LargeScale, Facilitated Evolution of our Improvement Infrastructure

1
Large-Scale, Facilitated Evolution of our
Improvement Infrastructure

• (a Bootstrapping Strategy)
• eLibrary Symposium November 14,
  2002 University of British
  Columbia

Douglas C. Engelbart Bootstrap Alliance,
USA lthttp//www.bootstrap.orggt
2
Lifetime Goal
As much as possible, to boost mankinds
collective capability for coping
with complex, urgent problems.
Continuous, dedicated pursuit
now for over 50 years.
3
Collective IQ in Actionvia CODIAK Capabilities
External Environment
Ingesting
Interacting
Scanning
COncurrently Developing, Integrating,
and Applying Knowledge!
Dynamic Knowledge Repository
Concurrently Integrating Collaborating Developing
Learning (Re)using
Recorded Dialog
Intelligence Collection
Knowledge Product
4
Suppose, just suppose, that Collective IQ could
somehow be boosted by XX ??

• What should our society do, if, for example, XX
  could conceivably be .??
• 20 What would this be worth to mankind?
• 40 Or this??
• 100 Or this??
• 200 Or this??
• 400 Or this??
• PURSUIT Inestimable Return on Investment

5
Basic elements of the Pursuit Problem

• The nature of the challenge -- what possibilities
  for improvement?
• The scale of the challenge -- how much change, in
  how many concurrent factors?
• Prevailing Paradigms -- how seriously do they
  cripple valuable pursuit options?
• Bewildering array of options -- are there useful
  strategies for guiding our choices?

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Human EffectivenessDepends Upon ACapability
Infrastructure!

• Where the Technology Revolution offers radical
  improvements!
• But, for the huge scale of impending technology
  change, our paradigms for guiding and applying
  technology have to be significantly modified.

7
True Infrastructure of Capabilities With Higher
Levels Depending Upon Lower Levels
8
More and more capabilities, at all levels, depend
in turn on supportive technologies.
9
Human System -- Necessary in Human Orgs
Appeared before the Artifacts (tools) did.
10
Basic Human Capabilities -- Involved in
essentially every productive capability.
Sensory
Perceptual Motor Mental
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And the Human System has to provide teaching,
training, conditioning ...
Sens/Percept. Motor
Mental
T
Training
Training
xx
12
And note that the humans interface here is much
more than Human-Computer Interface
H-AS-Interface
Sens/Percept. Motor
Mental
Training
13
Augmentation System deriving all of societys
capabilities from basic human capabilities
H-AS-Interface
Sens/Percept. Motor
Mental
Co-evolution is unavoidable should be explicitly
cultivated!
14
VERY IMPORTANT REALIZATIONS !About
GENERALIZATION !And About ...SCALE !
15
Lets model an Individual Human
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Augmentation System deriving all of societys
capabilities from basic human capabilities
H-AS-Interface
Sens/Percept. Motor
Mental
Co-evolution is unavoidable should be explicitly
cultivated!
17
Lets model aProduct Development Team
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Augmentation System deriving all of societys
capabilities from basic human capabilities
H-AS-Interface
Sens/Percept. Motor
Mental
Co-evolution is unavoidable should be explicitly
cultivated!
19
Lets model aBusiness Enterprise
20
Augmentation System deriving all of societys
capabilities from basic human capabilities
H-AS-Interface
Sens/Percept. Motor
Mental
Co-evolution is unavoidable should be explicitly
cultivated!
21
Lets model aMulti-University Consortium
22
Augmentation System deriving all of societys
capabilities from basic human capabilities
H-AS-Interface
Sens/Percept. Motor
Mental
Co-evolution is unavoidable should be explicitly
cultivated!
23
Lets model aNational Educational System
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Augmentation System deriving all of societys
capabilities from basic human capabilities
H-AS-Interface
Sens/Percept. Motor
Mental
Co-evolution is unavoidable should be explicitly
cultivated!
25
Lets model Canada
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Augmentation System deriving all of societys
capabilities from basic human capabilities
H-AS-Interface
Sens/Percept. Motor
Mental
Co-evolution is unavoidable should be explicitly
cultivated!
27
Lets model The Whole Human World
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Augmentation System deriving all of societys
capabilities from basic human capabilities
H-AS-Interface
Sens/Percept. Motor
Mental
Co-evolution is unavoidable should be explicitly
cultivated!
29
Collective IQ in Actionvia CODIAK Capabilities
External Environment
Ingesting
Interacting
Scanning
COncurrently Developing, Integrating,
and Applying Knowledge!
Dynamic Knowledge Repository
Concurrently Integrating Collaborating Developing
Learning (Re)using
Recorded Dialog
Intelligence Collection
Knowledge Product
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Dynamic Knowledge Repositories, are
central to supporting Collective IQ

• But besides serving an individual organizations
  needs -- they must also serve working
  environments involving multiple organizations.
• Brings out a central, very tough challenge The
  Concurrency thing if our two organizations
  have interdependencies, then my Repository needs
  to concur with yours within our cooperation
  domain.

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Concurrency and Interoperability
Towards one, integrated, Program DKR 6000
Companies, concurrently evolving their
DKRs Designing, Developing, Tracking
progress and changes then add,customers, teamin
g partners...
Aerospace Firm
(2000 people)
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Critical Factor Concurrent Evolution of
Societys Dynamic Knowledge Repositories

DKRs
Concurrency Scaling Up -- actually, to global
scope.
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And, as with biological organisms Evolution
happens

• Spurred on one hand by sudden mutation of
  radically improved nervous system.
• And, affected heavily by environment changes in
  their ecological niches.
• Evolution of all other organizations and
  institutions is simultaneously accelerating
• So double pressure evolving internal capability
  improvement, while adapting to radically changing
  environments.

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We need to realize that the challenge is much too
big to be handled by direct design

• Consider (and appreciate) the Capability
  Infrastructure for any given organization
• and the impossible complexity of re-designing now
  for next year
• Were leading to the assertion that the best we
  can do about improving our organizations is to
  establish an appropriate, large-scale
  evolutionary environment.

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Collective IQ? How will your organization rate?
Your industry? Your country?

• Big difference in the coming years, between being
  a leader or follower in this Collective IQ
  assessment.
• The scale of the challenge calls for strategic
  planning and execution
• Im betting on the following concepts being
  directly relevant to an effective strategy.

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The Worlds Organizations in Human-Tool Space
1
20 Years
Anticipatable
Today
Human System Development
20 Years
Tool System Utilization
37
Huge strategic factor The matter of SCALE!

• The scale of the capability-evolution challenge
  transcends what any one company, any one Explicit
  Plan, could formulate and accomplish.
• So, get serious about developing an appropriate
  Evolutionary Environment!
• And note that the real term should be
  Co-Evolution -- Human-Systems and Tool Systems
  interactively evolving.

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Co-Evolution Frontier Advanced View
2
20 Years
Anticipatable
Today
Human System Development
20 Years
Tool System Utilization
39
Rate and Scale of Change --More thoughts about
it

• Nanotechnology inevitable for instance, what
  youll be able to hold in your hand
• In the way of speed and storage
• As much as now exists in the whole of ?
• How about surgically implanted personal
  computers?
• Large teams of intelligent agents which you
  utilize with practiced skill ...

40
Co-Evolution Frontier Probable View
3
20 Years
Anticipatable
Today
Human System Development
20 Years
Tool System Utilization
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More than we realize ... we are controlled by our
PARADIGMS

• In the face of the greatest avalanche of
  pervasive, global change ever (EVER) faced by
  human society
• Our paradigm-limited perspectives (DANGEROUSLY)
  fail to recognize the consequent range and depth
  of either the threats or the opportunities for
  mankind.

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An especially important part of this Capability
Infrastructure ...

• Is that which is responsible for improving
  capability infrastructures
• Its the Improvement Infrastructure
• It can serve a key role in a serious strategy for
  maximal evolutionary effectiveness.
• Focus on improvements which can improve the
  improvement capability -- provides a
  bootstrapping strategy.

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Harnessing explosive technology depends,to a new
degree, on the Capability-Improvement
Capability.
CapabilityInfrastructure
Sens/Percept. Motor
Mental
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Huge strategic factor The matter of SCALE!

• The scale of the capability-evolution challenge
  transcends what any one company, any one Explicit
  Plan, could formulate and accomplish.
• So, get serious about developing an appropriate
  Evolutionary Environment!
• Perhaps even, about evolving an appropriate
  Evolutionary Environment?

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Readying the Organization for Frontier Penetration
A

• A Activity - serves the customer

Core Business Activity
H
T

• B Activity - improves product cycle time and
  quality

B
Improves A Capability
C
Improves B Capability

• C Activity - improves improvement cycle time and
  quality

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Look for Other Organizations on the Frontier
Heading the Same Way . . .
Customers
Customers
Customers
...
A
Org n
B
B
C
C
C
. . . i.e. improving a similar set of
capabilities
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Join Forces in an Improvement Community
Common challenges, issues, requirements Share
advice, strategies, lessons learned Common
Customer Group -- the Bs.
C Community
Each C member actively serves his/her
respective B initiatives
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Networked Improvement Community (NIC)
Sharing risk, cost, knowledge, experience
Customers
Customers
...
A
Org n
B
C
C
Common challenges, issues, requirements Share
advice, strategies, lessons learned
Investigate, build intelligence collections
Provide exemplary collaborative website A rich
test bed for experimentation, pilots
Common challenges , issues, requirements
Share advice, strategies, lessons learned
C Community
Actively Leveraging its Collective IQ Envelope
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The Bootstrap Alliance - a MetaNIC NICs
collectively improving their NIC capabilities.
Member Orgs
Member Orgs
A
...
A
BCS?
H
H
T
B
B
B
C
C
C
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Central Strategy Bootstrapping

• Give special attention on developing Collective
  IQ improvements
• Then as quickly as possible, insert those
  improvements into the Improvement Infrastructures
• Including that which is engaged in improving
  Collective IQ
• Bootstrapping the better we get, the better
  and faster well get better.

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Suppose this organization did full-time
improvement of other organizations
Capability-Improvement Capability.
Hey, you made it, why not use it?!
CapabilityInfrastructure
.
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Suppose only part of what this SO produces can
improve others Capability-Improvement
Capability.
Products
CapabilityInfrastructure
Still worth using it to bootstrap
Capability to Improve
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SOs Capability-Improvement Infrastructures
(CIIs) served by pooled CI resources.
Individual Social-Organism products and
expenditures
SO-1
SO-2
SO-3
SO-n
.....
Co-op DKR
CII-1
CII-2
CII-3
CII-n
Their pooled Capability-Improvement (CI) Resources
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Hypotheses about Collective-IQ evolution
dependency upon the Tool-System

• The Knowledge Containers (read document
  files) must be free to evolve with open
  standards -- as via W3C XML, X.
• Their Functional Apps must also be free to
  evolve -- as via appropriate Open-Source
  licensing.
• The Knowledge-Workers Vocabulary of nouns,
  verbs, etc. simply have to be globally standard.

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The Tool-System Target -- an Open Hyperdocument
System (OHS)

• Critical Requirement Establishing an initial,
  OHS-Launch Base upon which to start serious
  co-evolution.
• Basic architecture and implementation must enable
  smooth transition to very large-scale evolution
  of document properties and system functionality.
• Critical Must enable smooth transitioning from
  legacy systems as shift work dependence onto OHS.

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Launch Plan

• Bring quick-gain innovation to improving
  collaboration within software engineering.
• Do it as an Open-Source Project -- towards an
  Open-Source, Open Hyperdocument System (OS-OHS).
• Initially, our HyperScope, to provide your
  browser with High-granularity linking into every
  kind of project document -- from email to source
  code.
• Plus, evolving a range of optional file views and
  user interfaces.

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Basic HyperScope Architecture, providing a wide
variety of new browser services.
1
2
Human and Browser Client
General Intermediary (WBI
Targeted, file server
3
4
1. Special-coded URL 2. Special request. 3.
Extracting data from legacy-file server as per
instructions coded into message 1. E.g. a
spread sheet, a segment of source code, or
even data from a CAD system. 4. HTML
portrayal of data from Targeted Server
according to conventions embodied in WBI setup.
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Stage-1 OHS-HyperScope Browsing --Over a wide
variety of legacy files High-resolution linking
many viewing options.
Target Servers
Families of view Transcoders
Families of Translators
Browser
Intermediate I-File Extended XML properties,
incl. much newAddr. tagging.
View Generator
Equipped with minimal set of new user controls
Link db
And also, hi-resolution linking to audio, video
...
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What the Link Database holds

• For every HyperScope link that was actuated into
  a given I-File, the Link Database will record
• The target object
• The high-resolution location of the link in its
  home file
• The link-type designation embedded in the link
  syntax (whose significant usage will be part of
  the new working conventions of HyperScope users).

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The Link Data Base enables new types of
back-link management and enhancement -- e.g.

• Issue-based Information Systems (IBIS, GIBIS),
  tracking the evolution and resolution of
  issue-oriented dialog.
• Records by which back-tracking can determine
  Attribution for helpful ideas or assessments --
  and also to isolate bad ideas or problem
  assessments that steered an issue off target.
• Hope here is that people find more value in
  getting ideas out there right away and to be
  careful in their analyses and judgements.

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Other utility derived from the Link Database

• Viewing options, such as, show me which objects
  are being pointed at
• by a given person, or a specified set of persons
  ...
• with link types indicating agreement
  disagreement dependence upon this to support
  their argument this assertion would ruin their
  argument -- please double check ...

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Special new kinds of linking available when
HyperScope is equipped for a given type of legacy
file

• Its I-File form will have address tags on every
  reasonable-target object.
• HyperScope links can be inserted in any legacy
  file for which the HyperScope is equipped with
  suitable I-Translator and View-Transcoder
  processes.
• Any such link, in any such legacy file, can point
  to any now-addressable object in any other such
  legacy file -- and designate any of the prepared
  options for view presentation at the addressed
  point.

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Example of Special service I want to jump to
where the link at XX in Server A is pointing.
2
Server A
1
Human and Browser Client
General Intermediary (WBI
3
4
Server B
6
5
.
Indirect Linking Special URL (1) addresses a
link embedded in Server A (may not be HTML, but
WBI arrangement will find it). WBI retrieves
that link, and then acts upon it to go retrieve a
given hunk of data from Server B -- which if not
HTML, will be coded in HTML to provide the view
specified by combination of two links.
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A special kind of Indirect Link, continued --
ltRef1_at_6B4gt

• Clicking on ltRef1_at_6B4gt jumps down to reference
  statement labelled Ref1 -- e.g. as shown here
• Ref1 Authorship Provisions in AUGMENT, 1984 .
  lthttp//www.bootstrap.org/augdocs/oad-2250.htmgt
• But clicking on the ltRef1_at_6B4gt jumps to
  lthttp//www.bootstrap.org/augdocs/oad-2250.htm6B4
  gt

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Beyond HyperScope
Toward Stage-2 OHS

• While experience, extension and utilization of
  HyperScope increases, begin on Stage-2
• Provide for caching I-Files, especially for
  legacy files which are not changing
• Develop Multiple Classes of User Interface
  Systems (UISs) for editing and studying I-Files
• Evolve toward a stand-alone OHS which can be
  developed for properties and functions beyond
  what HyperScope could possibly do with legacy
  files.

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Stage-2x, Integrated Editing/Browsing
Target Servers
Families of view Transcoders
Families of Translators
Browser
Intermediate I-File
Editing
UIS
Link db
Multiple Classes of UIS. Integrating Agents.
Caching
And then, gradual phasing of all work into this
OHS.
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Extending OHS Functionality

• Continue I-File evolution, adding new object
  types, properties and methods.
• Especially, integrate advances in Semantic-Web
  capabilities -- e.g., Concept Mapping, Argument
  Structuring, Issue-Based Information Systems
  (IBIS), etc.
• AND (Very Important), stimulate and support
  multiple classes of UIS.

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Multi-Class UISfor Serious Frontier Penetration

• Cultivate High-Performance Support Teams to
  operate over the same Knowledge Repositories as
  their supported communities.
• Pedestrian Users use their level of UIS class,
  and are encouraged to gain knowledge and skill to
  move up to higher-level UIS classes.
• Richer properties provided in OHS standards may
  remain invisible until a user graduates to
  appropriate higher-level UIS class.
• Similar with extended/refined application
  functionality.

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A Key Deployment forHigh Performance Support
Teams

• Support a larger, conventionally capable
  community, organization, or project team.
• Special, evolutionary payoff from facilitating
  the Integration processes associated with
  developing and maintaining their Dynamic
  Knowledge Repository.

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University HPSTs -- Label ItHigh Performance
Scholarship

• Keeping the core Textbook / Handbook for a
  given discipline updated. Totally.
• Monthly?
• Then Weekly?
• Then Daily?
• These are for-real future possibilities.
• Who is going to help most to get there?

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The OHS Project, being launched by the
Bootstrap Alliance jointly with SRI International.

• Planned as the launch activity, toward developing
  a strategically cultivated, large-scale
  Evolutionary Environment
• Where Social Organisms can evolve their
  Collective IQ s most effectively.
• Assuming theyll be smart enough then to balance
  the other parts of their collective
  characteristics.

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Unique Opportunity Open-Source Pursuit of CoDIAK
and OHS

• Cultivating participatory communities actively
  involved with using and improving collective
  capabilities.
• Developing initial framework for the
  hyperdocument architecture.
• Developing initial framework for the functional
  tool systems.
• As with any new NICs, need basic organizational
  framework for coordination and governance.

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Launch Plan (2A)

• Put this project right in the middle of the
  international open-source development community.
• Make it good enough to attract a community of
  open-source-project users.
• Extend Human-System development to improving this
  communitys processes governance, planning,
  capability assessment, DKR development, ...

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Further Bootstrap AllianceEnlistment Plans

• Enlist the U.S.-based Software Productivity
  Consortium!
• Enlist the British Computer Society.
• Support and integrate the existing Japan
  Bootstrap Alliance.
• Follow up with a growing list of organizations,
  institutions, improvement communities, countries,
  ...

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REFERENCE URLs

• Links to Online Engelbart Publications
  lthttp//www.bootstrap.org/institute/bibliography.h
  tml2Agt
• More-or-less whole picture published in 92
  (concepts matured considerably since then, but
  the basic framework is the same)
  lthttp//www.bootstrap.org/augdocs/augment-132811.h
  tmgt
• Detailed textual spec for the HyperScope
  lthttp//www.bootstrap.org/a2h/BI/2120.htmlgt

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THE END