DoD Open Technology Development: Lessons Learned & Best Practices 2011

The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) Open Technology Development (OTD) process is an approach to software/system development in which developers in different military, federal, commercial and possibly public organizations can collaboratively develop and maintain software or a system in a decentralized fashion. OTD depends on open standards and interfaces, open source software and designs, collaborative and distributed online tools, and technological agility. This report documents best practices at all stages of the OTD process.

This report briefly explains the context for Open Technology Development (OTD) and why it is
important to the U.S. military. It lays out the concrete steps for establishing, managing and
distributing OTD projects within the government. Then it identifies programmatic procedures for
OTD, including analyses of alternatives, the Request for Information/Request for Proposal (RFI/RFP) process, evaluating proposals, source selection, contracting language, and acceptance/approval criteria for deliverables. Finally, it deals with life-cycle management: transition, operations and maintenance, and leveraging a developer community for ongoing development.

See the full report at http://www.oss-institute.org/OTD2011/OTD-lessons-learned-military-FinalV1.pdf