Merge Workflow

The key to successful management of large scale, global, open development collaboration - hardware or software - is Modular Breakdown of complex projects into small parts.

For the case of hardware designs - modular breakdown means that we break machines and product systems down to their smallest components.

Tracking any development effectively, and collaborating on a large scale - requires that each component is distinguished from the overall product - such that it can be developed independently and in parallel with many other components.

Thus, parallel development can exist on the level of an overall product, its module, and its sub-modules or components.

To document products and components, we use Part Libraries. Part libraries are also convenient in terms of how they can be modified using FreeCAD. A developer or user should be able to download parts and overall products from part libraries. To understand how part libraries relate to FreeCAD and large-scale parallel development - we must understand the Merge Workflow in FreeCAD:

1. FreeCAD has a Merge Workflow option. Go to File->Merge project... to access this workflow.
2. Proper use of this workflow allows files on the wiki - parts - to be merged into the same document.
3. To use this workflow - files must be saved in a positionally correct location. This means, that when a second part it merged with a first part - it appears in a location like in the final product.
4. This way of handling parts allows full modular breakdown. Each file or part is accessible.
5. Anyone can work on any part, and uplaod changes to the wiki.
6. The wiki keeps old versions, so that we can work with older versions at any time. The wiki thus has a full ability to do version history. It is useful to annotate older versions so other developers can see what the version contains.
7. It is useful to include a Visual Version History in the part library - which simply means pictures of snapshots of the file as it evolves in time. New snapshots are included for visual reference - to save time in assessing the content of files. This is an antidote to Git or other drop-box like platform - where a wall of filenames of parts takes time to parse for content. Git does not allow versioning at a granular level (new uploads over an existing individual files), only at a repository level. This does not work well for open hardware development because 2 component CAD files cannot be compared side by side.
8. The main point of this is allowing many people to work in parallel on the same CAD design.
9. Another advantage is retaining full versioning control on parts, not only on overall assembly.
10. Another advantage is
11. For solo work, it's acceptable to use git or other 'whole project versioning'
12. Note that 'whole project versioning' does not work for open hardware, as CAD and software are only a small portion of an overall project. That's why OSE uses the Development Template, which is cloned in full for the next iteration. Parts of the Development Template are updated as needed, while keeping the whole project version intact.