Eionet Portal Improvement Project - Third progress email to the NFP/Eionet Group

A blog post initially published 16 October 2018 on the former Eionet Portal prototype

Dear Colleagues,

As we discussed in the NFP/Eionet Group meeting last week we intend to already this autumn make the first major overhaul of the Eionet portal, on top of the gradual stepwise improvements that we have made since the project started.

In my presentation at the meeting I summarised the plan for the autumn on the slide Deliverables in 2018*) as follows:

  • A cleaner and better structured Eionet Portal and Eionet Forum on the current IT platform:
    • Outdated content updated
    • Irrelevant content removed
    • Navigation simplified and made more logical
  • A reborn (new) Eionet planner, ready for use for the full year 2019, covering all Eionet meetings, EEA governance meetings (MB, Bureau, SC), Eionet consultations, launch dates for publications and other events of relevance for Eionet. (Reporting Obligations deadlines available directly in a list from the Reporting Obligation Database) rather than the Planner).

*) Text slightly modified to reflect the discussion in the meeting)

Following up the discussions after the presentation and in the two breakout sessions we are now ready with a proposal for an improved structure/navigation to be implemented on the Eionet Portal, and, as agreed in Athens, I am hereby sending it to the full NPF/Eionet group for consultation.

You can find the proposal implemented on the Eionet portal test website (password: Eionet) and a schematic presentation of it in the attached PowerPoint file. Please note, when viewing the test website that the shortcuts that are “hidden” at the bottom will be more visible on the left side on the Eionet portal itself (where the shortcuts are now).

We would appreciate to get your comments by end October and intend thereafter to implement the new structure already in the week of 5-9 November (unless we get so many diverging comments that we find another consultation round to be necessary).

You can provide your comments in a free text format in an email to me or visualise them in the PowerPoint template (second page in the attached file). Furthermore, you can post your comments to this email on the project blog where you will find this email under the post “Third mail to the NFP/Eionet Group: Consultation”

I would also like to use this opportunity to ask for your comments on the improvement proposals that you will find on the project blog and in my presentation at the meeting last week (both the existing proposals and if you would like to add new ones). Furthermore, it would be great, as discussed at the meeting, if some of you volunteered to interact with the project team more frequently between the NFP/Eionet Group meetings (both members of the ICT User Group and other interested NFP/Eionet group members). Despite working with a subgroup between meetings, we will nevertheless, as also was discussed in the meeting, be fully transparent to the complete NFP/Eionet group and inform on all major step taken (both on the Project blog and in the NFP/Eionet Interest Group on the Forum)

With best regards,

Sigfús

PS1: While awaiting your comments we will work further on the cleaning operation of Interest groups on the Forum and the Projects websites and explore how best to technically implement the new Eionet planner.

PS2: Following the discussion in one of the breakout groups we have now added a list per country on the Eionet countries pages for both the “role” Reportnet and Extranet.

Sigfús Bjarnason
Eionet Systems Coordination

Coordination and Strategy Programme (CAS)