[med-svn] r5549 - trunk/community/papers/11_med-floss_luxemburg
Andreas Tille
tille at alioth.debian.org
Thu Dec 9 08:14:55 UTC 2010
Author: tille
Date: 2010-12-09 08:14:44 +0000 (Thu, 09 Dec 2010)
New Revision: 5549
Modified:
trunk/community/papers/11_med-floss_luxemburg/paper-text.tex
Log:
Applied extensive patch with enhancements from Michael Hanke with small changes (Many thanks Michael!)
Modified: trunk/community/papers/11_med-floss_luxemburg/paper-text.tex
===================================================================
--- trunk/community/papers/11_med-floss_luxemburg/paper-text.tex 2010-12-09 08:02:47 UTC (rev 5548)
+++ trunk/community/papers/11_med-floss_luxemburg/paper-text.tex 2010-12-09 08:14:44 UTC (rev 5549)
@@ -8,17 +8,17 @@
this software in Debian GNU/Linux. It has shown that the \DebianMed
project has a positive effect for the cooperating upstream projects.
- The fields molecular biology and medical imaging were covered quite
- good with Free Software solutions and there are even Free Software
- projects to manage a medical practice. The \DebianMed project tries
- to be the missing link between developers and users to support Free
- Software solutions for all areas in medicine.
+ The fields molecular biology and medical imaging had a number of
+ high-quality Free Software solutions and there are even Free Software
+ projects to help managing a medical practice. The \DebianMed project tries
+ to serve as the link between developers and users to support Free
+ Software solutions for all fields of medicine.
\DebianMed is intended to be useful for service providers who want
to distribute their free or proprietary solutions in medical care.
- The whole project is embeded into the Debian Pure Blends framework
- as well as Debian Edu, Debian Science and others.
+ The whole project is embedded into the Debian Pure Blends framework
+ alongside Debian Edu, Debian Science and others.
\end{abstract}
@@ -28,20 +28,20 @@
The advent of \DebianMed is characterised by the rise of several new
Free Software projects that were useful for certain tasks in medical
-care. Several of these projects -- even if looking promising in the
-beginning -- do not really exist any more because they did not
-respected the principle of Free Software: care for a solid user base
+care. Several of these projects -- even if promising in the
+beginning -- do not exist any more because they did not
+obeyed the principle of Free Software: care for a solid user base
and recruit qualified developers from it. This task is one of the
hardest in the field of health care: there is a much smaller number of
users for such specific software compared to a web browser or an
office suite.
-A big problem was that it was quite hard to obtain solid information
-about all these projects. Some engaged users tried to assemble lists
-of these projects and published these in the web. While those lists
-are an interesting start they are finally not really helpful for
-users: Users just need ready to run programs with no effort to obtain
-and install the software. The idea of \DebianMed was now to provide
+Obtaining reliable information about all these projects is a big problem
+Some enthusiastic users tried to assemble lists
+of these projects and published these on the web. While those lists
+are an interesting start they are ultimately not really helpful for
+users: Users just need readily usable programs without having to make efforts to obtain
+and install software. The idea of \DebianMed was to provide
not only a list but exactly what users need.
@@ -50,49 +50,49 @@
Common programs like a web server, or a mail user agent are installed
on most computers and have a very large user base. Knowing this, many
gifted programmers feel obliged for this kind of Free Software - they
-just need it for their own and thus feel motivated to spend their time
+just need it for themselves and thus feel motivated to spend their time
on it.
-The fact that a piece of software is needed for the own work is often
+The fact that a piece of software is needed for ones own work is often
the basic motivation to write Free Software. Biological software is
-often developed by scientists themselves because they are the only
-persons who have the needed insight in the topic. Many authors of
-this software just realised the profit they might gain to share the
-code and thus the field of biology is really well covered with Free
+often developed by scientists because they are the only
+persons who have the needed insight in a particular topic. Many authors of
+such software realised the profit they might gain from sharing their
+code and thus the field of biology is really well covered by Free
Software.
-Another quite well covered part of \DebianMed is medical imaging.
-Even if there are quite important packages like Bio Image Suite
-\cite{bioimagesuite:2008} not yet packaged for Debian first steps are
+Another quite well equipped part of \DebianMed is medical imaging.
+Even if important packages like Bio Image Suite
+\cite{bioimagesuite:2008} are not yet packaged for Debian, first steps are
done and there is quite a variety of DICOM viewers and development
-tools as well as other software which is very useful in medical
+tools as well as other software which is of particular utility in medical
imaging.
-The field of patient management and medical health record applications
-which is considered by most people as the basic health care software.
-Currently the only representative of this software which is
-included into Debian is GNUmed \cite{gnumed:2008}. It has turned out
-that there are a lot of similar Free Software projects that try to
-solve more or less the same problem but diverge in the techniques used
+Medical health record applications in patient management
+are considered essential by most people.
+Currently, the only representative of this software
+included in Debian is GNUmed \cite{gnumed:2008}. It has turned out
+that there are numerous similar Free Software projects that try to
+solve more or less the same problem, but diverge in implementation details
(programming language, database server, etc.), user interface (GUI or
-web application) and the basic ideas about work flow and philosophy. It
-is planed to include those alternatives that fit Debian quality
-standards and look promising regarding longevity of the project.
+web application) and basic concepts of work flow and philosophy. It
+is planned to include those alternatives that fit Debian's quality
+standards and look promising regarding the longevity of the respective project.
-In addition to GNUmed Debian has packaged the pharmaceutical drugs
+In addition to GNUmed, Debian has packaged the pharmaceutical drugs
prescriptor and interactions checker FreeDiams \cite{freediams:2010}
-which can also run standalone or in connection with other medical
+which can run standalone or in connection with other medical
health record applications.
-The even larger task to manage a hospital is also tackled by several
-projects and the most famous one OpenVista\cite{openvista:2008} as a
-real enterprise grade health care information system is a really
-complex project and needs a stronger team than the current \DebianMed
-team with a larger technical background in the specific techniques
-used in OpenVista. To overcome this problem the strategy of
+An even larger task, managing a hospital is also tackled by several
+projects and the most famous is OpenVista\cite{openvista:2008}. As an
+enterprise grade health care information system it is rather
+complex and needs a dedicated maintenance team beyond \DebianMed,
+with a strong technical background and familiarity with the peculiarities of
+OpenVista. To overcome this problem, the strategy of
\DebianMed is to try to involve the upstream authors into the
packaging. This has happened in August 2009 and we are positive that
-we will see OpenVista in Debian at some point in time.
+we will see OpenVista in Debian at some point in the future.
Another application for hospital management is
OpenMRS\cite{openmrs:2010} which is in preparation of being included
@@ -106,97 +106,97 @@
The Debian Project is an association of individuals who share the
intention to create the best possible free operating system. This
-operating system that is created is called Debian GNU/Linux, or simply
-Debian for short. Everybody in the internet may initiate a site and
-offer packages for the installation in Debian. A local administrator
+operating system is called Debian GNU/Linux, or simply
+Debian. Everybody on the internet may initiate a site and
+offer Debian packages. A local administrator
has to decide, if this public source may be trusted.
-For Free Software development to work it requires a critical mass of
+For Free Software development to work, it requires a critical mass of
supporters. Development without feedback prior to the submission of
the final product is disadvantageous. The development of programs is
not the main concern of a regular Linux Distribution. However, with
the focus on Free Software and smooth local compilation, Debian
considerably eases the contribution of comments and concise feedback
-of the technically skilled early adopters. Debian such helps to bring
+of the technically skilled early adopters. Debian helps to bring
developers and users of applications together.
\subsubsection{Debian Policy}
-All GNU/Linux distributions have a certain amount of common ground,
-and the \printurl{www.linuxbase.org/}{Linux Standard Base}
-(LSB)\cite{lsb} is attempting to develop and promote a set of
-standards that will increase compatibility among Linux distributions,
-hereby enabling software applications to run on any compliant system.
-The very essence of any distribution is the choice of {\itshape policy
- statements\/}.
+To a certain degree all GNU/Linux distributions are similir.
+The \printurl{www.linuxbase.org/}{Linux Standard Base}
+(LSB)\cite{lsb} is an attempt to develop and promote a set of
+standards aiming to further increase compatibility among Linux distributions,
+thereby enabling software applications to run on any compliant system.
+The very essence of a particular distribution is its {\itshape policy
+ document\/}.
While every single maintainer of a Debian package has to build the
-package in compliance with the policy he has the ability and the right
-to decide which software is worth packaging. Normally maintainers
-choose the software which is used in their own work and they are free
+package in compliance with the policy, he has the ability and the right
+to decide which software is worth packaging. Usually maintainers
+choose software that they used in their own work and they are free
to move the development of Debian in a certain direction (as long as
they follow the rules of the policy). This is referred to as {\em
- Do-o-cracy} in Debian which means: The doer decides what is done.
+ Do-o-cracy} in Debian and refers to the fact that: The one who does something
+ decides what is done and how it is done.
\subsubsection{Active influence of small groups}
This {\em Do-o-cracy} principle enables individuals or small groups to
-influence actively the support of certain work fields. While company
-driven Linux distributions somehow have to compete in market relevant
-fields with other distributors a pure community driven distribution
-which has no specific need to support basically mainstream software.
+actively influence the support of certain work fields. While company-driven
+Linux distributions somehow have to compete in market-relevant
+fields with other distributors, a purely community-driven distribution
+has no specific need to support basically mainstream software. % I don't get it
Debian Med is actively profiting from this fact and is supporting a
-lot of applications which are very specific to medical care which are
-not contained in any large distribution.
+lot of applications which are very specific to medical care and are
+not integrated in any other large distribution.
The advantage of plugging Free Medical Software directly into a large
-Linux distribution over creating a separate distribution with a
+Linux distribution as opposed to creating a separate distribution with a
specific focus on medical care will be discussed below.
\subsection{Technological infrastructure of Debian}
\subsubsection{Bug tracking system}
-Users should give immediate feedback about problems arising in using a
+Users should be able to give immediate feedback about problems affecting a
package. They always have the choice of reporting these to the
upstream developer, usually per email. A particular strength of
\printurl{www.sourceforge.net}{SourceForget.net} is to bring users of
a particular software together. Earlier than this effort was the
\printurl{www.debian.org/Bugs}{Debian Bug Tracking System} (BTS). The
-maintainer of a software can decide if the bug should be forwarded to
-the upstream developers of the package or if it is fixed by
-himself. All problems are made public and hence the whole community
+maintainer of a software can decide if a bug should be forwarded to
+the upstream developers of the package or if it can be fixed by
+himself. All problems are made public, and hence the whole community
may contribute to solving a particular issue.
In the case of Free Medical Software the upstream projects frequently
-do not feature such a bug tracking system. Thus the inclusion of such
-software into Debian adds extra value to the project because users can
-report issues via the Debian BTS and the maintainer of the package
-works as proxy to contact the software authors. For the user this has
-the comfort of a consistent bug reporting interface and the software
+do not feature a bug tracking system. Thus the inclusion of such
+software into Debian adds extra value to the project, because users can
+report issues via the Debian BTS and the maintainer of a package
+works as a proxy to the software authors. For a user this has
+the benefit of a consistent bug reporting interface and software
authors might get extra technical information provided by the Debian
-maintainer who is supposed to have decent technical knowledge.
+maintainer who generally has decent technical knowledge.
\subsubsection{Quality Assurance}
-To assure a constant quality Debian has several technical means which
-are for instance:
+Debian has several technical means to assure a constant high level of quality:
\begin{description}
\item[Autobuilders] There are periodical tests to rebuild all
- software which should be included in the future release. This
+ software targeting a future release. This
verifies compilation against recent build tools and might uncover
- technical problems in the software. This is an additional check
+ technical problems in software. This is an additional check
to the build daemons mentioned below.
- \item[Automated upgrade checks] Before a the a new version of Debian
- will be released automatic tests are done where every single
+ \item[Automated upgrade checks] Before a new version of Debian
+ is released, automated tests are done, where every single
package will be automatically installed into a clean stable system
of the last published Debian release and then the system will be
upgraded to the future stable release. This makes sure that new
Debian releases can be rolled out smoothly in release critical
applications.
- \item[Package Installation and Deinstallation] The tool piuparts
+ \item[Package Installation and De-installation] The tool piuparts
tests that .deb packages (as used by Debian) handle installation,
upgrading, and removal correctly. It does this by creating a
minimal Debian installation in a chroot, and installing,
@@ -206,15 +206,15 @@
\subsubsection{Build daemons}
-Sites external to the Debian main distribution may offer packages only
-for a subset of architectures. The Debian main distribution, however,
+Sites external to the Debian main repository may offer packages only
+for a subset of architectures. The Debian main archive, however,
automatically compiles software for all 13 architectures that are
-supported by the Debian effort. To get a package into Debian, be it
+supported by Debian. To get a package into Debian, be it
novel or an update of an existing package, the maintainer of a package
-submits the source code of the program together with his changes on
-the code to create the package. The build daemons (or autobuilders)
+submits the source code of the program together with his modifications
+of the code to create a package. The build daemons (or autobuilders)
compile the packages for each of the supported systems and make the
-resulting package publicly available for download. Logs of the build
+resulting binary package publicly available for download. Logs of the build
platforms are available online for everybody's inspection.
@@ -223,7 +223,7 @@
Debian contains more than 20000 binary packages, and this number is
constantly increasing. There is no single user who needs all these
-packages. The regular user is interested in a subset of these
+packages. The typical user is interested in a subset of these
packages. To specify packages of one's particular interest, several
options are provided by Debian:
\begin{description*}
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