ISCRAM 2007 presentation on Sahana

1. Humanitarian-FOSS:
Case Study On Disaster Management
ISCRAM 2007
Delft, Netherlands, May 13-16 2007
Chamindra de Silva
Acting Executive Director, Lanka Software Foundation
Sahana Project Lead
Sri Lanka

2. Agenda
• Humanitarian Response
• The Problem of Multi-Agency Coordination
• How can I.T. help
• Disaster Management: Sahana Project
• What is FOSS?
• The alignment of FOSS for Humanitarian Needs
• How it works: the software, the community
• Humanitarian-FOSS
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

3. Humanitarian Response
• Humanitarian Response
– Is the practice of saving lives and alleviating suffering
– It is usually related to emergency response whether in
the case of a natural disaster or a man-made disaster
such as war or other armed conflict
– Characterized by multi-agency, multi-national relief
response for large disasters
“ Today, no walls can separate humanitarian or human
rights crises in one part of the world from national
security crises in another. What begins with the failure to
uphold the dignity of one life all too often ends with a
calamity for entire nations ” - Kofi Annan
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

4. Humanitarian Response
Government Relief NGOs, INGOs Local Relief
Government Ministries, Red Cross, CARE, Religious Spontaneous volunteers,
Police, Army, Fire fighters, Groups, Sarvodaya corporate village
+ Well trained + focused on people communities, friends and
+ Authorized coord + trusted to accept aid family
+ Accountable +/- less well trained + first responders
+/- Big picture relief + accountable + lot of capacity
(national security) - fragmented / + instant aid
- Procedures create disconnected - not trained
bottlenecks - sometimes competing - focus unknown
- Overloaded - not accountable
Effective Collaboration and Coordination!
Relief
Victims

5. When is Relief Chaotic?
• Signs of a Large Scale Disaster
– When the relief needs overwhelms existing Gov and
Emergency Management resources
• Local emergency management infrastructure is can
also be destroyed
−
When multi-Agency response is critically needed

100s of NGOs and foreign aid groups arrive
simultaneously to help the relief effort

1000s of parallel and independent relief tasks to
coordinate
−
When the official disaster coordinator is overwhelmed

lack of bandwidth => coordination delays =>

lack of information => lack of trust
Overwhelming amount of information to be collected,
sharedHumanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study onresponders and victims
and used to empower Disaster Management

6. How Can IT Help?
• Scalable management of information
– databases, search, reports and dissemination
• Empowerment of responders and victims
– The right information at the right time
– help the trusted work efficiently
• Transparent mediation and coordination
– Help responders for multiple agencies self-distribute
themselves and provide a balanced response
• Live reports for decision makers
– Situation awareness
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

7. What is FOSS?
• Free and Open Source Software
• Free as in Speech, not Free as in Beer
– Freedom to access, run, modify and redistribute the
software as you wish
– Free Software Foundation (FSF)
• Open Source
– Access to source code or the “software blueprints”
– Technical merits of such development
– Open Source Initiative (OSI)
• The Global Community
– Meritocracy on contribution
– A melting pot of diverse skills and vocations
– Continuity of a society ( a purpose Management )
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster
/ meme

8. Humanitarian <-> FOSS
• No Restrictions to deploy and modify
– No discrimination on access (Red Cross CC #2)
– No time to check for royalties, license costs, etc
• Open system => Transparent and trustworthy
– Better acceptance than “foreign” proprietary systems
– Building local capacities & self-reliance (RC CC #6)
– L10N and integration (RC CC #7)
• FOSS community/contribution model
– “For the community by the community”
– The FOSS community model evolves partnerships
through natural selection of value provided
• Many countries cannot afford or do not invest
– Budgeting for a disaster that may or may not happen
– This should be a global public good
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

9. The Sahana Project
Example
• What is it?
– A web based portal with
sub-applications designed
to address the common
disaster coordination issues
– FOSS (LAMP)
• Main Goals
– Empower responders and
victims with information
– Encourage relief agencies
to work together on a
common platform for managing the disaster
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

10. Coordination Needs
Finding missing, injured
and displaced people
“Please, please help me find my
missing parents / child / relative”
Who is doing what, where?
“We are an NGO with medical
services, where can we help?”
“Where is there a lack of
support and relief services?”
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

11. Coordination Needs
Matching pledges of aid to
requests from the victims
“We need x number of tents not
clothes!”
“We have medical supply x. Who
needs it the most?”
Tracking the location, composition and facilities
of all temporary shelters, camps, hospitals, etc
“Are there any ICU facilities available and how many beds?”
“How many infants are need milk powder?”
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

12. Other Key Features
• Plugin Architecture and Modules
– Volunteer management (Trinity College, USA)
– Child Protecting Modules (Terre des Hommes)
– Inventory Management System (IBM, Care)
– Messaging module: SMS, CAPS
• GIS enabled
– Google maps, Virtual earth, OpenLayers
• XHTML/CSS/AJAX
– Accessible from PDAs/Mobile browsers
• L10N through web interface
• Syncronization through USB Disks
• Bootable from LiveCD, LiveUSB, PortableApp
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

13. Pragmatism
• Accessible interface
– Focus on simplicity and intuitiveness
– Translated to your local language
• Low Hardware costs
– Can be run on most old computer
– Software is free
• Mobility
– Can run on a laptop without Internet access
– Low power requirement (80W)
– Can be supplemented by mobile solar power units
• Efficient data exchange
– Through USB drives, internet, CDs etc
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

14. Sample Deployment
Model
• Centralized for authorized coordinators
– Inter-connected through the Internet
• Data collection distributed
– Paper Forms, other manual means
• Data entry distributed or centralized
– Can be done with volunteers
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

15. Sahana Deployment
• CNO, for Tsunami in Sri Lanka – 2005
– Officially deployed and track 26,000 families
• NADRA, for Asian Quake in Pakistan – 2005
– Officially deployed and integrated to NADRA
(Pakistan Government) to track all victims
• For Landslide disaster in Philippines– 2006
– Officially deployment to track all victims with by
Philippines Government + pre-deployment
• Pre-deployment in Sarvodaya, Sri Lanka
– Customization for Sahana requirements
• Yogjarkata Earthquake, Indonesia – 2006
– Deployed by ACS, Indonesian Reliefsource
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

16. How the software is
built?
• Requirements and Domain leadership
– Community of Humanitarian Consultants, Emergency
Management Practitioners, Academics
– Live disasters, NGO and Gov stakeholders
• Research
– Academics from Sri Lanka, US, Netherlands
• Development & Testing
– Modular plugin architecture
– Meritocracy on contribution similar to Apache Model
– Code/Usability conventions & QA rigor
• Scenario based packaging
– Mobile, Camp, Coordination Hub, Helpdesk,
WarehouseHumanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

17. Few Lessons Learned on
Deployment
• Get the system officially authorized
– Promoted through the central relief coordinating
authority designated by the Government
• Encourage data centralization and sharing
– Between government, NGO, UN, etc
– promote integration to trusted groups
• Securing the Perimeter vs Accessibility
– Solid ACLs and perimeter security is needed
• Pre-deployment is best
– Otherwise L10N and customization on the fly
• Build simple, resilient response strategies
– 1 Laptop, 1 Wireless LAN, Car battery
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

18. Lessons Learned on using
FOSS
• Give practitioners the OS they find comfortable
– Often a Windows XP + WAMP + Sahana
– Or Windows XP + Sahana PortableApp
• Passionate community of contributors
– The merger of two passionate/strong willed
communities
• Easy acceptance from user orgs
– Free(dom), Transparent, Transfer of ownership
• Scepticism
– 24x7 Support, Information Security
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

19. Humanitarian-FOSS
• A Definition
– The application of Free and Open Source Software
to help solve problems with regard to alleviating
suffering and saving lives
• Recognition of Concept
– Free Software Foundation Award for Social Benefit
inspired by Sahana (and won recently)
– UNDP IOSN
• Community
– 150+ Emergency Management Practitioners,
Humanitarian Consultants, Academics, Students
– Humanitarian User Groups (HUGs)
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management

20. Summary
• Humanitarian-FOSS
– When creating IT solutions for humanitarian
problems always consider doing it as FOSS and
sharing/improving it as a global public good.
• Sahana is an example of:
– How I.T. can bring significant efficiencies to the
coordination / collaboration effort in a large
disaster
– A successful global partnership of practitioners and
volunteers working together to provide a solution
for the common good
– The benefit of Humanitarian-FOSS
Humanitarian-FOSS: A Case Study on Disaster Management