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KFS - Kuali Financial System
Kuali Financial System
(Start Date: April 1, 2005)
Project Goals:
The Kuali Financial System (KFS) project is working to create a comprehensive suite of financial software that meets the needs of all Carnegie Class institutions. Its partner institutions are colleges, universities, and interested organizations that share a common vision of open, modular, and distributed systems for their software requirements. The goal of KFS is to bring the proven functionality of legacy applications to the ease and universality of online services.
Since early 2005, the then "Kuali Project" has focused on developing an enterprise-level financial system based on Indiana University’s Financial Information System (FIS). Kuali’s initial product, the Kuali Financial System (KFS), incorporates the baseline FIS functionality and approved enhancements, in what has become the Kuali mold: a collaborative approach to design, an open development platform, and a web-based operating environment.
Investing partners/Leading Institutions:
Colorado State University
Cornell University
Indiana University*
Michigan State University
San Joaquin Delta College,
The University of Arizona
The University of California – Davis
The University of California - Irvine
The University of California – Santa Barbara
The University of Hawaii
The University of Southern California
NACUBO
The rSmart Group
*PI school: Bradley C. Wheeler, Indiana University, PI
Project Highlights:
1. On October 13, 2006, Kuali Financial Systems (KFS) Release 1.0 was released and made available for download and included the following functionality and components:
a. Chart of Accounts
b. General Ledger
c. 22 individual rules-driven financial transactions (E-Docs)
d. Kuali Nervous System
e. Kuali Enterprise Workflow
2. On July 1, 2007, Strathmore University in Nairobi, Kenya went live with KFS 1.0 for their financial system
3. On November 13, 2007, Kuali Financial Systems (KFS) Release 2.0 was released and made available for download and included the following functionality and components:
a. Enhancements to KFS Release 1.0 Chart of Accounts, General Ledger and financial transactions.
b. Integration of the new Kuali Rice components, specifically the Kuali Nervous System (KNS) and Kuali Enterprise Workflow (KEW)
c. Purchasing and Accounts Payable
d. Labor Distribution
e. Contracts and Grants
Milestones and Deliverables:
Last 12 months
1. With KFS Release 1.0 and 2.0, in addition to the code, the following additional items were delivered:
a. A comprehensive set of specifications, technical, and user documentation.
b. A complete set of configuration and setup instructions for successful installation of KFS.
c. Financial Policy Templates for institutions that need them.
d. “Financial Administrator Development Series” development materials for staff with fiduciary responsibilities at higher education institutions.
e. A complete list of third-party software contributors, acknowledgements, and licensing requirements.
2. With the assistance of the rSmart Group, Strathmore University, in Nairobi, Kenya, successfully implemented the Kuali Financials System in July, 2007.
3. In the fall of 2007, the KRA/KFS Integration Team was formed. This group made up of functional experts and technical representatives from KRA, KFS, and Kuali Rice identified key parts of each application that share data and services. Out of this group, several new enhancements have been proposed to improve the integration across Kuali applications making it an advantage to those institutions choosing to implement two or more Kuali systems. Resulting work from this group includes the kickoff of development of the Kuali Identity Management service (KIM) and the Kuali Organization Management service (KOM).
Next 12 months
1. KFS Release 2.2 patch is scheduled for March 2008. This release includes some performance enhancements with the financial documents and routing.
2. Kuali Days VI is scheduled for April 2008 in Chicago, IL
3. KFS Release 3.0 code freeze and QA Period will begin on 9/15/2008.
4. KFS Release 3.0 is scheduled for release on 12/15/2008. This release will contain improvements to the previous two releases in terms of performance, modularity, and overall code design leveraging the newest development from the Kuali Rice platform. KFS Release 3.0 will also contain the following new components:
a. Effort Reporting – a robust new set of functionality based on significant development written by the University of California Office of the President.
b. Budget Construction
c. Accounts Receivable
d. Capital Asset Management
e. Purchasing/Accounts Payable enhancements including the receiving module.
5. Kuali Days VII is scheduled for November 2008.
Community:
The bi-annual Kuali Days conferences have emerged as the primary community development events for Kuali and now have separate tracks for Financial Systems, Research Administration, Student and the Rice middleware. 320 people attended the most recent event in Tempe, AZ in November 2007 and the numbers would have exceeded that had the Foundation not chosen to close registration three weeks before the event because of fire marshal rules about meeting space limits. The most recent events were:
Kuali Days IV, May 21-22, 2007 St Louis, MO
Kuali Days V, November 13-14, 2007 Tempe, AZ
Future dates include:
Kuali Days VI, Chicago, IL, May 12-15
Kuali Days VI, TBD, Nov 2008
Another emerging activity are the Kuali Developer Boot Camps. The most recent was held Jan 22-26, 2008, on the Colorado State University campus in Fort Collins, CO. Initially, these were aimed at new developers being tendered by investing partners in the various Kuali initiatives, but it is now clear that there will be a need to serve developers from schools that are planning implementations.
In July, 2007, the University of Southern California was invited to join the KFS initiative as investing partners and tendered staff and cash to the Board. The USC partners selected one of their members to join the KFS Project Board as their voting member.
In November 2007, Colorado State University was invited to join the KFS initiative as investing partners and tendered staff and cash to the Board.
New Commercial affiliates have joined the Kuali Foundation within the past year including Huron Consulting Group, IBM, Exeter, and Syntel.
Sustainability:
The Kuali Foundation sought input on the issue of sustainability for Kuali Financial Systems and following is the proposed process:
Sustainability for Kuali Systems
Introduction
Sustainability of any software product is important to the purchasers and users of systems. Ultimately it will factor into the decision to purchase software from a vendor. Vendors typically promise ongoing releases of new and improved products. Such assurances by those with a business mission of software production and support can create a barrier for open source solutions. Although proponents of open source argue that these guarantees are ultimately a myth, the process for maintaining and improving software in open source needs to evolve and meet the need for sustainability.
Background
The Kuali Foundation is dedicated to the collaborative design and development of quality higher education administrative systems. To better reflect the collaborative nature of development and delivery, Kuali replaced the term “open” with “community.” Community Source means that institutions pool people and financial resources to create mutually beneficial software that can be shared. Collaborations such as Sakai, uPortal, and the Open Source Portfolio have demonstrated the success of community source approaches, but the Kuali Financial System, is the first in a line of core administrative systems. Future systems already under design will address research, student, and endowment management.
The Kuali Foundation has said that the systems created by Kuali will be quality systems that are maintained and improved upon. Although anyone can download and customize community source software, mission critical administrative systems like Kuali Financials must demonstrate that maintenance and improvements can be sustained within an uncompromised controlled environment. Kuali sustainability includes commitments of ongoing, periodic releases of functionality that can be depended on, that add value to institutions, and that meet any changes that have occurred from a compliance mandate. Sustainability is a feature of any software that should be addressed. However, because community source is not currently the perceived traditional software vendor route, sustainability must be rigorously tackled and demonstrated.
How will this be achieved?
The goal of achieving a process of sustainability for community source must include the unique characteristics that make community source attractive, as well as those nuances that have made the Kuali project successful. These distinctions have included:
· A team of functional experts that scopes and prioritizes all requirements
· An IT infrastructure that analyzes requirements for coding in order to ensure consistency and quality
· Review, approval and testing of functionality in the code by functional users
· Collaboration amongst multiple institutions with a focus on best practices that will satisfy most of higher education
· Free sharing of thoughts, ideas and code
· A Kuali user conference that allows for ongoing sharing of ideas and education of the system.
· A robust website to provide prospective users with functional and technical documentation; the ability to review the system on-line; and complete information about the systems and project.
These success factors must extend to ongoing customer service assistance for both technical and functional questions. The above must also appeal to those currently shopping for new systems and those planning a migration strategy to newer technology that will be available for the future. By having a well outlined process that meets these objectives, Kuali will be able to affirmatively say they have met the sustainability challenge.
A successful sustainability model for Kuali should include all of the following:
- Preparation for ongoing releases of financial software. These expected releases provide assurance to users that the software is well maintained, that it is evolving to be a better product, and that compliance issues are being addressed in releases. Specific importance needs to be placed on the following:
- Accounting standards
- Auditing standards
- Federal compliance guidelines affecting financials
- Security of data from external, and some internal, parties
- Greater efficiency and effectiveness of processes
- Continuing commitments by institutions using the system to provide ongoing committed developer resources to the project. Only through ongoing donation of developers, managed by the foundation, will the system be able to grow and provide enhancements that will make the system the best choice for higher education.
- The Kuali foundation must have a minimum number of developers on staff as Kuali employees who will provide the baseline changes to the system that meet mandates that come down from various federal agencies and accounting standard boards. These developers would also view donated code to make sure it adheres to the guidelines established by the Kuali Technical Council and to wrap and submit releases.
- Kuali must be open to accepting functionality developed by other institutions. As referred above, this code would have to be reviewed. But the essence of open source supports this donation process. Kuali Foundation must provide detailed documentation that outlines how code must be written and what framework should be followed. This framework should be advertised to put other institutions in a position to write code that meets the requirements. Donations that do not meet these standards should not be accepted.
- A Functional Council that addresses evolving business office needs. The Functional Council process that currently exists for the Kuali Financial System should evolve and exist after Release 3.0 of that system. A functional council is key and must:
a. Review and prioritize lists of needed functionality
b. Review and approve projects slated for development, either donated or Kuali staff developed
c. Vet donated code for functional efficiency and compliance
d. Facilitate and provide assistance with testing
e. Review and sign off on documentation
The Functional Council is donated resources which for this activity report to the Kuali Financial System Board. Expenditures for the KFFC will be financed by the Kuali Foundation.
The functional council chair should be a voting member of the Kuali Financial System Board.
- An organizational structure with staff who will provide ongoing annual conferences that service the needs of both functional and development staff.
- Commercial affiliates will provide a role in identifying functionality that is needed through their ongoing support of customers and implementations. A process will be available for commercial affiliates to provide donated resources to the Kuali Foundation for development, functional expertise, or donation of developed code.
Critical Mass must be achieved in order for the Kuali Financial System to be successful. Without a well documented sustainability model, too many doubts exist about the ongoing life of Kuali products. The model established by the Kuali Foundation to meet demands of sustainability is one that could be repeated across all Kuali products.
Executive Director, Kuali Foundation:
The Kuali Foundation is seeking to fill an Executive Director position. The ED is responsible for the successful planning and operations of the Kuali Foundation. He or she will develop priorities for the organization, create and implement plans, and coordinate programmatic initiatives, technology, and work effort across the various Kuali initiatives. He or she will develop and maintain effective partnerships with other organizations to foster interoperability and cohesion within the enterprise software development community. Also, the ED will manage the fiscal and human resources of the Foundation. The incumbent must be able to activate and organize the community in order to respond quickly to new challenges with well-conceived solutions that meet the needs of the Kuali Foundation members. The ED will have responsibility for maintaining and increasing the Kuali Foundation revenue. This will include communication with members, recruiting new members, and retaining existing members, as well as development of grant proposals.
A search committee was appointed at the Kuali Days event in Tempe. After a position description was created, the position was widely advertised nationally and applications have been accepted. A short list of candidates is to be interviewed in February with a goal of making an appointment in March, 2008.
Marketing/Evangelism:
As noted above, the Kuali Days events represent a focal point of community development, but there are several other avenues emerging to complement this. The Kuali Commercial Affiliates (KCAs) have been active in engaging prospective institutions that plan implementations. Some of the KCAs are doing cross marketing and cooperative efforts, while others pursue solo directions.
The appointment of the Executive Director will greatly focus the Kuali Foundations attention on marketing and evangelism.
Synergy with other projects:
The KFS Development Team is working with the Kuali Rice, Kuali Research Administration, and Kuali Student initiatives on integration solutions. Some specific areas that have already been identified as potential integration
Utilizing Sakai for online collaboration within the project
Would like to deliver uPortal portlets for KFS services in the future.
Would like to investigate the use of Fedora for document and image sharing.
