsets for successful collaboration all support for systems should exist and be managed within the partnership an inclusive network design, develop, train, support, market; Anyone can find their own means to participate support the creation of businesses based on the products and processes of the ecosystem
Principles supporting ecosystem building (cont'd) nodes should grow through their own processes nodes should be able to replicate e.g. by creating opportunities for student projects e.g. by providing training and support to institutions wishing to establish new nodes work together towards sustainability beyond research funding
Principles supporting ecosystem building (cont'd) AVOIR remains agile and free of politics at all levels we create world-class software as a means to build capacity, and anything else is subservient to that requirement AVOIR members adopt a do-or-queue approach to requests for software features put it on the list and wait, or write it yourself
AVOIR people At least one professional programmer at each site All other people must be provided for through institutional processes Free Software Innovation Unit at UWC Project management and overall architecture 18 software engineers and other professional staff, including skills in enterprise architecture, services-oriented architecture, software architecture, business analysis, project management, graphic design AVOIR governing board
AVOIR development partners Senegal: University of Cheik Anta Diop de Dakar Ghana: University of Ghana Legon Nigeria: University of Jos Rwanda: National University of Rwanda Uganda: Makerere University, Uganda Martyrs University Kenya: Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and technology, Universityof Nairobi Tanzania: University of Dar es Salam, Sokoine University of Agriculture Mozambique: Catholic University of Mozambique, University of Eduardo Modlane Namibia: University of Namibia South Africa: University of the Wesern Cape Mauritius: University of Mauritius
Tools to support collaboration kngforge Automated demo updates http://kngforge.uwc.ac.za kgroups Communication & marketing http://avoir.uwc.ac.za Mailing lists: nextgen-online nextgen-users avoir-board Usability testing lab (UWC) Source code: CVS cvs.uwc.ac.za un: anoncvs, pwd: anoncvs protocol: pserver White papers Source code Documentation
The KINKY application framework......and...
Driven by users and practitioners, not by technology.
Driven by users and practitioners, not by technology. The awesome potential of student projects
The price of success... We have created a brand!
Examples of other products... khospitalpharmacy kcontentmanager kgroups kpostgraduate kforums kalumniportal kportalcreator kprojectmanager ksurvey kclinicaltrack klaborresearch kwiki kcommittemanager...and of course CHISIMBA application framework
Our most important product People Knowledge, skills, attitude Our ability to do anything with software
Benefit from Parliamentary and Legislative information systems project Benefit
The AVOIR value proposition AVOIR is an Africa wide and led initiative Close relationship with 15 (and growing) universities around the continent AVOIR produces only FOSS solutions and is fully focused on its stack of applications and services AVOIR promotes FOSS not just as a product, but as a process of becoming part of and benefiting from other initiatives AVOIR is part of a Global network Access to the skills of thousands of developers around the world
How African Parliaments Benefit World class Free Software (Open Source) Skills and services to support and enhance the software are available throughout Africa Rapid development of applications The more you do the faster it becomes Government IT agencies (e.g. SITA) can also participate as the process is free and open Winning from the outputs of other projects Creating African innovation
Bungeni-specific Benefits Only open standards No data lockup in proprietary databases and systems Complete elimination of total cost of exit But fully integratable with proprietary systems where required via Enterprise Services Bus Often the highest cost in IT systems, and one seldom budgeted for Flexibility and responsiveness to changing requirements and opportunities
How AVOIR Network Benefits Opportunities for sustainable capacity building and growth Opportunities for innovation in new spaces Other initiatives win from the outputs of a parliamentary information systems project Potential employment opportunities for students who gain experience with AVOIR
How Africa Benefits Transactions within Africa driving African innovation Economic transactions Transactions in ideas Transactions between systems (projects) Training, innovation, production and application are intimately linked in a chain that fosters development across national boundaries
Value proposition A superb rapid application building framework a variety of platforms based on it a team that can expand and build on it one of the best architected web and integrated platforms available today Process to design, develop, deploy and support world class software A growing community of developers can adapt it to any local circumstance Anyone can participate in building on its rock-solid architecture Quality delivery while building capacity for software engineering in Africa
Online: http://avoir.uwc.ac.za Email: dkeats@uwc.ac.za We are grateful to the IDRC, USAID, the Department of Science and Technology, UNESCO and Sun Microsystems for financial and other support to the AVOIR project. We are also grateful to those organizations who had enough confidence to contract us to develop applications even though we were then unproven.