Periodic Reporting for period 2 - EOSC Enhance (Enhancing the EOSC portal and connecting thematic clouds)
Reporting period: 2020-12-01 to 2021-11-30
EOSC Enhance is a 24-month project funded by the European Commission and tasked with progressing the vision for the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC). Before the start of the EOSC Enhance project, the EOSC Portal incorporated different components developed around two separated sections, the EOSC Portal catalogue, built on the outcomes of the eInfraCentral project and the EOSC Portal Marketplace, mainly resulting from the work of the EOSC-Hub project. The project will work to develop and improve the functionality of the current manifestation of EOSC - the EOSC Portal, further augmenting the catalogue of services assembled to date, and connecting independent, thematic data clouds for the benefit of users and service providers across Europe.The project will pursue the following main objectives.
Objective 1: Enhance the service provider interface and incorporate new services and resources into the EOSC catalogue.
Objective 2: Accelerate the deployment and uptake of EOSC services and resources.
Objective 3: Increase user demand for EOSC services and resources via portal improvements and development.
Objective 4: Enable easier access to thematic clouds services and data.
Objective 1: Enhance the service provider interface and incorporate new services and resources into the EOSC catalogue.
Objective 2: Accelerate the deployment and uptake of EOSC services and resources.
Objective 3: Increase user demand for EOSC services and resources via portal improvements and development.
Objective 4: Enable easier access to thematic clouds services and data.
In the initial phase of EOSC Enhance, significant effort was devoted in integrating the different sections of the EOSC portal under a new unified architecture. An overview of the main results is shown in the attached figure. This included the analysis of specifications and requirements leading to the creation of new profile models used to describe the heterogeneous resources offered via the Portal. A common onboarding process was defined, among other key enhancements and improvements in functionalities towards the providers of the EOSC portal as well as the end users. The work of EOSC Enhance was carried out through the regular interactions and discussions with a wide range of EOSC stakeholders and projects in different groups and fora, and information on the progresses of the project were constantly disseminated across the EOSC community by using different communication channels. The mentioned advancements allowed to achieve the successful launch of the EOSC Enhance Software Release 1, a new version of the EOSC Portal gone into production in November 2020.
In its second and last year EOSC Enhance will build on the foundations key achievements delivered in its first year to discuss future enhancements with the wider EOSC community that will be invited to express their needs during a new iteration of the Requirements Gathering campaign.
EOSC Enhance is committed to work in close collaboration and synergy with new Infraeos-03 and -07 projects for iterative improvement of the process, prioritisation and implementation.
Due to the start of the new phase in EOSC and the transition to a new governance system under the lead of the EOSC Association, EOSC Enhance will actively participate in the discussions, decisions and actions affecting the development and maintenance of the EOSC Portal. The project confirms its commitment in aligning, as far as possible, planned tasks to the emerging needs of the EOSC community at large and to the changes of this evolving system. EOSC Enhance, has its main focus on the EOSC Portal Software Release 2 in 2021, which will include regular minor bug-fixing releases and 2 major new releases (mid 2021, end of 2021) with new functionalities for providers and end users.
EOSC Enhance is committed to work in close collaboration and synergy with new Infraeos-03 and -07 projects for iterative improvement of the process, prioritisation and implementation.
Due to the start of the new phase in EOSC and the transition to a new governance system under the lead of the EOSC Association, EOSC Enhance will actively participate in the discussions, decisions and actions affecting the development and maintenance of the EOSC Portal. The project confirms its commitment in aligning, as far as possible, planned tasks to the emerging needs of the EOSC community at large and to the changes of this evolving system. EOSC Enhance, has its main focus on the EOSC Portal Software Release 2 in 2021, which will include regular minor bug-fixing releases and 2 major new releases (mid 2021, end of 2021) with new functionalities for providers and end users.