Network Programme - Section 9

Infrastructure Planning

9.1 Structures and Actions

Below we set out the structures and activities associated with the infrastructural role of the Network of Excellence.

Newsletter - RENOIR will build on the existing Requirements Engineering Newsletter to provide an email based news service updating nodes on developments in requirements engineering, including network events, meetings organised by network nodes and so on. The editorial, technical and administrative support for the news service will be provided by the network coordinators.

Bulletin - In conjunction with the Newsletter a regular bulletin will be issued (and made available through WWW) providing abstracts from, and pointers to, publications and technical reports issued by network nodes. The bulletin will also carry charters, inventories and state-of-play reports from research area circles. The editorial, technical and administrative support for the bulletin will be provided by the network coordinators.

Network Services - A particular feature of RENOIR will be its use of Internet based services to support its primary activities. This involves a number of obvious tasks such as: maintaining a WWW site with information on RENOIR, on requirements engineering and with links to the sites maintained by network nodes; managing distribution and address lists; providing advice and guidance on infrastructure to less experienced nodes. We also plan to support the use of virtual spaces (MOOs) as a forum for research discussion in requirements engineering and to exploit recent developments in Internet based video-conferencing. We would expect to use these technologies on a limited basis initially, for example to support one research circle or a small tutorial, expanding if successful. Technical and administrative support for these services would be provided by the network coordinators.

Repositories - RENOIR will establish repositories containing: requirements engineering process models and methods that can be used by nodes; information and experiences related to the adoption of requirements engineering technology; prototypes and demos; training material.

9.2 Coordination

The responsibility for infrastructure is allocated to the infrastructure committee. They act through task groups associated with the actions described above and with the support of the network coordinators.

The policy of RENOIR is to place particular emphasis on Internet and electronically mediated services as described above. The objective of our infrastructure strategy is to ensure that access to one node gives access to the skills and knowledge available throughout RENOIR. We will measure our success in the creation of an appropriate infrastructure with respect to that objective.

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