Improving the Deployment Toolkit

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A place to gather ideas about creating a process to perpetually improve the Deployment Guide and deployment toolkit.

If you are not a member of the team that created this page please add your comments to the Discussion page.


Pencil.png NOTE: The contents of this page are not set in stone, and are subject to change!

This page is a draft in active flux ...
Please leave suggestions on the talk page.

Pencil.png

Principles

  1. Improvements will be based on real experiences
  2. Improvements in documents and process will not depend on individuals but will stand alone and naturally support a changing OLPC team
  3. Documents should be self explanatory (documents should be as easy to pick up and use as possible with no prior experience or training)
  4. Improvements will be made in a sustainable way (the process by which the improvements are achieved will be documented so as to enable repeated improvement)


Challenges

  1. The people involved in each deployment may be different and have never completed a deployment before
  2. The technology being deployed evolves with time, ahead of the changes to the deployment guide
  3. Each location to which laptops are deployed will have different challenges


Resources

This section contains links to other sites that may contain useful information

  1. What can we learn from Sugar Labs, e.g. via their wiki
  2. "Deployment Meetings"
    1. This wiki's deployment meetings page
    2. Pipka deployment meeting page
  3. OLPC UK Community Effort
  4. OLPC News (separate website)
  5. OLPC Friends

Deliverables

This section shows the deliverables as described in the statement of work for this improvement activity. Each deliverable contains a link to the section in this wiki where the planning for that deliverable can be conducted

  1. Improved Deployment Guide Section in this Wiki (Here is the current one: Deployment Guide)
    1. Achieved by following the process in (1) above
    2. Clearer structure
    3. Clearer reference to the official Deployment Guide, Deployment Toolkit and Contacts List
    4. Links to all useful information for Deployments (e.g. sample training guides) (Alan Smith)
    5. Additional content to include:
      1. How to address national & regional education policy (including sponsorship)
      2. Funding scenarios decision tree
      3. NGO v Gov v Philanthropist v Charity
      4. Team set up and deployment management
      5. Links to related documents such as training guides (Alan Smith)
      6. Templates, e.g. training & deployment timetables (Alan Smith)
      7. Lessons learned, e.g. Don’t rely on solar power, ...
      8. A teachers perspective / how to facilitate learning with the XO
  2. Improved Deployment Guide (Google Docs "official release" version)
    1. Achieved by following the process in (1) above
    2. Official ‘release’ of the improved Deployment Wiki suitable for printing. The purpose of this is to provide a reference document containing a cleansed and structured form of the content of the wiki.
  3. Process for releasing new Deployment Guide (Google Doc) - to allow OLPC to continue updating new releases of the Deployment Guide from the wiki, as the information on the wiki is continually updated
    1. Refined through delivery of 2,3, & 4 below
    2. How to create a new release of the Deployment Guide Google Doc from the Deployment Wiki
    3. How to cleanse and restructure the Deployment Wiki to aid continued collaboration and maintain consistency with the Deployment Guide
    4. How to update the Deployment Toolkit from the updated Deployment Guide
      1. To maintain consistency
      2. To incorporate any new configurations, technologies or services into the cost model from new developments identified in the Deployment Wiki
  4. Improved Deployment Toolkit (Currently an Excel Spreadsheet; Convert to Google Docs spreadsheet?)
    1. Achieved by following the process in (1) above
    2. Contains a parameterized estimating model for building a laptop and infrastructure order suitable for a specific deployment, including financials and the Economic Template
    3. Purpose is to encapsulate the knowledge of what is required to deploy one laptop per child in a form suitable for determining the infrastructure and budget requirements for a deployment
    4. Additional content to include:
      1. Make consistent with updated deployment guide
      2. Include further examples of templates filled in by various deployment type (large, medium, small etc.)
      3. Embed Economic template into same toolkit, and update to deliver a tool for showing the split of costs over time, to allow for incremental budgeting, and a tool to allow for budgeting for ongoing maintenance and laptop replacement
      4. Include links to useful information on topics covering tax, import, replacing parts etc.
  5. Guideline and Process for Customising Deployment Guide (Google Doc) for creating a Deployment Plan for a specific deployment. The official deployment guide contains all guidance for all kinds of deployment to all kinds of environment. Only certain parts of this guide will be relevant to each specific deployment. The official guide also becomes out of date as new lessons from new deployments are captured in the wiki. This process provides guidance on how to create a specific deployment plan by taking just the relevant material out of the official deployment guide and updating this with any new material from the deployment wiki. The purpose of this activity is to simplify things for the deployment team and make sure they have the latest information.
    1. Guidance document about how to create a customised Deployment Guide that will be appropriate for YOUR deployment.
    2. This is to ensure that those preparing for a Deployment complete all necessary documentation to procure the necessary laptops and associated infrastructure and complete all necessary documentation for the deployment team to commence deployment
    3. It will include major deployment milestones, as well as collaboration and knowledge sharing activities
    4. Outputs of using this process include:
      1. A budget plan and order sheet created using the Deployment Toolkit
      2. A Deployment Plan that has been tailored for this deployment by taking relevant parts of the Deployment Guide, Contacts Database and Deployment Wiki
      3. Updated deployment tracking wiki
  6. Deployment Tracker (within the Deployment Wiki)
    1. Who is at what phase (team contact details, location, nature of deployment)
    2. What open questions they have
    3. What problems they've solved
    4. A copy of their deployment plan
  7. Contacts list (Google Docs Spreadsheet) - people involved in OLPC deployments across the globe, as well as their role (where known)
  8. Report containing lessons learned, observations & recommendations
    1. The report will summarise the changes and provide additional observations and recommendations made during the course of the work
    2. The purpose of the report is to provide OLPC with additional insights into how people are thinking and how to improve communication, knowledge management, and effectiveness of the deployment process
    3. To enable this activity to be repeated in the future
    4. To identify additional improvement areas outside the scope of this piece of work
    5. The report will include:
      1. Summary of work done to create the deliverables to enable this activity to be repeated at a future date
      2. Observations on potential issues that should be addressed or opportunities that could be exploited
      3. Recommendations for how to increase the use and effectiveness of the deployment guide

Approach

  1. Technical Research
    1. Is there a way to generate a document from a wiki? (AlexP - Manual method: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Wikipedia:Tools/Editing_tools#From_Microsoft_Word )
    2. Create a wiki editing quick reference
      1. Technical reference for wiki notation for numbered lists, references etc.
      2. Organisational standards
        1. Place the following text and a link back to this page at the top of any new page that is part of this improvement: This page is work in progress as part of the Improving the Deployment Toolkit activity. Please only edit if you are part of that team otherwise you can contribute ideas or review comments via the discussion page
      3. Collect references to other relevant pages like the Style guide and ensure consistency
        1. Prefix each page of the Deployment Guide with Deployment Guide/
        2. Capitalise words in short phrases for page and section titles
    3. Is there a way to automatically count the number of pages below a given page like the Deployment Guide
  2. Create a plan
    1. Assess the size of the guide (number of pages linked from the Deployment Guide)
    2. Identify key sections
    3. Identify candidate pages for merging or differentiating (e.g. similar title/content)
    4. Prioritise update activity
    5. Allocate update tasks
  3. Identify people to contribute or review
    1. Identify people to interview
    2. Identify members of the Wiki gang who could advise or review
    3. Use the wiki history pages to:
      1. Identify frequently active users
      2. Identify main authors/experts for key pages
  4. Setup interviews and meetings for status updates and reviews
  5. Create a copy of the Deployment Guide page as a Draft Deployment Guide
  6. Update the Draft Deployment Guide
    1. Preparation
      1. Check sections with the same title as new sections you want to add don't already exist and if they do make a decision about whether to edit that live page directly or to take a copy and publish it by copying it back later as we do with the main Deployment Guide page
      2. Review material in the ClassActs/Resources section
      3. Identify existing material that could be referred to by or moved into the new sections
    2. Add new sections
      1. How to align with national & regional education policy (including sponsorship)
      2. Planning scenarios decision tree (use Policy Questions word doc as basis)
        1. Funding
        2. Policy
        3. NGO
        4. Government
        5. Philanthropist
        6. Charity
      3. Team setup and deployment management
      4. Links to related documents such as training guides
      5. Templates, e.g. training & deployment timetables
      6. Lessons learned, e.g. Don’t rely on solar power, ...
      7. A teachers perspective / how to facilitate learning with the XO
      8. How to edit this wiki
    3. Follow all links from the Draft Deployment Guide according to priorities
      1. Combine or delete pages where appropriate, updating any references to these at the same time
      2. Review and update pages to improve clarity, navigation and accuracy
      3. Split pages into multiple sections or pages where appropriate
      4. Add cross references between pages where appropriate
    4. Review structure and flow of the Draft Deployment Guide
    5. Add additional navigation / cross references between sections as required
    6. Add clearer reference to the official Deployment Guide, Deployment Toolkit and Contacts List
    7. Go through the google doc and add missing material back into the Working Deployment Wiki
    8. Use the discussion tab for each wiki page for sharing ideas and review comments
  7. Review Draft Deployment Guide with OLPC
  8. Create google doc from Draft Deployment Guide
  9. Review google doc with OLPC
  10. Agree publishing date and comms with OLPC
  11. Copy the Draft Deployment Guide back into the Deployment Guide
  12. Announce new Deployment Guide and google doc
  13. Use this section as a basis for creating the Process for Releasing New Deployment Guide
  14. Create a Deployment Toolkit (wiki page and excel spreadsheet)
    1. Obtain latest versions of spreadsheets
    2. Combine the OLPC Deployment Workbook Excel spreadsheet (country budget planner) with the Economic Template Excel spreadsheet
    3. Simplify
    4. Improve usability
    5. Update assumptions if required (contact authors)
    6. Align the Deployment Toolkit with the Deployment Guide
      1. For each line item in the spreadsheet there should be a corresponding section in the wiki
      2. For each relevant section in the wiki, the spreadsheet should allow budget planning for it, e.g.
        1. Power generation solutions
        2. Teacher training options
        3. Project support resourcing options
  15. Create Guidelines and Process for Customising the Deployment Guide
  16. Create Deployment Tracker
    1. Leverage existing resources such as the google map showing deployments

Plan

Core Team

The core team are managing the project described in this page, allocation of tasks, and communication with OLPC and other third party contacts.

The core team consists of the following people:

  1. Pippa Thomas
  2. Mark Burnett
  3. Alexandros Papadopoulos

Extended Team

The extended team consists of the following people:

  1. Toyosi Ogedengbe
  2. Sergio Coury

This list is maintained by the Core Team

Task Management

Ideas

As Ideas emerge and are discussed they will be added into the deliverables below

  1. Identify and document the major Processes in simple to follow steps
  2. Get a non consultant, non technical author to review our deliverables from a readability perspective
    1. Early on to help ensure write in simple non consultant English
    2. Near the end to review the final deliverables
  3. Include an orientation and induction process
  4. Find other initiatives similar to OLPC that we can learn from
  5. Find other kinds of deployment guide that we can learn from
  6. Who else can we learn from?
  7. Include a map of the various different resources / web sites and their purposes - list forming under the Resources section
  8. There seem to be a lot of people enthusiastically sharing their experiences via all sorts of different wikis, and the way some of the entries are written is more like a personal blog - i.e. a stream of consciousness of their lessons learned and experiences. This is no doubt effortless for the individuals by comparison to attempting to edit a wiki by finding the right place to update information. So something to think about is how can we increase the ease of updating the wiki or how can we more effectively harvest the personal experiences without having a team to do it
  9. Consider how children can pass on knowledge from one generation to the next, so as younger children come into a school and are given a laptop they learn from older children and the older children are challenged to put their knowledge into practice through the questions of the younger children
  10. Create a facebook page for children with an XO so they can communicate and share ideas with each other

Unallocated tasks

This section contains a list of tasks identified by the extended team or collated from discussion pages creates as part of this project. Tasks will be moved from this section into the Allocated tasks section by the core team as they are allocated.

  1. Identify duplicate pages and recommend approach to consolidate / delete

Allocated tasks

This section contains tasks allocated to specific members of the extended team by the core team.

Pippa Thomas

  1. Create a single page FAQ describing what OLPC do and what we are doing on this project

Tasks pending review

Completed Tasks

Processes

Guideline and Process for Customising Deployment Guide

  1. Update the Deployment Tracking Wiki to indicate you are preparing a deployment
  2. Follow the Readiness Assessment Process to check you have everything you need to start a deployment and understand the main areas of challenge for your particular location
  3. Make a copy of the Deployment Guide and call it "Location Deployment Plan" (replacing the word "Location" with the name of the location you are deploying to
  4. Remove sections from the document that do not apply to you
  5. Update the Team section with roles and responsibilities and contact details for your team
  6. Update the Support Team section with roles, areas of expertise and contact details of any people in other teams that have agreed to support your team
  7. Follow the Deployment Plan

Solve Problem Process

Part of the Deployment Process

  1. Check to see if the Deployment Guide says how to solve the problem
  2. Check to see if the Deployment Wiki says how to solve the problem
  3. Check to see if there are any Open Questions in the Deployment Wiki that are similar to yours; If there are, contact the teams that created those questions to see if they have made progress and work together to solve the problem
  4. If no solutions can be found, create an Open Question page so that others can see you are trying to solve this problem
  5. Check the Deployment Tracker to see what other teams are currently working who are at the same or later stage in the Deployment Process as you and consult with them
  6. Update the Open Question page when you find a solution

Readiness Assessment Process

This process helps you determine whether you are ready to start a deployment by providing a checklist. It also includes a questionnaire to help you determine the major areas of challenge you may have to point you in the right direction for how to overcome these challenges, such as

  • by providing links to specific collaboration areas in the Deployment Wiki that may be more up to date than the guide as it is used by those involved in deployments right now to collaborate and share ideas
  • by pointing you at the most relevant areas in the Dealing with exceptions section of the Deployment Guide

Process for releasing new Deployment Guide

Assumptions:

  • The Deployment Guide will always be available from the same URL
  • A draft of the new release will be created in a separate document whilst it is being worked on
  • Once the new release is ready for publication, the google doc will be updated and an announcement made on the Deployment Wiki

Process:

  1. Identify volunteers from currently active deployment teams to support the process by providing up to date experience and review of changes to the wiki and document
  2. Create a new page in the Deployment Wiki for collaborating on producing the new version of the Deployment Guide
  3. Update the front page of the wiki to say that a new version of the deployment guide is currently being produced, the expected date by which it will be available, and provide a link to the collaboration page inviting input
  4. Produce a draft of the new Deployment Guide by copying the current release into a new google doc
  5. Review changes made to the wiki.laptop.org Deployment Wiki since the last release of the Deployment Guide was created
    1. Consolidate similar entries in the wiki and add these to the draft deployment guide or replace sections if these entries supercede them and also remove the corresponding superceded sections of the wiki
    2. Review the Open Questions section of the Deployment Wiki
      1. Answer the questions if possible, consulting the deployment teams who raised them in the process to validate the answers
      2. Update the Open Question page and incorporate the answer into the draft deployment guide
  6. Send the draft to the volunteers and members of the core team who have agreed to review it
  7. Apply review comments
  8. Issue the new document by publishing a message on the Deployment Wiki

Documents

Deployment Guide

Notes: As well as containing a refinement of the current Deployment Guide, this revised document will also contain the following:

  1. A process for requesting improvements to the guide
  2. A process for requesting help when the guide does not contain the expected information (the Solve Problem Process)
  3. A FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) section
  4. The Anatomy of an OLPC deployment
    1. A high level overview of the deployment process
    2. The typical roles and responsibilities of deployment team members
    3. A list and description of all the typical parts (e.g. laptops, power, connectivity) and associated deployment activities
    4. A list of alternative parts, pros and cons of each and when you would usually choose one over another (e.g. forms of power)
  5. Glossary of terms
  6. A Dealing with exceptions section listing the circumstances that are not dealt with by the standard deployment process either because they are problem situations or exceptional or rare circumstances that would otherwise clutter the process and make it difficult to follow

Sections:

Dealing with Exceptions

Contacts List

Containing the following details for each contact:

  • Name
  • Role
  • Location
  • Areas of expertise
  • Email
  • Mobile
  • Land line
  • Address
  • Deployment experience (which locations have they been involved in deploying)

Report

Containing the following sections:

  1. Summary of work done to create the deliverables to enable this activity to be repeated at a future date
  2. Observations on potential issues that should be addressed or opportunities that could be exploited
  3. Recommendations for how to increase the use and effectiveness of the deployment guide


Location Deployment Plan

The Location Deployment Plan provides a plan for a specific deployment. It is created by the Guideline and Process for Customising Deployment Guide from the Deployment Guide.

Templates for Deployment Wiki Pages

Open Question

Contents

  1. Question title
  2. Description of the problem
  3. Solutions considered and discarded and why
  4. Ideas for how to solve the problem that are currently being explored
  5. Contact details for the team
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