Coeus/KRA Technical Topics

Andy Slusar, KRA Project Manager

(Cornell)

Bryan Hutchinson, KRA Development Manager

(Cornell)

Terry Durkin, KRA Development Manager (Indiana University)

Coeus/KRA Technical Topics

• Background

• Coeus and KRA compared/contrasted

• How we identified gaps

• How we are filling gaps

• Convergence / Divergence

• Q & A

Background

The vision statement from the KRA project’s successful proposal to the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation asks: “What if any and every college and university could use, without fee, an outstanding research administration system that embodies the ‘best of’ techniques and processes for research administration, while maintaining the flexibility to fit disparate institutional structures and needs?

“This is entirely possible via a community source partnership to pool resources, requirements, and execution of an efficient development process. The software and community developed through this process could meet college and university needs while providing an economically sustainable path for the future.” The KRA project is the instrument to develop this software and its community.

- Kuali Foundation web site (http://www.kuali.org/communities/kra/)

Background

A significant part of this model is the wholesale adoption of the functionality in a proven system, thereby avoiding the inertia of a “clean sheet” design. The KRA partner institutions have therefore agreed, from the outset, on the functional components that the project will deliver. The project has chosen MIT’s existing Coeus system as its baseline design. KRA will then fill in functionality missing from Coeus, update its technical architecture for easier integration with other administrative systems, and release open source software backed by the Kuali Foundation.

- Kuali Foundation web site (http://www.kuali.org/communities/kra/)

Coeus Participation on KRA• KRA Board

– Steve Dowdy MIT Voting Member– Terri-Lynn Thayer Coeus/Brown Voting Member– Tim Schleicher Johns Hopkins Ex-Officio Member– Jen Flach Coeus Ex-Officio Member

• KRA Functional Council– Steve Dowdy MIT Voting Member– Tim Schleicher Johns Hopkins Member– Jen Flach Coeus Member

• KRA Technical Council– Sabari Nair Coeus Voting Member

• KRA Development Team– Rajeev Mancheril Former Coeus Developer– Geo Thomas Former Coeus Developer

• KRA Subject Matter Expert Teams

Functionality and Features

• The KRA mandate is to provide all of the Functionality of Coeus in KRA.

• When providing COEUS functionality we are seeking Functional Equivalence not an exact copy of COEUS functionality. For example KRA screens are functionally equivalent though their appearance and flow is different.

• The focus has been how to bring the Features of a rich-client system to the Web.

Coeus and KRA Compared/Contrasted

• History

• Architecture

• Look & Feel

Coeus and KRA - History

• Coeus– 12 years of development– 46 members in the Coeus Consortium

• KRA– Part of the Kuali Foundation– New Development (Startup Q1/2007

Development started July 2007)– 7 Partner Schools Currently

Coeus and KRA - Architecture

• Coeus– Java on top of Oracle Stored Procedures– Not Service Oriented Architecture (SOA)

• KRA– Kuali Architecture and Rice– Database Agnostic– SOA

Coeus and KRA - Look & Feel

• Coeus– Coeus Premium: Swing desktop application– Coeus Lite: Web Application with functionality

subset

• KRA– One Web Application– Standard Kuali Look & Feel

Coeus Premium Look & Feel

Coeus Lite - Look & Feel

Coeus Lite - Look & Feel

Kuali - Look & Feel

Kuali - Look & Feel

Approach to Incorporating Coeus Functionality in KRA

• Functional/Technical analysis of Coeus (lite and premium) in light of KRA/Kuali

• KRA Functional and technical team trips to MIT• Regular involvement of Steve Dowdy, Sabari

Nair, Jen Flach, Tim Schleicher, Rob Yetter and other Coeus Subject Matter Experts (SMEs).

Gap Analysis - Technical

• Technical Gaps: things that Coeus does that Kuali (Rice) cannot currently do technically

• Technical Gap Proposals in Confluence

• Examples:– Workflow– Custom Attributes

Gap Analysis - Functional

• Functional Gaps: Functionality that Kuali won't support regardless of technology

• Functionality vs. Features• Rollup of Functional Decisions in Confluence• Examples:

– Lookup Framework– Custom Attributes– Complex UI

How we are filling gaps

• Process

• Documentation

• Development

Filling Gaps - Process

• Technical Gaps– Proposals are documented in Confluence and JIRA; the

Enhancement Proposal pages in Confluence include:• Technical Guide (how the enhancement will be implemented in Rice)• Client Developer Guide (how a developer of an application built on Rice would

make use of the enhancement).• User Guide (how and end user would use the enhancement if applicable).

– Presented to KRA/KFS/Rice Integration Team (Weekly Meetings)

– Approved Proposals are scheduled for a Rice release

Filling Gaps - Process

• Functional Gaps– Regular review with Lead SME's– Decisions/Recommendations are presented to

the Functional Council– Decisions that require technical implementation

are taken back to the KRA development team

Filling Gaps - Development

• Technical Gaps– Upon Approval are assigned– Work is being done by both the Rice team and

the KRA Team

• Functional Gaps– Any Functional Gap decisions that require

development work are assigned to a KRA developer

Example - Workflow

• Workflow was discussed in depth at the KRA-Coeus Technical Task Team meeting in Boston 2/28 - 3/2/07

• Following this meeting, a Gap Analysis document was developed

• Both Coeus and KRA (through KEW) support workflow functionality. However they do it in different ways.

• As a result of the Gap Analysis, several Technical Gaps were identified, and several Functional Questions were raised.

Example - Workflow

• Rice Enhancement Proposals were written for the technical gaps and presented at the Rice Integration Team meeting where they were approved.

• JIRA Tasks to implement the proposals were assigned. Some have been completed and some are still in progress.

• Functional Questions were presented to the Lead SMEs who provided answers and shared information back with the larger Functional team.

Example - Workflow

• Technical Gap: 'Meta-Rules', 'Rules', and 'Conditions'• Context: Coeus Rules can have multiple conditions

combined with boolean logic, and each condition can be based on a database column, YNQ answer or a database function. Coeus has the concept of Meta Rules where individual rules are combined with ordering and if/then logic.

• Proposal: We can model Coeus conditions and routing rules as KEW rules if we make some modifications to the framework.

Example - Workflow

• Technical Gap: 'Multiple Approvals' • Context: Coeus prompts the user, when they get their first

approval request, if they are going to get future approval requests and allows them to choose to receive these requests or bypass them (opposite of ignorePrevious KEW configuration where system determines if user gets future requests based on static configuration.)

• Proposal: We could do routing report and look for user in those, then prompt if necessary & pass flag to KEW if this action should stand in for future action requests (the flag to KEW is the enhancement).

Example - Workflow

• Technical Gap: 'Inbox - View Resolved Gap'

• Context: Coeus shows users both pending and resolved items in their Inbox (Action List equivalent)

• Proposal: Enhancement Show Resolved items in action list, perhaps as a separate tab (this is the same thing as the My Outbox enhancement request described in Workflow Document Search Enhancement Request.)

Example - Workflow

• Functional Questions

• Context:Coeus contains a nice UI to maintain Routing and Notification Rules and Meta Rules, while most of the workflow configuration for KEW is done in XML. Rules can be maintained via a web UI in KEW, but it is not as nice or full-featured as Coeus.

• Question: How much of the existing Routing Maintenance UI In Coeus Premium should be kept?

Example - Workflow

• Question: Can we deliver version 1 of KRA without the fancy UI and depend on the XML configuration in KEW, and then include the Rule Maintenance UI improvements in a later release?

• Proposal: Stick with the existing KEW XML configuration for Phase 1 of KRA, and then deliver a more full-featured UI that is similar to Coeus Premium (allowing for differences between desktop and web clients) in a later Phase. This will allow us to concentrate on functionality first and features later.

Example - Workflow

• Implications:– If we stick with existing KEW XML configuration for Phase 1 of KRA,

there will be more technical expertise and possibly more training/documentation required for implementing schools, however, it reduces the demand on the development team and allows them to concentrate on replicating Coeus Functionality.

– If we need to implement a more complex UI in Phase 1, this will take developer resources away from replicating other Coeus functionality (Reality Triangle).

• Decision: We will move ahead using the KEW XML based configuration for Phase 1. A more advanced Workflow configuration UI (similar to Coeus) will be deferred until Phase 2.

Filling Gaps

• Rice Enhancements for KRA Release 1.0– 19 Enhancements Proposed– 17 Approved, 1 Deferred for KIM, 1 Not needed based on

existing KEW functionality– 15 Development Complete, 2 In Process

• Functional Questions– 18 Decisions based on initial gap analysis, some of which

led directly to Rice Enhancements– Continuing dialog via Lead SME/LBA/DM meetings

Convergence / Divergence

• Long-term proposal: Coeus and KRA products merge into one.

• What is our upgrade path?

• Until the product merge, how do we keep KRA and Coeus from diverging?

• How can we pro-actively help these two products converge?

Managing Divergence

• Coeus has regular releases, and these aren't slowing down, nor should they at least for now

• KRA needs to have a complete functional release that can be implemented to show we're legitimate

• We need to keep track of new Coeus releases and manage which features get put into KRA

• Future– Joint design– KRA team members actively monitor Coeus enhancement requests

Proactive Convergence

• Proposal: KRA as a replacement for Coeus Lite• Maintain shared db to make sure both KRA and

Coeus can run on top of any database changes KRA makes

• Develop future Coeus modules using Kuali architecture / Rice framework

• Coeus’ offshore team helping port grants.gov to KRA / Kuali architecture / database agnostic code

Upgrade Path Strategy

• Keep the Coeus database structure largely intact– Minimize table changes– Create views to help maintain backwards

compatibility

• Develop scripts to enable a seamless upgrade for Coeus Institutions to KRA

For Further Information

• http://www.kuali.org/communities/kra/

– General KRA Information• https://test.kuali.org/confluence/display/KRADOC/Home

– KRA Documentation

• Contacts:– Andrew Slusar - as833@cornell.edu

– Bryan Hutchinson - bh79@cornell.edu

– Terry Durkin - tdurkin@indiana.edu

Questions?