Planning
Different activities can be planned:
Tasks pup up every day within an OVN. In most cases, affiliates just do stuff as the need arises, without creating tasks in a planning and management tool, such as the NRP-CAS. Creating tasks makes activity more transparent, helps with the delegation of tasks, and makes logging of activities more accountable, etc. There is a balance to strike between bothering to create a task for everything and being efficient doing what's necessary.
Projects are planned up to a certain point. We need to remain compatible with the open way of development, which is agile. There we need to strike the right balance between planning and emergence. Experience within SENSORICA shows that plans in projects always change, since the environment is very dynamic.
Manufacturing, or production is a more scripted activity, which can be better planned. The planning includes work that needs to be done, materials that need to be consumed or used, spaces, etc.
NOTE: It is highly advised that planning and logging are done in the same place. SENSORICA uses the NRP-CAS to do both. In the past, some SENSORICA affiliates have proposed to use other planning tools made by third parties that have better user interface and experience. If planning and logging are done in two different places, we create the task of transferring data from the planning environment to the logging environment, which represents extra work that no one wants to do in an open environment. Even if this transfer can be done automatically using some API, we we still create extra work that requires more specialized and rare skills, which is to maintain the API, so that the two services continue to talk to each others as they both evolve.
In relation to NRP-VAS
Plan small tasks
You can schedule and plan small tasks using the NRP-CAS by employing processes. Process are created in context, i.e. for projects. The creation of a process needs to specify a project.
Individuals can plan their daily activities using the ToDo tool in the NRP-VAS.
Plan projects
You can plan a project using the NRP-CAS, employing a methodology that has been formalized using Workflow recipes. See more on the Recipe page.
A Resource type list can also be used to plan tasks and even projects. The difference between a Workflow recipe and a Resource Type list is that the first one has one deliverable or output and the second one can have many outputs. There is a way to create other deliverables in Workflow recipes.
Both planning methods don't support cycles as in agile development. Cycles are there and one can still use the tools in the NRP-CAS to work around that problem. Ask Bob, Lynn and Tibi for more.
Some methodologies have been designed by Tibi, Fernando and Lynn, with the help of Bob. All methodologies are templates that anyone can fork and improve.
To plan a project just go to the Plan Work Order Using Recipe. You can get there from the Demand page.
Planning production
Manufacturing uses a manufacturing Recipe. These activities are more scripted.
See also