The road-runner rules. How constraints can drive community innovation.

The great animator Chuck Jones wrote a list of 9 unbreakable rules (http://www.knowable.com/a/legendary-cartoonist-chuck-jones-reveals-the-9-rules) for the road runner, a character that went on to be wildly popular. Their simplicity and clarity is a testament to how the creative mind can be channeled when constraints are applied. 

In the world of design the idea of applying constraints to nurture innovation is universally understood. In our community, however, I often hear the reverse. That if we constrain developers they will (pick one), be demotivated, go elsewhere, develop a competing solution, stop contributing. But is this really true? 

This session tells the story of how many vital and fast growing projects, in the Drupal world and in other open-source communities, have thrived not despite but because they applied rigid design constraints on themselves. It details how those constraints were arrived at, how they were applied and what they achieved. Finally it shifts focus to Drupal core, pointing out some of the places where we are effectively applying the principle, as well as places where we could do more.

Attendees of all levels will learn some broad principles of design and innovation and hopefully be inspired to apply some of these ideas to their own projects and contributions to Drupal.