Dear Colleagues,
Collaborate,
Create, Communicate..
This month we have started the on-line discussion on the
CGIAR Collaboration Tools Review. Participants from various backgrounds in CGIAR
Centers have joined this exciting on-line discussion.
My participation in the ESRI 2004
International User Conference in San Diego provided
an excellent opportunity to meet with a number of ESRI
Senior Officers, including the ESRI President. ESRI
pledged to support the CGIAR in its geo-spatial efforts.
Lots of good news on system-wide
purchases to read about. We hope you will enjoy the new look of our monthly newsletter.
Happy reading!
Your comments and contribution to the content of this
newsletter and to its new look are welcome.
ICT-KM 2004
INVESTMENT PLAN DEVELOPMENTAL UPDATES
Current Projects Status
PROJECT UPDATES
Content for Development Thrust
The Project Coordinators for the
4
ICT-KM Projects (Virtual
Resources Center, E-Publishing System, Data Standards and
Virtual Library) are currently developing the specification for the combined functions of these projects
integrated under the C4D.
This
C4D project is seen as a vitally important component
to all the CG Centers and the Project Coordinators are
working collaboratively to ensure that it aligns well
with the actual needs of the entire CG community.
VASAT
Activities
on the Virtual Academy for the Semi Arid Tropics, an
ICT-KM Project partnered by ICRISAT, ILRI and IWMI along
with a host of partners in South Asia and West and Central
Africa, got off to a good start with two regional workshops.
The first workshop was held in India at the ICRISAT
campus during 28-29 June 2004 and
the second took place in Niamey.
The
workshop in India was presided over by Dr William Dar,
Director General of ICRISAT. The aim of the workshop
was to identify concrete opportunities for collaboration
with actors in the area of ICT for development. Participants
were from Pakistan, India, Nepal, the Philippines, and
the USA.
The
Open University system in Asia has reached a critical
mass and a take off stage, and has created new opportunities
for rural youth to earn more through imparting new knowledge
and skills. There is great potential to use IT to develop
customizable mass education in rural areas of Asia.
The rural IT Centers offer new opportunities for learner
support and for delivery of instruction and information.
During this meeting, informal agreements were arrived
at between ICRISAT (on behalf of VASAT) with the ICICI
Bank and the Indian Institute of Technology (leader
in terrestrial wireless technology) to set up systems
for data gathering at the village level, covering weather
parameters and soil nutrients. In effect, this would
cover 1200 villages with a total population of approximately
1.2 Million. A round table will soon be organized in
Nepal to identify opportunities for VASAT activities.
The Open Academy for the Philippine Agriculture and
VASAT already has close working relationships.
VASAT
activities in Niger have commenced with Marie-Julie
Menard taking charge as Project Manager for the WCA
region. A series of meetings with community radio organizations,
with ACMAD (a regional organization serving 50 member
countries on meteorology matters) and with the IRI-Columbia
University were held in Niamey during July 2004. Dr
Stephen Zebiak, Director General of the IRI attended
a discussion meeting organized by ICRISAT. It was decided
that the VASAT project would offer training to community
radio operators (numbering 15) starting early August.
These community radio stations are equipped with digital
satellite receivers that enable them to download and
browse web pages. Content already created for VASAT
would be accessible this way to the rural communities
in Niger. The first such value-added community radio
station would be inaugurated in September 2004 when
ICRISAT’s Board will meet in Niamey.
Second-Level Connectivity
The
Advisory Group for the Second-level Connectivity project
has completed its first activity to select and prioritize
the locations of CGIAR Offices where Internet access
will be improved.
The
second activity of the project will be to carry out
site surveys at each of the prioritized locations. The
site survey will recommend the most appropriate solution
for improving Internet access and highlight any other
work that Centers need to carry out before the solution
is implemented.
The
Advisory Group will ensure the project uses the funding
where it is most required and make decisions as to which
locations should be given priority. It is expected that
most locations will receive improved Internet access
during the first phase of the project but some may have
to wait for phase 2. The results of the site surveys
will influence the prioritization of the locations together
with the Project Advisory Group’s devised scoring system
using the guiding principles from the project proposal
and the information already available to guide the prioritization
process. The scoring is based on a set of simple criteria
that takes into account several factors about the location,
including the number of Centers that will benefit, the
number of CG staff that will benefit, the potential
benefit to NARIs and the locations’ region.
At
this stage the Project Advisory Group is making this
information available to all Centers and is providing
the opportunity to appeal the priority list of offices
and locations. The Advisory Group will review the appeals
based on the additional information provided by Centers.
All
the background information produced by the project can
be found on the project collaboration site
http://sharepoint.icraf.cgiar.org/Connectivity.
ICT-KM 2
The consultation process for
ICT-KM 2, previously known as Global Public Goods Information
Systems Rehabilitation - Phase 2 (GPG2) will start in
September. We will keep you updated on this exciting initiative.
ICT-KM Program Monitoring and Evaluation
Plan
In collaboration with IDRC’s Evaluation Unit, we have developed
the draft plan for Monitoring and Evaluating the ICT-KM Program and its Components.
It was distributed to the Project Coordinators as well
as participants of the M&E Rome Workshop. The
plan proposes an M&E approach and some indicators
to facilitate discussion and to assist the Project Coordinators
in their own M&E planning.
The plan describes the specifics and the worksheets used
for developing and then presenting the main components
of the M&E activities at the ICT-KM Program level
and Project levels. It also describes an approach
for monitoring progress on a system-wide level towards
a “One-System” CGIAR.
The Monitoring and Evaluating the
ICT-KM Program and its Components draft plan can be
viewed at the ICT-KM Collaboration site. To log on
http://collaborate.ictkm.cgiar.org/Project please
use the user id: browser1 and password: browser.
Collaboration Software Review
The much-awaited on-line dialogue
on CGIAR Collaboration Software Review started on 9
August 2004. The discussion is facilitated by consultants
from Bellanet and involves many CGIAR staff from various
backgrounds to discuss application options for supporting
collaborative online dialogues. The first week of the
discussion focused on the use of different collaboration
tools to support on-line dialogues within the CGIAR
from a non-technical perspective.
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UPCOMING MEETINGS
4th Information
Managers Annual Meeting
The
4th Information Managers Annual Meeting will
be hosted by WorldFish Center on 6-9 September. 25 participants are expected to participate in
this meeting which will focus on building on the success
of the joint journal subscriptions and a new CGIAR Virtual
Library.
IT Managers Annual Meeting
The IT Managers Annual Meeting has
tentatively been scheduled from 2-5 November 2004 at
WorldFish Center, Penang. More announcements on this
important meeting will be coming up soon.
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TECHNICAL CORNER...
WAN Security Study
The working group is currently developing the terms of reference
for this review. The selection of an external consultant will
start immediately after the completion of the terms
of reference. The study is expected to be complete by the external
consultant in October and the report will be discussed
in the IT Managers Annual Meeting in November.
CG-CGNET
Global Communication Forum
The
CG-CGNET Global Communication Forum has started with
an interesting article on Spam by Georg Lindsey
of CGNET
CGNET has been working on improving
Spam prevention by adding packet-shaping devices. The
system in place is from TurnTide and works by restricting
the bandwidth of known spammers and spam-suspected sources
to bog them down so they abandon the address ranges.
In the months of May, June, and July before TurnTide was
introduced, CGNET was catching an average of 155,542
spams a week for the CGIAR using Brightmail. With the cutover to TurnTide the number of spam
caught for the CG should increase and therefore the
measurable number caught by Brightmail will decrease.
During
the same timeframe, CGNET filtered out an average of
60,841 viruses per week addressed to CGIAR servers.
Active
Directory Project
IFPRI has joined the Active
Directory forest. IRRI remains scheduled for September. WARDA
has delayed preparations for their migration. IITA is
preparing to migrate its two remote sites at Cotonou
and Yaounde, IITACA and IITABE, into the CGIAR forest.
These two remote sites each have over 100 users, and
will need to be integrated into the Active Directory
forest prior to beginning Exchange 2003 upgrades.
CGNET is currently
surveying the centers in the Active Directory forest,
to confirm the status of their local AD networks in
advance of the upgrades to Exchange 2003.
Reminder: weekly
updates on the Active Directory project are posted on
the IT collaboration site at
http://forum2.ipgri.cgiar.org/cg-it/. IT Managers
can log on to the website for details.
Exchange 2003
In preparation for beginning Exchange 2003 upgrades, the
Center queue positions for upgrading are reported in
the weekly update. CIFOR has been placed second in the
queue, with WorldFish being first.
The forest root at CGNET is prepared for the CGIAR upgrade
to Exchange 2003. Upgrades to Exchange 2003 will commence
after the three remaining Centers, and three remote
sites with over 100 users, have joined the forest.
System-Wide Software Acquisition
After a series of negotiation, we have been granted the Adobe
Contractual Licensing Program (CLP) V4.0 in the Education category, the least expensive pricing
category. Initial estimates of the potential order to be
placed make us eligible for Point Level 3 pricing, the
highest discount level which
will bring savings up to 70% on certain Adobe products
compared to regular prices. The same category discount
will apply for any subsequent order placed by centers
for the duration of the contract (2 years).
Please contact your IT Managers for further details.
This
month we also completed another purchase though CG-wide
arrangement, the Oxford English Dictionary Online
subscription.
TECHNOLOGY WATCH
This column is especially dedicated
to keep a regular watch for emerging ICTs of potential
interest to the CGIAR.
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COMING UP
I will be
attending the 4th Information Managers Annual Meeting
on 6-9 September at WorldFish Center
After that I will be leaving for Rome to participate in the
3rd System Office Workshop, 16-17
September at Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).There will also be an inter-unit consultation
on 15 September at IPGRI, Rome.
In the last week of September I will attend the Program
Management Workshop conducted by N.P. Rajasekharan,
Director of HR-SAS at WorldFish Center.
Collaborate,
Create, Communicate...
this
is the motto of the ICT-KM Program. We believe that
by expanding the CGIAR's opportunities to work together
and communicate we will produce better science to help
poor in developing countries, and we will get that knowledge
to them.
Your comments are especially welcome. Please visit the
Website,
http://ictkm.cgiar.org/ or write to
ictkm@cgiar.org with comments and/or
ideas for the next monthly update.
Working together for a better future,
Enrica
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