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UID:pretalx-adass2026-F8FNGH@pretalx.adass.org
DTSTART;TZID=AWST:20261102T114500
DTEND;TZID=AWST:20261102T120000
DESCRIPTION:The Square Kilometre Array Observatory (SKAO) is a geographical
 ly distributed scientific programme involving hundreds of scientists\, sys
 tems engineers\, software developers\, operators\, and stakeholders across
  multiple countries and organisations. Developing software at this scale p
 resents not only technical challenges\, but also challenges in building an
 d maintaining a shared understanding of systems\, priorities\, risks\, and
  responsibilities across diverse communities.\n\nOver multiple Planning In
 crements (PIs)\, we found that conventional artefacts such as requirements
  documents\, Jira tickets\, planning boards\, architectural diagrams\, and
  status reports were often insufficient to communicate the relationships a
 nd dependencies inherent in a complex observatory software ecosystem. Diff
 erent stakeholders frequently possessed different mental models of the sam
 e problem\, leading to misalignment despite access to the same information
 .\n\nThese visual artefacts were applied throughout the software lifecycle
  -from onboarding new team members and communicating software architecture
  to Programme Increment planning\, capacity allocation\, dependency manage
 ment\, release coordination\, subsystem interaction modelling\, operationa
 l architecture\, non-functional requirements\, and clarifying roles and re
 sponsibilities. Each visual was created to simplify a specific communicati
 on challenge by making complex relationships easier to understand and disc
 uss.\n\nThe work presented is not intended as an alternative to existing s
 oftware engineering practices or tools\, but rather as a complementary col
 laboration technique for large scientific software projects. As astronomy 
 software ecosystems continue to grow in complexity and scale\, visual thin
 king offers a lightweight yet effective way to help distributed communitie
 s answer a fundamental question:\nAre we all looking at the same sky?
DTSTAMP:20261001T111331Z
LOCATION:Banquet Hall
SUMMARY:Seeing the Same Sky: Visual Thinking as a Collaboration Tool in the
  SKAO - Snehal Valame
URL:https://pretalx.adass.org/adass2026/talk/F8FNGH/
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