To everyone involved in supporting, developing and using Sahana software, I wanted to wish you a very happy holiday season and Happy New Year!
2012 was a banner year for the Sahana Software Foundation. We saw incredible growth in the adoption and acceptance of open source solutions for disaster information management on the part of governments and charitable humanitarian organizations, including and especially our own Sahana software products. This growth has brought positive change to our community and how we approach new opportunities for helping communities and organizations in need. Some of the highlights for me (and in no particular order):
- Our response to Hurricane Sandy, supporting the City of New York, Occupy Sandy, and numerous other community-based organizations.
- Our annual meeting held in New York, which brought our community together (at my home!) with a shared vision on our priorities for the next year.
- Our SahanaCamp NYC, which introduced Sahana Eden to a large number of local organizations, (now paying dividends during our Hurricane Sandy response).
- The growth of IFRC’s Resource Management System into a global system for all Red Cross national societies.
- Our work with the Missing Persons Community of Interest – which seeks to coordinate solutions development for missing and found persons applications between solutions providers and stakeholders.
- Having SSF Join the Open Source Initiative and OASIS.
- Our leadership in helping to organize the third Grace Hopper Celebration Open Source Day – held in October.
- Our March Sahanathon – a weekend of hacking on a solution to support SSF
- Another amazing Google Summer of Code and Google Code-In!
- The launch of our own Sahana internship program.
- Our EU-funded EUROSHA pilot program to introduce Sahana Eden to four disaster prone African countries.
I’m sure I have missed many other excellent and important accomplishments during the year. Please share your favorite moments in the comments to this post.
2013 promises to bring incredible new opportunities for SSF. There are several new projects that we will be starting next year for a diverse set of customers – including ongoing work for Occupy Sandy and other community based groups in the northeast United States, two projects for a public health agency and a public-private partnership on the West Coast of the United States, and several international opportunities. We will challenged by the need to grow and professionalize our organization rapidly and effectively while continuing to do what we do best: build the best open source software for disaster management on the planet.
Thank you all for what you have done to make Sahana software what it is today.
Since Hurricane Sandy struck New York almost 2 months ago, I have been going (almost) non-stop. So I am taking the rest of the year off to catch up with my family and address other things on my personal to do list. So I will be signing off until 2013. There will be no e-mail, no IRC, no IM, no twitter, no nothing. I will be incommunicado until January 2. My vacation responder is already on…
Have a Happy New Year!
Go forth and do good!
Mark