The document summarizes a talk given by Terry Nolen and Dave Gebhart from Sabre Holdings about establishing an open source development community within a traditionally closed source company. Some key points: - They founded an open development community at Sabre to encourage innovation and productivity in a way that aligns with open source concepts. - Setting up the community involved gaining management support, combining existing small communities, establishing processes, and using available technology while complying with corporate standards. - For the community to succeed it requires communicating its existence widely, using rewards to motivate contributors, and expecting a varied set of projects that will grow the community over time.

1. Open for Business… o n the Fringes Terry Nolen and Dave Gebhart Sabre Holdings Business Topic Session Thursday 4:30 – 5:15 D137-138

2. About the Speakers Terry Nolen Senior Principal Software Architect Sabre Airline Solutions Phone: 682-605-1173 [email_address] Dave Gebhart Senior Developer Sabre Airline Solutions Phone: 682-605-3841 [email_address] Founders of an open development community within a traditionally closed source company.

3. Corporate Open Source? Kind of an oxymoron isn’t it? Like oil and water. They don’t mix, right? Corporations are seeking and now deploying new ways to incite innovation and productivity, and open source concepts are attractive to them. Don’t kill the speakers, please! We’re hacks as well, and we’ve been able to find a cool way to be innovative, productive and have fun at work.

4. Open for Business – on the Fringes Backgrounder Gaining Management Support Combine Many Communities into One Develop Process and Practice Needed Technology Community Relations Things that work and don’t seem to work New Horizons On the Fringes Q & A

5. Backgrounder Sabre Holdings - Known for Innovation The world’s first computer travel reservations system (1960’s), travel agencies enabled with travel booking capability (1970’s), Spin off from AMR (American Airlines), creates world class airline yield management solutions (1980’s), creator of Travelocity.com(1990’s), acquisitions: Travelocity.com, GetThere.com, Site59.com, launches Jurni Network, lastminute.com, TRAMS, and Zuji.(2000’s) An InformationWeek 500 company, ranked in the top 25 percent among the nation’s leading IT innovators. In 2006, Information Week named SABRE seventh on its list of the “Greatest Software Ever Written.” A Corporate Open Community Solution How did we get started? Open Source Research (February 2006) Business Justification (April 2006) Management Approval (May 2006) Implementation (June 2006) Consensus and Consolidation (October 2006) Where is this solution today? With a year of experience, we are on a roll

6. Gaining Management Support Is it a Hard Sell? It won’t show revenue until later; unless your plan show’s how it will, so don’t count on it. It can be relatively cost free if you do it yourself, and have no dedicated staff. Buying everything can be costly. But when it grows look for additional costs. Show how it’s global. With many business using global resources, this is a good benefit. The Stakeholder Find a dedicated supporter Gain Publicity, Backing, Philosophy, Technology and Financial Support Inside the Corporate Box Copyright and Intellectual Property Protection Intranet and Employees – Usage in the safe zone. Business Justification Make the justification for the platform formal and complete Understand Strengths and Weaknesses of Open Source Describe how project involvement can be a form of training and experience in an existing or new technology Show how having this type of innovation can be used to show customers that you’re innovative Be measurable. Make sure statistics are included to justify usage and re-usage Show a ROI by keeping costs low Be Flexible

7. Combine Many Communities into One You’re Not Alone There are probably a few other divisions or departments dabbling as well. Show Momentum or Join Forces Don’t fragment the community. A larger community will benefit all the projects. Decision Making Chiefs and Indians in One Room (Community) Treat every idea or thought equally, but dollars may dictate Migration and Combining Efforts Convince/Persuade Decision Makers First Combine the Community through Success Partner with Corporate Innovation or R&D Springboard great ideas into reality Provide a home for good but orphaned R&D Expect other Divisions and new M&A’s to have different technology Find an integrated but flexible way to include them all

8. Develop Process and Practice Set Project Roles Stakeholder, Evangelist, Champion, Committer, Contributor, User Secure projects to prevent unwanted change Automate as much as you can Project creation, Statistics calculation, Communication Leverage corporate infrastructure (SSO, LDAP, etc.) Document administrative support functions Show how to Contribute Document how to contribute and a contribution life cycle Document quality checks and security Timeliness Make sure that projects are implemented as soon as possible Resolve platform issues as soon as possible, even if it is a hack itself Be Flexible Use existing corporate tools when mandated Don’t be married to a specific set of tools; use whatever works

9. Needed Technology Build or Buy? Organizations may or may not have the technology they need With either, consider integration points like login authentication, source control, bug tracking, statistics tracking and planning software. Look for something that will provide a common login and tools for all functionality. One stop shopping. Comply with the Corporate Standards. Don’t defy the CTO or CIO if you want their support. Convince them by example and they’ll come to you. Build a solution Use your existing wiki for organizing a development framework. Because it’s usually secure within your business or corporation, there’s no fear of intellectual property loss. Use an existing Web GUI framework. Very similar to a wiki, but more foundational code to own. Buy a solution Look at the “Forges”. Sometimes they provide a hosted or locally installed version of their framework. It comes with most of the whistles, but may cost more than you expect. Buy It!

10. Community Relations Communicate, Communicate, Communicate Keep all management engaged Create a Corporate Communications relationship Advertise Your Existence Presentations, Web Page, Blogs, Email, Video Broadcasts… RSS feeds for instant notification Encourage Word of Mouth Talk to your innovative or bored friends Show them the cool projects Present the community to Innovation and Hack events Encourage management use as an Innovation to enhance sales

11. Things that Work and some that Don’t Work Things that Work One stop shopping for development Don’t limit innovation to programming Things that Don’t Work Managers don’t like giving up their resources Overtime and Own time Integration with separate sign on capability Things that may work Hard rewards and bounties are frowned upon by management unless there is viable proof that it can increase contribution

12. Rewards and Bounties for Contributors Be creative. Creative people like creative rewards. Consider a point based system with a weighted scale based upon contribution. Then apply points to hard rewards. Reward contributors with public recognition (soft rewards) Custom T-Shirts are inexpensive and appreciated

13. On the Fringes Expect your platform’s projects to be varied in type bringing value to different audiences at different times. The projects will all be “On the Fringes” of corporate mainstream and not significantly influential for the corporation in the beginning. As a whole, the platform will active but it will start and grow slowly Activity increases as the community increases Seek out a couple of breakthrough projects with significant application to the corporation or business The projects will take off as well as the platform’s visibility It will increase the contributor / user community through awareness Continually improve the platform The larger the community gets, the platform will show stress as any multi-user system might do. Be prepared to expand.

14. Questions? and Answers!