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• GÉANT OER update and ICT-22 call proposal - Peter Szegedi
  

  PS informed the TTC about a new call under the ICT programme (deadline - April next year), which is highly competitive, but relevant to possible continuation of the work that has been done so far in OER. At first, OER was a 9 month pilot that lead to a development of the aggregation engine and a portal, later picket up by GN4 - it is now a separate activity (SA8). It is expected to launch the OER portal by the end of the project. This area will not be funded in the 2nd phase of the GN4, but the service has more potential than a GN4 activity, so there is a need to look for funding elsewhere. PS is now working on creating a strong consortium, including commercials, libraries, universities that would create proposals - broader community needs to be involved.

  ICT is the closest opportunity to receive funding, however, there are other calls that are relevant and will be looked into. 

  
  
• TF-CPR update - Laura Dunford
  

  Task Force meeting was held in Cambridge in October. The members requested to have a clearer overview of other TFs and SIGs, on which LD gave a presentation. There was a brief discussion about a possibility that TF-CPR might have to become a SIG. Other discussions included Cloud Services (what is it that they need to know in order to be able to promote those services), raising the visibility of the trainings, maintaining websites and blogs, and the future of the PeaR community news (still generated in the old TERENA way).

  One of the issues raised was user outreach - Cambridge office described some of their work, which made it clear that there are too many projects for a few people to cover. TF members took a tour of the NOC to better understand what they want to promote. 

  Reporting mechanisms of the work should be more coordinated in the future. Some of the ideas: 5 min update, quarterly report, thematic updates, etc.

  
  
• REFEDS Update - Nicole Harris
  

  REFEDS SC had a discussion about the VAT issue - due to REFEDS being recognised as a separate entity from GEANT, the Dutch tax authorities require REFEDS to pay VAT retrospectively. That leads to the cut of 20% and therefore a smaller work plan with less MM. 

  REFEDS SC are trying to look for ways to bring more sponsors in - Jisc and CESNET agreed to contribute, but more financing still needed.

   PSz: Could GÉANT look into possible solutions? Perhaps change the status of REFEDS like GLIF has requested (for example, become a TF or SIG)?

  NC: SC wanted more information why it was decided, but GÉANT only provides a service for REFEDS, it is a separate global initiative.

  
  
• TF-MNM -MNM - Nicole Harris
  

  Decision has been made to let it run out next September, as the TF is effectively dead.

  
  

• Review of the slides on the Middleware issues - Peter Schober 

  PSc reviewed the work done in the Middleware area (action item 20150708-03). One of the attempts was community effort led by SURFnet, which proved to be not successful - perhaps the aims were not clear or it failed due to a general lack of interest. Other ideas were given up on, except of EduID.se and EduID.ch - common idea to expand the concept of federations, including the schools + after university (lifelong learning) - that brings some aspects of provisioning and pre-provisioning. One of the proposals is to create a task or subtask in REFEDS (or similar). 

  There are still ideas that has not been tried - those perhaps could be moved to the NREN level.

  Some of the reoccurring issues: authentication security, distance learning, guest accounts, connecting on mobile phones. 

   

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