EIIF - Final report - suggestions for content and structure

Hi EIIFers.

Late as usual, but deadlines do tend to produce some kinds of results....

Suggestions for the contents of the final report of the EIIF XG.

My approach is strongly oriented to the role the proposed framework has 
within the existing sociotechnical context of W3C and its members.

The main two questions that we need to answer are:
 - is it meaningful/valuable to embark on an effort to define an EIIF?
     Is there a need?
     Can an initiative fulfill that (theoretical) need?
     Can it be successful in the competitive space of EM technologies?
   That is: answer the question: "why should I (company X) invest in this?"

 - is this something that W3C should do?
     What amount of effort will be required?
     Will it contribute to other ongoing work at W3C? (can it be a 
source of insights?)
     Could it attract new Members to W3C? (ref: the recent discussion 
about W3C finances!)
   That is: answer the question: "why should it be done within W3C?"

I send this as a draft that you can express approval for, suggest needed 
improvements, or tear to pieces.

I fully believe that we need to address questions like the ones below, 
even if we do not have to report them in the structure proposed below.

Regards,

/olle


==================================================================
"FINAL REPORT"
   Well, I mostly use the term "standard" below, and it is not always 
the best term.
   Opportunities for improvements ;-)

_________________________________
Executive summary

   (some usual stuff)

_________________________________
The Emergency Management Domain

   A general description that identifies the field in which the XG 
works. More
   specific information about the scope of the XG in the next section.

A description of the general area of emergency management (EM).
Societal costs of disasters and other emergencies can be huge.
Effective EM needs to be supported.
A classic case where cooperation between actors is of fundamental 
importance.
Actors are public sector agencies, commercial companies, NGOs, and even 
individuals can provide valuable support and assistance.
The need for international cooperation is becoming more urgent.

IT support is very much fragmented -- between agencies as well as within 
agencies.
Effective cooperative work must be supported by interoperable IT systems 
and platforms.

There are many technologies and standards that are either target or can 
be used in EM.
But there is a lack of interoperability between these, which causes 
cooperation to be suboptimal.

The XG has investigated/explored the area of standards and technologies, 
to determine whether there is an opportunity to enhance EM by specifying 
new standard(s) in the area.

The general objectives of the XG are:
 - ... (see the XG Charter)

This deliverable describes insights gained, conclusions arrived at, and 
recommendations for further work



_________________________________
The 3W area - scope

   A targeted description that identifies the scope of the area in which 
the XG
   works.

A critical and commonly needed area in terms of supportive information 
is the 3W area, which concerns information about ....
The XG has identified this as a suitable target for interoperability 
standards in the EM domain.

A more elaborate description of the 3W area is .....

This subset is a core component of the emergency information space.
It targets, among other things, the "people" aspect, which is one of the 
key objectives of any EM operation.
It has also relevance for other aspects of EM, like ....


_________________________________
The EM ecosystem

   A description of the "social" context in which we need to find 
support for
   further work in this area.

EM concerns a number of stakeholders, with different roles, objectives, 
and interests.
These form collectively the ecosystem in the EM domain.
Development of IT standards  must address the drivers and obstacles that 
influence practical adoption of such standards.
Successful standards take advantage of the interests (today as well as 
tomorrow) of these stakeholders.

The following major stakeholders are identified:
 - dedicated EM agencies at the national level .....
 - NGOs .....
 - EM interest organisation (at a national level: IG, forums, ...) ...
 - international coordination agents ...
 - IT industry as suppliers ....
 - etc

We should also highlight that the success of proposed standards is 
influenced by existing and emerging standards
The aspects of *compete* (could some other standard be negatively 
impacted by this new proposal, and if so would its supporters "go to 
war"?) versus *cooperate* (is some other standard compatible with the 
proposed new standard, so there is a win-win situation?)

An evaluation of the situation indicates that there is a clear potential 
for a successful standards proposal in 3W area, because ....


_________________________________
Existing standards and technology

   A short summary of the space of relevant standards. Mainly an 
inventory that
   identifies the specific standards and highlights their main purpose and
   scope.

The following standards are relevant for the 3W area:

STD-X:

 - focus ...
 - scope ...
 - created by ...
 - acceptance/use ...

STD-Y ...
...

 From the 3W point of view, the following can be said about their 
relevance for the target area: ...

There is a gap or mismatch ... which sheds light on the value of an 
interoperability framework.
The role of the framework is to ....


_________________________________
A draft model for the 3W area

   We describe in a short way the modelling results that we have 
achieved. The
   intension is to give a kind of executive overview of these results. 
There is
   a separate deliverable that provides more details.

The XG has performed modeling work, based on analysis of existing 
standards, to identify the critical generic entities, and how they are 
related.

An overview of this model is ....

A detailed description is found in: ....

_________________________________
Proposal for further work

   This is where we propose what further work to do within W3C. It could 
be a
   WG, targeting development of the EIIF framework. Or it could be as an IG,
   to create the community that could then propose a more elaborated
   description of a WG.

The results from this XG is a small proof of concept in the 3W domain.

It is promising, both in terms of the model that has been defined, and 
in terms of the experience-based belief that it is possible to create a 
more complete and encompassing interoperability framework.

A realistic proposal for further work is .....

The objectives are ...

Participants in this proposed work should include the following 
categories of stakeholders:
 - national EM agencies:  ...
 - NGOs: ...
 - industry: ...

Informal queries about interest for participation has resulted in 
positive responses from: 2 national EM agencies, 1 NGO, 3 industries, 2 
research ...


_________________________________
Use of W3C technologies

   Here we can sell it as something of value for the W3C Semantic Web 
Activity,
   perhaps.

Interoperability must be based on the conceptual level.
Semantic Web Technologies target that need.
The proposal for further work expects to build upon the following SemWeb 
technologies: .....


_________________________________
Governance of the EIIF

   As W3C in practice targets generic technologies (usable across many
   domains), we need to say something about the relationship between W3C and
   the result of a EIIF WG.

Valuable and successful standards in some application domain need to 
evolve, when the domains evolve, or when the way actors in the domain 
change their roles of ways of working. The typical need is the need to 
extend. to extend a standard, there needs to be a forum for managing 
this extension.

Standards and technologies in the EM domain are typically managed and 
governed in one of the following ways: ...

The proposed view is: W3C's role is to host the initial development of a 
core standard (EIIF). Once this has received approval (in what way?) by 
the stakeholders in the ecosystem, a governance strategy must be defined.

   Well, a strategy should be done before committing W3C resources. So 
how to
   handle this hen-and-egg situation?

This may be in terms of maintenance work done at W3C by stakeholders.
Or it could be done by transferring the standard to some other 
standardisation initiative.

   This is a tricky question, and should be managed somehow. Could be by us
   keeping a blind eye on this question and hope nobody raises issues. 
Or that
   we just suggest alternatives. Or that we somehow check with other
   initiatives whether they would be willing to take oven governance. 
But then
   we get the question: why not do all the work inside that initiative 
instead?



_________________________________
Summary

   Yes, something that matches the executive summary...


==================================================================

-- 
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Olle Olsson   olleo@sics.se   Tel: +46 8 633 15 19  Fax: +46 8 751 72 30
	[Svenska W3C-kontoret: olleo@w3.org]
SICS [Swedish Institute of Computer Science]
Box 1263
SE - 164 29 Kista
Sweden
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Received on Thursday, 21 August 2008 12:40:22 UTC