JISC

Why do we need the Core Middleware programmes?

Middleware forms a key part of the JISC strategy

The JISC strategy was reviewed at end of 2003, and re-launched at the beginning of 2004. The new strategy for 2004–2006 identifies clear strategic aims, and it is important that each JISC programme, and in turn each project, can directly identify which of these aims are being addressed through development work. The creation of sustainable middleware appears as a key focus within the strategy, and work within this area is also of importance in terms of JISC’s international position and partnership activities. 

The Core Middleware programmes will be addressing the aims as identified below. The areas of work are linked to these aims in the Core Middleware programme's Operational Plan. Note that none of these aims will be fully addressed by the Core Middleware programmes, and work to meet these aims will be mapped to activity across the JISC Executive.

Aim One: To develop solutions that help enable the UK education and research communities to keep their activities world class through the innovative use of ICT.

• Sustainable and coherent procurement and delivery services for online content to provide access to content as widely as possible for all learners and researchers (1.2).
• A middleware service (1.4).
• The identification and continuous review of appropriate international standards especially in middleware and learning environments, to enable the sharing of resources across all education sectors (2.4).
• Helping to embed eResearch technologies more widely across research disciplines and where relevant to encourage the use of such technologies across education, in particular this will require: A middleware service (4.2).

Aim Two: To provide advice to institutions to enable them to make economic, efficient and legally compliant use of ICT, respecting both the individual’s and corporate rights and responsibilities.

• Supporting institutions to promote staff development and training skills…particularly within the context of helping institutions manage interests in ICT (7.2).

Aim Three: To help the sector provide positive, personalised user learning experiences and aid student progression.

• Supporting institutions through the change management processes required to embed ICT within their operations (10).

Aim Four:  To develop mutually advantageous partnerships with organisations in the UK and abroad.

• Developing strategic partnerships with other organisations engaged in developing and promoting the innovative use of ICT (12).
• Engaging with suppliers and other public-sector bodies involved with ICT development and procurement in the  UK and beyond (13).

Aim Five: To advise, inform and help implement the strategies of government, funding councils and research councils.

• Improving research outreach activities (15).
• Expanding JISC activities to support wider post-16 community or specialist colleges (16).

Technological capability has moved forward

In terms of technology, the middleware field has been moving forward for some years and JISC has been actively monitoring developments and achievements.  The Development Group now feel that a level of maturity has been achieved within the field to enable successful take-up within UK HE and FE.  This decision has been informed by auditing the field through scoping and development programmes (such as work within the 05/99 Programme and the AAA Programme) and through continued engagement with international effort such as the Internet2 Shibboleth development.    It is now timely for UK HE and FE to be given the opportunity to better utilise the improved technology openly available.  JISC can enable this through development work (particularly on the infrastructure level), and through educational, training, and promotional activities.  The Core Middleware programmes should enable all of these opportunities.

New community requirements have been clearly identified

Through development work such as the AAA Programme, new requirements within the community have been clearly identified.  These were outlined in the JISC Core Middleware: Technology Development call for proposals and can be summarised as follows:

• An access management solution that will solve access to internal resources (e.g. exam papers) as well as external resources.
• Need for support for long-term stable collaborations between institutions, particularly collaborative e-learning scenarios.   
• Need for support for ‘ad-hoc’ collaborations between groups of researchers (‘virtual organisations’).
• Continued need for support for access to external resources, preferably via a ‘single sign-on’.

There is also a fundamental need to join-up access management solutions across the educational community.  There are currently two distinct systems in place within the UK: the Athens system for access to learning and teaching materials, and the e-Science digital certificate approach to research materials.  The next generation access management system should provide a solution for both of these scenarios. 

New funding is available

The Infrastructure component of the Core Middleware programme is funded by money awarded by the Comprehensive Funding Review (CSR).  Whilst funding in itself should not be the driver for development, it must be recognised that the CSR money is usually awarded to address a specific issue, and to achieve specific deliverables that benefit the entire educational community. The CSR money has been awarded to JISC as HEFCE and government have recognised the importance of the middleware agenda and have appropriately supported this need.  It will be utilised to build a service environment with a wider range of capabilitiesto support the next general access management services for the  higher and further communities. The parallel technology development component of the programme, funded through the JISC UKCommittees for the Information Environment (JCIE) and Support of Research (JCSR), is complementary and addresses the development of new technologies where these do not currently exist.