The Caribbean Knowledge Management Portal

Knowledge Management for the Caribbean

Information Society

Our Vision

An open source and open standards framework which facilitates regional networking, encourages the exchange of knowledge and the sharing of experiences on issues of national development, and preserves institutional memory, thereby contributing to regional capacity building processes

How we got here

Strategy development exercises (brain-storming, concept analysis, resource audit, reviewed niche opportunities, etc.)

Made a commitment to Open Source and Open Standards

Proposed a structure for the integration of the products

Conducted the necessary R&D to transform the idea into reality

Our Goals and Objectives

To develop a framework which could simultaneously address KM at the institutional level, while at the same time facilitating a regional mandate

To utilize Open Source, Open Standards, and where necessary Free Software

To deploy scalable, extensible and customizable To utilize Operating System Neutral Technology

The Caribbean Knowledge Management Portal

An Open Source, Client/Server based system

Designed in a decentralized manner Facilitates stand-alone query and data

population Security and customization features to

facilitate the publication of private content on local portals

The Caribbean Knowledge Management Portal (cont)

Delivers the following products:• Caribbean Development Profiles

• Caribbean ICT Profiles

• Caribbean Digital Library

• Caribbean Skills Bank

Hosts the CKM Communities of Practice

What makes this Portal Special?

Delivers the following features:• Document Management

• Versioning of artifacts

• Process Work flows

• Collaborative and Communication Tools

• Extensibility through open standards

• Built-in Context Sensitive Search facility for standard document types

Research and Development

Content Management: Plone, Zope Web Server/Optimization: Plone, Apache Programming Language: Python Operating System: Linux Virtualization Environment: VMWare

Result: The Portal can run on Windows and Linux without changes

Lessons Learned

What went right:• Open standards presented opportunity to address

needs in strategic manner

• Strong Systems Analysis allowed rapid prototyping and successful proof of concept

• Strategy development exercises brought extensive thought to the identification of critical and core issues

• Our framework is flexible, scalable and extensible

• We do not have all of the knowledge. Engage a Consultant.

Lessons Learned (cont)

What went wrong:• Under-estimated the time required for R&D

(particularly research)

• Contending R&D issues, at times, required focused and uninterrupted attention

• We were not sufficiently clear in the articulation of our desired outcome

Lessons Learned (cont)

Recommendations:• Give serious consideration to Open Source,

Open Standards and Free Software

• Allocate sufficient time for research

Conclusion

The Caribbean Knowledge Management Portal is pivotal to ECLAC’s regional KM initiative

The framework represents ECLAC’s recommendation for national and institutional KM strategies

Conclusion

I trust that the following are now true: You see the opportunity for using this

framework You are committed to participating in this

new initiative Recognize the validity of Open Source

and Open Standards

Thank You