Working Teams

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Introduction

OSE is pursuing development of high performing team as it moves into 2017. Each team needs to have a minimum level of functions:

  1. Process Manager- a person who understands the development process of open hardware, as embodied in the Development Template. Assures that both development and its documentation occurs. Maintains
  2. Product Owner - stakeholder who is interested in developing a Distributive Enterprise around a given hardware project.
  3. Engineering Team - doing CAD, calculations, and other design work. Core of this is proficiency in FreeCAD.
  4. Documentation Team - documenting all work. Key to this is proficiency in Google Presentations and basic video production including screen capture. The Engineering Team and the Documentation team are the workhorses of a successful Development Team. Documentation Team also publishes all results on the OSE Minds social network.
  5. Human Resources - acquisition of SME (Subject Matter Expert) and Development team talent. Any successful project begins with building upon past work - and the quickest way to master past work is to recruit SMEs. In addition to recruiting SMEs and team members, HR coordinates with Curriculum Development to assure that team members acquire sufficient training as part of their on-boarding process. HR is responsible for effective on-boarding and off-boarding of team members, with a promise that we are creating serious teams with a clearly stated goal of changing the world via open source product development.
  6. Curriculum Development - team develops training materials in key
  7. IT - assures that the OSE ISO is updated with the latest software and part libraries.

The process for building a high performing team involves recruiting area Generalists - such as an HR Generalist - as the first step to building an effective HR function.

Collaborative Literacy

Success of OSE relies on selecting and training for a high level of Collaborative Literacy within and between all team members. This means that team members share a common language of development: understanding the tools and processes by which development takes place. This includes technical skills of tool use and design principles - but more so it includes the ability of anyone in the world to see the work - with the intent of helping the work go forward.

Team members must be willing to function as parts of a much larger, open effort. The key ingredient to effective collaboration is keeping a Work Log to document everything that one does for the project - with the assumption that others can see and build upon work without any communication inefficiencies. For example, it is inefficient to have to ask someone where they are on a project - if that information can be documented as work product on someone's log. The assumption is that we have open team boundaries, where others can participate in the development process by getting oriented on others's activities - without even having to ask for permission or access. This is a cultural aspect that many people may find awkward at first - but it is a natural way of how we operate at OSE.

In the mainstream world - people function in secrecy - as commercially-significant information is at stake. At OSE we function openly - because the distribution of economic power is our goal. At OSE, we don't take patents or sign Non-Disclosure agreements - as these are forms of Competitive Waste. The effectiveness of open source relies on elimination of all competitive waste - and replacement of such waste with unleashed creativity.

Development Template

OSE has been refining its Development Template to foster Module-Based Design as discussed on the main OSE site (http://opensourceecology.org/development/):

Currently, the Development Template is mature (as of Nov. 2015), and can serve as a basis for a unified development process. The Process Manager understands the Development Template, and knows where to find each development asset of the Development Template on the Wiki. The OSE Wiki is the main development platform of OSE.

Part Libraries

An effective, large scale development process for open hardware within the Global Village Construction Set (GVCS) involves modules and product ecologies. Modules are components that are used throughout the set as part of different products. Product Ecologies refers to designing for a minimum parts count and maximum inter-operability of the entire GVCS. This means that each machine or product is developed within the context of a larger Set, not as an individual item.

To coordinate the development of many machines and many modules, a Part Library is used. The Part Library is an accepted set of parts that we work with in the GVCS. This may include entire GVCS machines, their submodules, and individual parts. These parts are iterated over time, but the current set is found at the Part Library.

Currently, the Part Library is largely incomplete. Common materials that are used throughout the GVCS need to be added to the Library - including plumbing fittings, lumber, and any other modules from the Open Building Institute.

Software

Linux is ubiquitously available around the world as a freely-downloadable operating system. The OSE development stack relies on using open source software wherever possible. All the software that OSE uses on a regular basis is bundled as the OSE Linux distribution, which can be downloaded for free. Any OSE Developer is required to download OSE Linux. OSE Linux also includes existing Part Library repositories, so that all OSE Developers can find the current design files.

OSE Linux is being built to save thousands of hours of download times for OSE Developers. A one time install will provide all the software without hassle - to make sure all OSE devs start at a common and uniform place with any software.

2017

2016

  • Development Working Teams
  • IT/Web Team - standardizing a collaborative, federated web infrastructure for OSE and Chapters
  • Development Method Team - formalizing protocols for OSE's open hardware development method
  • Wiki Team - developing templates, structure, and semantic structure for the OSE wiki


High Priority

Signup

To apply for participation in an OSE Working Team - fill out this form. If you have questions, email info at opensourceecology dot org.

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