1. European e-Infrastructure Services Gateway (eInfraCentral)
Goals and vision for a joint service catalogue
Krakow, 29 September 2016
Alasdair Reid, Policy Director, EFIS Centre

2. What is eInfraCentral ?
A coordination and support action – selected for funding under the INFRASUPP call of Horizon 2020.
A 30 month project implemented by a partnership of 9 organisations including 5 major e-infrastructures
Expected start date: End 2016

3. Why eInfraCentral
In the context of ‘open science’ agenda there is a need to capitalise on past e- infrastructure investments and develop an ‘e-infrastructure commons’
Project addresses two key obstacles to e-infrastructure development:
Dispersed and non-harmonised presentation of services
Poor discoverability of services
One of two inter-linked CSA projects funded under INFRASUPP (other is for Policy support to e-IRG secretariat led by LUH), einfraCentral responds to second topic:
dissemination and collaboration activities for information sharing among projects and stakeholders, through the development of a web-portal to convey updated information on the evolution of e-infrastructures and the integration and potential reshuffling of the services catalogues offered by e-infrastructures as well as service-related KPIs and costs.
The portal will also support monitoring activities on the take-up of open science and e- infrastructures policies

4. eInfraCentral’s mission
To ensure that, by 2020 a broader and more varied set of users (including industry) discovers and accesses the existing and developing e-infrastructure capacity.
A common approach to defining and monitoring e- infrastructures services will increase the uptake of and enhance understanding of where improvements can be made in delivering e-infrastructure services

5. Three core objectives for eInfraCentral
1. Structure an open and guided discussion between e-infrastructures to consensually define a common catalogue for their services.
2. Develop a single entry point (one-stop shop) for end users to browse the service catalogue, and enhance the monitoring of key performance indicators that focus on availability and quality of services and user satisfaction.
3. Draw policy and sustainability lessons for the future development of a European e-infrastructure ‘market place’ as an extension of the common service catalogue and portal so that it includes a much broader range of e-infrastructures and services.

6. Project activities and timeline

7. Interlinkages between core activities

8. Key highlights of the project
A ‘co-design’ process will involve funders (the European Commission, etc.), the (e-)research infrastructure community and a representative user group. This virtual ecosystem will be engaged in a consultation process through interviews, surveys and workshop and partnering events. The consultation findings will feed into a revised categorisation and related KPIs for e- infrastructures services;
On-going user interaction will also guide the design and development of the eInfraCentral portal. The portal will be developed in two phases (fast prototyping with a first set of services deployed, and the full release of a complete web portal, dashboard and collaborative e-tools) to become the main entry point to European e-infrastructures services;
Service catalogue alignment will be facilitated by drawing on experience of developing FitSM standards to develop a standardised service portfolio definition.

9. First steps Grant agreement signature and launch – by end 2016.
Project advisory board set-up and liaison with e-IRG work planned (end 2016).
Working groups and consultation with users from January onwards, including launch of survey on requirements
Assessment user group established (spring 2017)
Service catalogue portal prototype release (summer 2017)