e-Infrastructure Use Cases and Service Usage Models (eIUS) & Barriers to Uptake Matthew Mascord eIUS Project Manager/Analyst NGS Users Forum, OeRC, 19 June 2007

What is e-Infrastructure? “Currently, research is increasingly carried out through distributed regional, national and global collaborations enabled by the Internet. A feature of such collaborations is that they are built upon an infrastructure, comprising of grid computing software, which can provide researchers with shared access to large data collections, advanced ICT tools for data analysis, large scale computing resources, and high performance visualisation, among other examples. e-Infrastructure is the term used for the technology and organisations that support research undertaken in this way. It embraces networks, grids, data centres and collaborative environments, and can include supporting operations centres, service registries, single-sign on, certificate authorities, training and help-desk services. Most importantly, it is the integration of these that defines e- Infrastructure.” - JISC Website (2007)

Previous Work – Differing Perspectives ● Disciplinary coverage. ● Timescale ● Informing specific service provision. ● Component of research lifecycle e.g. Resource discovery

OSI e-Infrastructure Working Group “A vision for UK e- Infrastructure”

SUPER Newhouse, S, Schopf, J.M., Richards, A, and Atkinson, M (2007) Study of User Priorities for e-Infrastructure for e- Research (SUPER)

RIN Study RIN mission: “To lead and co-ordinate new developments in the collaborative provision of research information for the benefit of researchers in the UK"

Intute Requirements Study Wilson, JAJ and Fraser, M. (2006) Intute: Supporting the Research Community – requirements report

Discipline Specific Studies ● AHDS e-Science Scoping Survey ● AHRC e-Science Research workshops ● AHRC/EPSRC e- Science demonstrators ● ESRC Scoping Studies Greek inscription from the island Rhodes © Centre for the Study of Ancient Documents, University of Oxford

eIUS: e-Infrastructure Use Cases and Service Usage Models ● Gathering concrete evidence. ● Interviews ● Focus groups ● Talk aloud observation ● Written up as Experience Reports

eIUS Proposed Methodology

Barriers to Uptake of e- Infrastructure Services “Why people are not using e- Infrastructure like the NGS?”

Tackling Barriers ● Outreach and Engagement ● Education and Training ● Informing/influencing: – Service Provision – Influencing Technical Development – Influencing Socio-Political Context

Deliverables of Interest ● Analysis of Barriers and Usage, State of Adoption Report ● Training Recommendations – Provision Survey – Gap Analysis ● UK ‘one-stop-shop’ – Event Scheduling and Advertising System – UK Repository of Support Material for Communities – UK Support Contact System ● Training Events and Material

Benefits to the Communities ● Research Community (the 'users') – Understanding of what is available – improved services and tools – better training and education ● Service providers – Understanding of how researchers actually use services – better understanding of needs – increased uptake of services ● Training providers – better understanding of needs – training material ● Funders – Increased engagement with research community – Identication of gaps in service provision

Questions and Discussion ● For example, – How would NGS users like to be involved? – What do you see the benefits are for yourselves, if any? – Do you agree/disagree with the outlined methodology of these two projects? – What could the project do to effectively engage with early adopters such as yourselves? Contact Details eIUS: ● URL: ● Discussion List: ● Barriers: ● URL: Images copyright their respective owners: Science & Technology Facilities Council; Robert Scarth; Duncan Hall; University of Oxford; Bryan Fenstermacher; -Kj (Flickr ID); The University of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada; Frenkieb (Flickr ID); Centre for the Study of Ancient Documents, University of Oxford