OpenMRS from Scratch
The goal of this page is to help you understand what it takes to implement OpenMRS. If you are already beginning an implementation and would like more detailed advice, see the Field Guide.
Staff Requirements
Primary implementer
Skills needed
One dedicated IT person for at least two or three months, usually full time. They need to know the whole stack (server maintenance, MySQL, Tomcat, Java, etc.) The level of expertise you need on site depends in part on whether or not you have the Internet to get help from online resources or remote developers.
Tomcat expertise
Install and manage Apache Tomcat
Upload and install new WAR files
Troubleshoot, read log files
Database expertise
Install and manage MySQL environment
Understand the OpenMRS data model
Metadata configuration e.g. locations, addresses, patient IDs, programs, relationships.
Understand the capabilities of the module functionality
Perform SQL queries and run SQL scripts
Clinical form design
Understand how to create meaningful, useful, and non-ambiguous questions/answers
Medical expertise – to understand what questions/answers make sense, what's clinically relevant
Technical expertise – to understand how questions/answers can be interpreted by a computer
Data management expertise – to understand how questions/answers will be used for reporting, research, etc.
Concept dictionary design
Concept dictionary management – understand the process of creating/modifying new concepts.
Ability to infer dictionary concepts from a form (both coded questions and answers), modeling expertise – e.g., do you create