Hi all,
Starting today and as agreed during our Munich meeting, we will have a weekly coordination confcall involving FIWARE Chapter/WG leaders on Mondays from 14:30 until 16:00.
In today's confcall, there is a hot topic to address that has to do with the response to a new technical assessment report produced by HLRS by request of the EC. Please find it attached to this mail.
As you will see, the assessment cannot be more negative, mostly considering the crucial point at which we are. Almost no FIWARE GEri has passed the tests for the local installation of the software using available installation and admin guides.
Please try to arrive with an analysis of the status of GEris in your chapter.
Besides the implementation of immediate remediate action that can only be taken by each owner of FIWARE GEris, we would like to propose an overall 3% of cut on the budget/funding of partners to fund the subcontracting for aprox. 600 K€ of some organization(s) that can handle the testing of manuals and tutorials linked to each GEri. Based on the experience from the previous phase (FI-WARE project) and the recent assessment nows look evident that we cannot continue like this, trusting on the internal QA procedures of partners as we had done in the past.
Due to the inherent technical nature of the matter, FIWARE Architecture Chapter Leaders are also requested to join.
Other topics will be covered if there is time during the allocated slot, from 14:30 to 16:00.
Best regards,
-- Juanjo
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: FIWARE: Rubio report - IMMEDIATE ACTION REQUIRED
Date: Sat, 27 Sep 2014 08:42:16 +0000
From: <Arian.ZWEGERS at ec.europa.eu><mailto:Arian.ZWEGERS at ec.europa.eu>
To: <juanjose.hierro at telefonica.com><mailto:juanjose.hierro at telefonica.com>, <stefano.depanfilis at eng.it><mailto:stefano.depanfilis at eng.it>
CC: <nuria.delama at atos.net><mailto:nuria.delama at atos.net>, <Jesus.Villasante at ec.europa.eu><mailto:Jesus.Villasante at ec.europa.eu>, <Peter.Fatelnig at ec.europa.eu><mailto:Peter.Fatelnig at ec.europa.eu>, <Ragnar.Bergstrom at ec.europa.eu><mailto:Ragnar.Bergstrom at ec.europa.eu>, <Maria-Concepcion.ANTON-GARCIA at ec.europa.eu><mailto:Maria-Concepcion.ANTON-GARCIA at ec.europa.eu>
(with apologies for the long email. Please read all)
Dear Juanjo, Stefano,
We have received the FI-WARE Generic Enabler Assessment report by Daniel Rubio (attached). The report presents an assessment of the ease of getting started, i.e. downloading and installing the GEs or using FI-Lab, rather than an assessment of the actual functionality of the GEs. In other words, it assesses the FI-WARE GE implementations from a third party point of view; any phase 3 subgrantee could and would have similar experiences.
Just like the previous report by Lutz Schubert one year ago and the Engineering report from April 2014, the Rubio report highlights several issues that question the readiness of FI-WARE GEis for take-up in the FI-PPP phase 3. A summary of the main Rubio findings is as follows:
• Documentation
o The documentation is often not updated or refers to GEi versions that are no longer available.
o The documentation fails, in most cases, in explaining how to install the dependencies and libraries or other software the GEi needs to work correctly.
o There are big differences in documentation. Installation guides follow different writing styles and enter into different levels of detail.
• Installation
o In many cases the download section or the download links in the installation documentation are broken so the software cannot be downloaded. In other cases, no stable version is offered and there is only the possibility to download a source code snapshot from the development repository.
o No common installation approach is given. Some GEis come with a clean automatic installation procedure while others have a tedious long manual installation which is almost impossible to revert and that might break other software on the system.
o Of those GEis that use scripts for installation, the scripts are often only working on very specific system configurations and are not able to automatically install the dependencies.
o Many of the GEis require a very specific system to work, and are not able to install or run if it is slightly changed. Sometimes the required system is old and no longer supported with security updates.
• FI-Lab
o Documentation is poor and needs an introduction presenting the aim and purpose of the platform, so that newcomers can clearly understand for what purpose they can use FI-Lab and what they can expect.
o Several open source example applications must be included. They must be very well documented and the documentation needs to explain how to make these applications. Newcomers should be able to use these applications and compile them. These applications should be coded and documented by other people than the developers of the Generic Enablers.
o A FI-Lab forum must be created with a wide community of users where everybody developing with FI-Lab can join and resolve problems, share experiences, improve applications, etc. People would be more inclined to use the forum than (for instance) the helpdesk if a large, responsive and knowledgeable community is active.
o For each section, it should be possible for newcomers to understand their aim and capabilities via a “quick start guide” or tutorial followed by a set of references for the user to continue learning how to use the platform. Most of the information is not organized and is difficult to find.
o There is a need for more tutorials that build on each other to teach the users to build complex applications from scratch.
o The documentation (and videos) should be maintained accordingly with the platform updates. Changes in the functionality or the user interface of the platform should be reflected in the documentation.
Third parties are looking at FIWARE right now. They will encounter the same issues as Daniel Rubio. They will leave and never come back.
Urgent action is necessary now.
Therefore, the following is necessary:
* Documentation: hire external professional documentation writers for making user-friendly installation (and user) guides. Such professionals must be present in the consortium's partners, but the people involved in the project will not have the authority to include them, certainly not on short notice. Therefore, subcontracting is the only option.
* Documentation writers must be closely working with the developers to guarantee that the latest GEi versions are used.
* For easy uptake the documentation needs to be complete and fully comprehensive; it should be clear, give a uniform level of detail within the same GEi and across all GEis, not skipping installation steps and making sure that it is updated accordingly to the software versions available for download.
* Installation: hire external professional testers for testing the dependencies, libraries or other software the GEis need to work. They should work with the developers (who implicitly know dependencies), test/develop installation scripts, and support the documentation writers
* Installations must be automated to a maximum degree, using the Operating System repositories for resolving dependencies, when possible, or giving extensions to repositories including in them all the necessary extra dependencies as this would lead to clean, fast and easy installations. The installation mechanisms, as well as the documentation, should be tested in clean environments to be able to correctly determine if the installation packages or scripts work correctly and resolve the installation of dependencies.
* The GEis must be able to be integrated into existing frameworks, making them integrate as smoothly as possible and they must be configurable for a wide range of existing system setups. Users should not be forced to use a specific software platform, in particular when that platform is already obsolete and unsupported.
* Fix the download section or the broken download links in the installation documentation.
* Offer a stable version for download, not a source code snapshot from the development repository.
* Create a FIWARE forum with a community of users of FIWARE where everybody developing and using FIWARE technologies can join and resolve problems, share GEis installation and configuration experiences, etc. The forum would also allow FI-WARE developers to identify where users have problems and take actions to solve them. This is part of FI-Core activities.
* FI-Lab
* The same as for documentation above applies to FI-Lab, and is especially relevant related to “quick start guides”, tutorials, training guidance. The documentation (and videos) should be maintained accordingly with the platform updates. Changes in the functionality or the user interface of the platform should be reflected in the documentation.
* Create several open source example applications. People will not start from scratch but will modify an example. These examples must be very well documented and the documentation needs to explain how to make these applications. Newcomers should be able to use these applications and compile them.
* A FI-Lab forum must be created with a wide community of users where everybody developing with FI-Lab can join and resolve problems, share experiences, improve applications, etc.
* Clean the Catalogue from GEis that require unsupported Operating Systems or port these GEis to newer OS versions.
Maximum priority to solve the above problems must be given now, whatever resources are needed. In no other time in the life of the project have we been confronted with a higher need for immediate action. The credibility of FIWARE and the success of the whole FI-PPP phase 3 are at risk. Today more than 150 proposals are being submitted to the accelerators; they should not face the problems stated in the Rubio report.
These issues must be solved with maximum urgency.
We like to discuss this with you on Tuesday Sept 30, in the morning. Please let me know your availability. If necessary, please clear your agenda.
Best regards,
Arian
________________________________
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