WP2 ECOLEAD

1
Hamideh Afsarmanesh University of Amsterdam
General meeting Rome, 11 January 2005
2
WP2 OBJECTIVES SCOPE
- Identification of VBEs constituting elements
and required functionality - Provision of
adequate models, ICT facilitating tools, and
methodologies - Establishing proper operational
environment for the entire life cycle of the
VBEs -Interaction / inter-linking with the PVCs
and Dynamic VO management
Establish a VBE reference model and an
innovative VBE management system
3
VO CREATION AND VBE
VO
far more costly far less efficient
Opportunity driven
VBE
Controlled Border Universe
Long-term strategy
Open Universe
4
VBE - BASELINE AND THE VISION
THEN
Replicable Breeding Environment
NOW
Cluster of organizations
Well-founded reference framework Management of
daily activities Governing policies Remotely
accessible services Controlled emerging
behavior Re-utilizable bag of tools Social
responsibility
Ad-hoc industry based No interoperability No
reference model Ill-understood behavior Lack of
support services ...
5
WP2 MACRO SCHEDULE
M1 (Month 12) Deliverables D21.1, D21.2, and
D23.1
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VBE - AIMED INNOVATION

• Developing new approaches to live research
  topics
• VBE reference model and management system
• VBE Ontology construction/evolution/integration
• Organization competency framework management
• Trust establishment
• Supporting Value systems / metrics
• Facilitation of launching VOs

7
AIMED INNOVATION EXTERNAL RESEARCH TRENDS
8
VBE - AIMED INNOVATION - 2 EXTERNAL
RESEARCH TRENDS

• VBE reference model and management system
• VBE Ontology construction/evolution/integration
• Handling competency/resources
• Trust establishment
• Supporting Value systems / metrics
• Facilitation of launching VOs

• Static and dynamic directories
• Information retrieval through the web
• Topic detection for organization of partners
  information
• Manual information acquisition
• - Q. Wang, Y Kaing An Ontology-Based
  Binary-Categorization Approach for Recognizing
  Multiple-Record Web Documents Using a
  Probabilistic Retrieval Model Journal of
  information retrieval, Kruwer academic
  publishers, Netherlands, issue 6, page 295332,
  2003
• - J. Makkonen, H. Ahonen-Myka, M. Salmenkivi
  Simple Semantics in Topic Detection and Tracking
  Journal of information retrieval, Kruwer academic
  publishers, Netherlands, issue 6, page 295332,
  2003

9
VBE - AIMED INNOVATION - 3 EXTERNAL
RESEARCH TRENDS

• VBE reference model and management system
• VBE Ontology construction/evolution/integration
• Handling competency/resources
• Trust establishment
• Supporting Value systems / metrics
• Facilitation of launching VOs

• Trust acquisition mechanisms
• Previous collaborations and performance
  measurements
• - B. Esfandiari, S. Chandrasekharan On How
  Agents Make Friends Mechanisms for Trust
  Acquisition In proceedings of the 4th workshop
  on Deception, fraud and trust in agent societies,
  Melbourne, Australia, 2001
• - S. Jones, M. Wilikens, P. Morris, M. Masera
  Trust Requirements in E-Business A conceptual
  framework for understanding the needs and
  concerns of different stakeholders In
  communication of ACM journal, Volume 43, issue
  no. 12, 2000.

10
VBE - AIMED INNOVATION - 4 EXTERNAL RESEARCH
TRENDS

• VBE reference model and management system
• VBE Ontology construction/evolution/integration
• Handling competency/resources
• Trust establishment
• Supporting Value systems / metrics
• Facilitation of launching VOs

• Industrial Engineering approach to performance
  metrics
• Output (objective) and strategic (subjective)
  metrics
• - S. G. Premakanthan An Industrial Engineering
  Approach to Defining Organizational Performance
  Metrics Outputs and Strategic Outcomes and
  Performance Information In proceedings of
  Autralasian Evaluation Society 2004 International
  Conference, South Australia, 2004

11
VBE - AIMED INNOVATION - 5 EXTERNAL RESEARCH
TRENDS

• VBE reference model and management system
• VBE Ontology construction/evolution/integration
• Handling competency/resources
• Trust establishment
• Supporting Value systems / metrics
• Facilitation of launching VOs

• Study of VO launching applications
• Search and match-making mechanisms
• - M. J. J. Wolters, M. R. Hoogeweegen Management
  Support for Globally Operating Virtual
  Organizations The Case of KLM Distribution In
  proceedings of the 32nd Hawaii International
  Conference on System Sciences Islands of Maui,
  Hawaii, 1999.
• T. Murer, M. L. Van De Vanter Replacing Copies
  with Connections Managing Software across the
  Virtual Organization IEEE 8th International
  Workshops on Enabling Technologies
  Infrastructure for Collaborative Enterprises
  Stanford University, Califonia, USA, 1999.

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STRATEGIC KEY RESULTS
VO Breeding Environment Organization Framework
VO Creation Framework
VBE reference framework
VBE management services
Dynamic VO creation assistance tool
Contract negotiation wizard
Value system and metrics for VO breeding
environments
Reference architecture for collaboration
e-services
CNO set-up and management guidelines
D23.1
?
?
D21.1
D21.4
?
?
D21.3
D21.5
D21.2
D22.1
D23.2
?
WP4
WP6
?
WP3
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WP2 PROGRESS TOWARDS RESULTS

• Characterization of VBE constituting elements
• Scenarios and case studies
• Base concepts life cycle elements
• First modeling of elements, functionality
  actors
• Approaching VBE reference framework
• Ontology construction evolution
• Partners profile management
• Trust modeling
• VO creation context

14
AIMS OF VBE CASE STUDIES?

• Abstraction from existing cases, to
• Better understand the problem area
• Model, engineer, predict the behavior
• Improvement of some existing cases, to
• Optimize existing approaches
• Design new systems
• Try to define futuristic scenarios (what is not
  there), to
• Identify the gaps, in every aspect of the system

15
AIMS OF VBE CASE STUDIES?

• Abstraction from existing cases, to
• Better understand the problem area
• Model, engineer, predict the behavior
• Improvement of some existing cases, to
• Optimize existing approaches
• Design new systems
• Potential next generation scenarios, to
• Identify the gaps in every aspect of the system

• Defining scenario cases to be applied for
• Demonstration/validation of components
• (at the WP2-level)
• Integration with other components
• (at the Project-level)
• Communication / impact creation
• (External to project)

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VBE SCENARIOS AND CASE STUDIES - 2
State of the Art VBEs
Improved SoA VBEs
Entities
Service for international
students Furniture production CZIA scenario Extra
Travel Service Home Menu Service
- Virtuelle Fabrik - Mexican VBE cases -
Emergency management - Slovenian cases -
VIRFERBRAS, Brazil - VIRTEC, Brazil - KIESEL,
Germany - Virtual Biotech, Germany - CEFAMOL,
Portugal - Yorkshire Forward, UK - BIPOLO,
Switzerland - PVC, Australia - RNO, Canada
Actors Roles
Skills
Competencies
Brokerage
Organization
Infrastructure
Futuristic VBEs
Support institutions
Public health ERA Electricity market ...
Life cycle
Rules
Rights
Policies
...
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VBE LIFE CYCLE
VBE Operation
VBE Metamorphosis
VBE Creation
VBE Evolution
VBE Dissolution
VBE Creation includes incubation / planning and
constitution VBE Operation the normal phase
of the VBE existence VBE Evolution small
changes in membership and daily operating
principles VBE Metamorphosis major changes in
objectives, principles, membership and/or
mergers, leading to a new form of
organization VBE Dissolution when the
collaborative entity ceases to exist
Being a long-term entity, this
stage of VBE is typically replaced
by the metamorphosis stage, preserving the gained
knowledge.
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VBE LIFE CYCLE EVOLUTION
VBE phases can be represented by a cumulative
curve path (self-organizing system)
Metamorphosis phase Dissolution phase
Progress in Phases
Operation and evolution phase
Creation phase
Time
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VBE SEQUENCE OF ACTIVITIES
Life-cycle related functionality
Metamorphosis Dissolution phase
- Transferring the collected knowledge /
information and members to another VBE -
- Member registration - Search of partners
directory - Generation and definition of
ontology - VO establishment and contracting -
Progress in Phases
Operation and evolution phase
- Systems parameterization - Databases creation -
Data/information loading -
Creation phase
Time
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VBE ACTORS, ROLES RIGHTS

• VBEs rules, rights, and responsibilities depend
  on the roles of its involved actors.

6. VBE Administrator
5. VBE Advisor

• Classification of VBE Actors
• Categorization of Access rights
• And responsibilities for VBE actors

3c.VO
4c.Common
Ontology Provider
Coordinator
3b.VO
Incremental
4b.Common
Broker
Propagation
Service Provider
of rights Coincides With the Increase
in Members responsibilities
3a.Potential
Broker
4a.Support
Institution Provider
2. Member Organization
1. Public (guest)
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VBE CONTROLLED BORDER UNIVERSE
VOs
Large size organizations
Resources and assisting services
Medium sizes organizations
Very small organizations (1 or 2 people)
VBE mgmt. sys. rules
Support institutions
22
CLASSIFICATION OF VBE INFORMATION
23
MODELING OF VBE INFORMATION
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VBE REFERENCE FRAMEWORK

• 4 complementary near-orthogonal dimensions to
  represent the complexity of variety of entities,
  concepts, and functionalities
• - elements in different dimensions are bound to
  each other
• (1) VBE Structural model Conceptual structure of
  roles and functions of VBE actors. (i.e. Roles,
  rights and duties etc. associated with each
  member organization, e.g. VO brokers role,
  rights and responsibility)
• (2) VBE Physical model Materials and all
  physical resources in VBE. (i.e. HW (e.g.
  machinery and networking) / SW (e.g. assisting
  shared tools), personnel (human capital), the
  stored information / knowledge, etc. )
• (3) VBE Activity Sequence model Activities
  related to the entire VBE life cycle management
  and coordination. ( e.g. Conflict resolution,
  performance management, member registration, etc.
  )
• (4) VBE rules of Behavior model Policies and
  governance rules. (e.g. Interoperability
  principles, Policies for code of conduct,
  Conflict resolution policy, Contract enforcement
  policy, etc. )
• Some example bindings
• - between the physical components (personnel)
  and the structural components (roles and
  functions of member organizations)
• - between the behavioral components (policies)
  and the life cycle related sequence of activities
  (measuring the performance of VBE members during
  the operation phase in a VO)

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Ontology Construction Evolution
Base generic ontolgy definitions
Generic
Neutral/top-level for any ontology - Base
definitions (existing)
Common basic pre-defined
Domain - specific
Application - specific
Explicit definitions
Domain dependent - Sector ontology
Domain Application Experts
Build Ontology (semi-) automatically Discovery
from on-line text
Common
Application dependent - Application case
ontology
(e.g. food-processing)
26
TRUST AND TRUST ESTABLISHMENT

• VBE shall provide an environment to build trust
  among its members and to reduce risks for VO
  creation
• Trust building tools mechanism are needed to
• Rate, monitor, build, maintain and re-build
  trustworthiness among members
• Some promising mechanisms and tools
• Ethical codes / rules of conduct for VBE members
• Mechanisms to ensure levels of privacy /
  visibility / access rights related to the roles
  in VBE
• Keeping profiles and records of past performance
  of each member
• Identification of indicators to be monitored
• compliance with deadlines
• past record of achievements
• tracking disclosure of information

27
VO CREATION STEPS
Business Opportunity
Potential partners Identification / Assessment
Business Model design / Rough VO plan.
Negotiation
BO Identification Characterization
Iterate
Detailed VO planning
Main steps (D23.1)
VO Launching
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INTERACTIONS WITH OTHER WPs
WP5
WP1 / SSB
Draft concepts
Status reporting
Common Concepts Modeling tools
Recommendations
WP2
Similarities
WP4
Base VBE concepts
Preliminary ICT requirements
WP3
Joint WP2-WP4 meeting
WP6
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WP2 ADDRESSING SOME PROBLEMS

• Inter-WP2
• Reaching a common approach and understanding
  alignment of general RD objectives
• Fragmented resources of partners in all tasks
  concentration on 1-2 topics in each
  subproject
• Collaborative work among partners
  definition of complementary activities (not
  overlapping)
• Intra-WP2
• What to integrate with other WPs and how?
• How to benefit from different WPs co-existence?

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WP2 - NEXT STEPS

• Finalize characterization of key components
  and features of VBE as well as working and
  sharing principles  (-gt D21.1)
• Develop prototype of partners' profile catalog
  and skills management system (-gt D21.2)
• Progress on semi-automatic ontology
  construction approach
• Progress on trust modeling and value systems
  modeling
• Elaborate requirements - process, actors and
  mechanisms - for VO creation in a VBE context
  (-gt D23.1)
• Refine workplan for second phase

Milestone 1
WP2
- Fundamental models, concepts and mechanisms in
VBE - Partners profiling and competencies
management - Dynamic VO planning principles
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PARTNERS MAIN ROLES IN WP2
T21.1, T21.2 gt D21.1 M12 UVA, ITESM,
UNINOVA T21.3 gt D21.2 M12 CERTICON,
UVA T21.4 gt D21.3 M18 JSI, UVA T21.5,
T21.6 gt D21.4 M18 CTU, VF, CERTICON T21.7 gt
D21.5 M18 ITESM, UVA, CERTICON -----------------
--------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------- T22.1 gt
D22.1 M18 UVA, TX -------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------
--------------------- T23.1 gt D23.1 M12
UNINOVA, UVA T23.2 gt D23.2 M18 JSI, UVA
WP2.1 WP2.2 - UvA
WP2.3 - Uninova