hfoss and rad

Humanitarian-FOSS and Rapid Application

Development4 July 2010, Academia SinicaMichael Howden and Fran Boon michael@sahanafoundation.org

fran@sahanafoundation.org

Overview• Background of HFOSS• HFOSS vs. FOSS• Developing HFOSS• Rapid Application Development• Getting Involved

The Historic Trigger: 12/26/04 Indian Ocean Tsunami

• At least 226,000 dead

• Up to 5 million people lost homes, or access to food and water

• 1 million people left without a means to make a living

• At least $7.5 billion in the cost of damages

Problem: Aftermath of Disasters• The trauma caused by waiting to be found or find the next of kin

• Coordinating all aid groups and helping them to operate effectively as one

• Managing the multitude of requests from the affected region and matching them effectively to the pledges of assistance

• Tracking the location of all temporary shelters, camps, etc.

How Can Technology Help?• Scalable management of information

– No stacks of forms and files to manage• Efficient distribution of information

– Accessibility of information on demand• Automatic collation and calculation

– No delay for assessments and calculations• Live situational awareness

– Reports are updated live as data is entered

Sahana is Born• Organisation Registry• Missing / Affected

Persons Registry• Request Management• Mapping

Beneficiaries

$

$ $

Donors

Humanitarian Organizations Supplies

INFORMATION

$Money

NPOs /Government

Projects Related to HFOSS

Humanitarian FOSS vs. FOSS• Goal: To Add to the Social Good• Programmers != Users• Diverse Community

– Programmers– Designers & Producers– Disaster Responders– Social Workers– You!

Challenges• Uncertain and changing conditions.• Communication Gap:

• NPOs/Government IT Providers• Limited time and resources• Technology is Easy

Getting people to use it is hard!

Participatory Programming• Engaging with Users• Bottom Up vs. Top down• Agile vs. Waterfall

Software Development Cycle

RAPID APPLICATION DEVELOPMENT…

Emergency• We have to build a system by

lunchtime!

Incident Reporting System

Data:• Location• Date• Reporter• Details

Screens:• Report Incident• View Incidents• Update Incident

Model-View-Controller• Models

– Define Tables in the Database

• Controllers– Workflow, Logic

• Views– HTML / JavaScript Templates

Model: Define Tablemodels/irs.py

table = db.define_table("irs_incident",location_id,

Field("date", "date"),person_id,

comments)

Controller: CRUD Formscontrollers/irs.py

def incident():

return shn_rest_controller("irs", "incident")

http://127.0.0.1:8000/eden/irs/incident

Rapid Application Development

Scripting Language: Python

•Library support including GIS, GSM

•Interactive Shell to explore

Rapid Application Development

Framework: Web2Py

•MVC – easier to maintain•Automatic Database Migration•Sensible Defaults

– No need to specify Routes to Controllers– Field Types provide server-side & client-

side validation & client-side rendering•In-built Translation interface

Rapid Application Development

Sahana Eden Resource Controller

•CRUD Forms with default Views

•Web Services– REST– JSON– XML

Rapid Application Development

Sahana Eden•Mapping

– OpenStreetMap– Google, Yahoo, Bing– GIS: WMS, WFS

•Messaging– SMS– Email– Twitter

Coding Style: Substitution

controllers/irs.py

module = request.controller

def incident():resource = request.functiontablename = "%s_%s" % (module, resource)table = db[tablename]

return shn_rest_controller(module, resource)

Coding Style: Maintainability

controllers/irs.py

def incident():"Using a docstring helps other coders"

# Lots of other comments are also useful

Coding Style: Constants

MY_LABEL = “My Label”

…

… MY_LABEL …

………… MY_LABEL ………

Community Development Process

•Blue Prints

– Functional Specs: User Stories

– Drafted on Wiki

– Discussed on Chat & Mailing List

Community Development Process

• Agile Development– Functional increments released quickly to users

for early feedback– Copes better with rapidly-changing

requirements

• Simulations– Usability Testing

• Issue Tracker– Logging & Prioritising

Rapid Application Development

• Building new functionality is fast & easy– Critical for HFOSS

• Python, Web2Py• Sahana Resource Controller• Coding Style• Community Development Process

– Agile

Interested?Join the Global Community:

http://eden.sahanafoundation.org

• Mailing List

• IRC Chat