WACREN Conference 2016

14 Mar 2016, 08:00 → 18 Mar 2016, 17:30 Africa/Dakar

Saly 1 (Hotel Novotel)

Boubakar Barry (WACREN)

WACREN is organizing its 2nd Annual Conference hosted by the Senegal Research and education Network (snRER).  

This year's conference brings together policy and decision makers, researchers, network managers, collaboration specialists, identity and access management experts, and connectivity and equipment providers from across Africa and the rest of the world. 

Held at the Novotel Hotel, Dakar, on 17-18 March 2016, the conference is preceeded by a series of workshops promoting e-Infrastructure development and open science in Africa.

The 2nd TANDEM National and Regional Conferences and AfricaConnect2 coordination meetings are also colocated with the conference in a week of activities commencing on 14 March 2016

The main theme of the conference is: "Enabling Virtual Research and Education Communities", with the following sub-themes:

• Authentication and Authorization Infrastructure (AAI) and Mobility
• NREN Business and Governance Models
• Innovation in R&E Networks
• Network Design and Operation
• Online Teaching and Learning
• Shared Experiences, Best Practices and Collaboration

Monday, 14 March

09:00 → 17:30 Federated Identity Management - What, Why and How - March 14

Tuesday, 15 March

08:00 → 16:30 Promoting Open Science in Africa - March 15

Wednesday, 16 March

09:00 → 17:30 TANDEM Workshops and Meetings - March 16

Thursday, 17 March

08:00 → 08:45 Registration

09:00 → 10:30 OPENING CEREMONY

Convener: Prof. Mary Teuw Niane (Minister of Higher Education and Research of Sénégal)

10:30 → 11:00 Group Photograph / Tea Break

11:00 → 12:30 PLENARY SESSION I – Paper Presentations

Convener: Dr Pascal Hoba (Ubuntunet Alliance)

11:00 An NREN in a national and global environment: value creation at SURFnet

**1. Introduction** National Research and Education Networks (NRENs) exist in most countries. They all provide services to – minimally - the higher educational sector, some provide services well beyond that. NRENs come in many different organisational models, from departments of a ministry to independent companies. All NRENs however are challenged to provide the right services to their constituency. They eventually need to do this sufficiently distinguishable (cost, quality or functionality) from services that can and will be provided by the market. In this paper we discuss show SURFnet – the Dutch NREN – tackles these challenges, and how this can only be done in a global context. ![picture with NRENs in the world as logged by TERENA][1] *NRENs in the world as included in TERENA compendium 2013* **2. How SURFnet tackles the challenge** SURFnet is the Dutch NREN. SURFnet’s vision is that access to innovative ICT and internet services is necessary for advanced and innovative education and research. Founded in the 1980s, it has been running networks ever since. In the past decade the scope has widened from providing netwerk connectivity to related ICT services such a identity federation, eduroam, personal storage and others. **Governance model** SURFnet is a Dutch BV, a limited liability company. It is one of three daughters of SURF that itself is a cooperation consisting of members (the individual institutions). The SURF cooperation owns all shares in SURFnet, SURFsara (the high performance computing centre) and SURFmarket (a centralized entity purchasing licensing, cloud services and digital content). ![SURF governance model][2] All three organisations provide services to the constituency and are therefore both supplier to and owned by the major stakeholders. This leads to feedback both through the ownership as well as the service delivery mechanism: ownership ensures that the strategic direction fits with the strategies of the universities in the long term, whereas service delivery feedback ensures that correct quality and relevant services are delivered now. **Funding** The funding has two different streams, one based on innovation that supports the long term projects that have a higher risk, and the second one the exploitation, where individual institutions contribute based on the services they receive. This is a second factor that creates a valuable tension between innovation and exploitation. **Services** To retain its relevance the services SURFnet delivers should ideally be - sufficiently distinguishable from what the market delivers, or - delivered in a way the market is not willing or able to do. SURFnet always strives to deliver the newest capacities and capabilities to its customers as production service early and at a reasonable price, to enable them to run and innovate their own ICT-based activitities. SURFnet preferably focuses on these services that have a strong communal characteristic, where the combined scale and the collaboration of the constituents make the service more relevant. *Services: Network* SURFnet has been building networks since 1988, delivering high-quality connections to universities . Every generation of the network incorporated new technologies and provided considerable bandwidth growth. *(expected: a new picture with different generations from 1Mbps to 100Gbps)* The services on the network have evolved from standard data connections to include private, on demand configurable networks that can be integrated in the institutions own network. *Services: Identity* SURFnet as a central entity provides the infrastructure to manage identity validation between institutions and suppliers. An NREN can be a unique trusted partner, that has no other interest than facilitating and optimizing the capabilities. Services such as eduroam, access to scientific libraries, access to cloud services and collaboration platforms rely on these systems. Global interfederations are the next step. **Global collaboration** Innovation and service renewal is not a solitary process, it can only be succesful when an NREN is well connected tot its peers, both in a very physical way as well as the human way. Currently a number of different platforms exist, for this paper we will focus on the network and discuss GLIF and the CEO Forum/GNA. Both are collaboration platforms with a global scope. The intent is to bring together resources and open these up to the community. The GNA is about defining a framework for R&E Networks and Exchange Points (GXPs) to participate in a global network interconnect. Connecting to networks like these and participating in the organisations leads to early access to ideas and concepts, but also to access to e-Infrastructure resources across the world. This is a unique approach to networking that only NRENs can be expected to execute and benefit from, for the benefit of their user base. ![GLIF connectivity Europe][3] *GLIF Connectivity to Europe* ![GNA Artist Impression][4] *Artist’s impression of a Global Network Architecture Network* [1]: http://i.imgur.com/IZ7nBOc.png [2]: http://i.imgur.com/GwSeHus.png [3]: http://i.imgur.com/9Vcy6ud.png [4]: http://i.imgur.com/5bg8PeD.png

Speaker: Mr Bram Peeters (SURFnet)

Slides WACREN_NREN_collabv03.pdf

11:20 NREN survival strategies

NRENs not only serve closed user groups on a not-for-profit base, but also on a not-for-loss basis. The primary customer base of NRENs consists of research and higher education institutions and the NREN often have to compete for the provision of Internet services with large monopolists or (even larger) commercial companies. Emerging NRENs more than often face challenges to convince government and other potential donors that they are more than a commercial Internet Service provider and need extra support to survive. In order to survive there are several strategies that other NRENs have deployed and can be used as examples by emerging NRENs. First, the classical approach, is to bind Higher Education and Research by providing additional services that are not provided by standard ISP's. Examples of such services are Federative Identity Management, access to on line educational content, access to shared facilities such as High Performance Computing and massive storage. A second approach can be to broaden the primary customer base to other related customer groups, such as libraries, hospitals and NGO's. The national regulator might object to this approach, but examples of successful expansion of the user groups are known and the expanded user group provides a more solid base of the business model. A third approach is to broaden the profile of the impact of the NRENs in the area of the public good. The most used argument of the added value of NRENs is that ICT in Higher Education is necessary to boost the economy of a country as they will pave the way to an ICT oriented service economy. There are however examples of areas where a sustainable NREN has added value for the country as a whole, such as health care, rural area development, millennium goals and even tourism. No NREN, existing or emerging, is the same, neither are the national setting circumstances the same. There is there no one size fits all solution, but by giving an overview of existing strategies emerging NRENs can pick the most most suitable tactics as part of their own strategy.

Speaker: Dr Robert Janz (Project manager)

Slides Janz_WACREN_2016.pptx

11:40 Mapping the NREN business model using the business model canvas: the case of TENET

For several years the subject of business models for national research and education networks (NRENs) has been at the center of discussions in the NREN community. Research and many business leaders agree that business models offer a better way of predicting business success rather than industry classifications. A business model describes the logic of how a firm creates values for its clients and for itself. It is easy to assume that NRENs, being not-for-profit in nature and whose market is given does not need to have a clearly articulated business model. However, with competition from aggressive commercial operators, NRENs are increasingly finding themselves in situations where they have to rethink their business logic. Tertiary Education and Research Network of South Africa (TENET), the NREN of South Africa is one of the oldest NRENs in Africa. Established in the year 2000, the NREN is now almost 15 years and is the biggest NREN in Africa in terms of network coverage, volume of bandwidth and assets. Over the years, TENET has established itself as a not-for-profit business entity in South Africa with the purpose of securing, for the benefit of South African universities, technikons and associated research and support institutions, Internet and Information Technology services. This involves entering into and managing contracts with service providers and institutional users, carrying out ancillary operational functions in support of service delivery and providing other value-added services as may from time to time be needed in support of the higher educational and research sector in South Africa. Using the Business Model Canvas developed by Alexander Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur, this paper maps TENET’s business model. The Business Model Canvas is one of the many business model generation tools that entrepreneurs use. It is a strategic tool for developing new or documenting existing business models of an organisation. It is a visual chart with elements describing a firm's customers, offer, infrastructure, and financial viability. From these four pillars come nine elements of a business model: Customer Segments, Value Proposition, Distribution Channels, Customer Relationships, Revenue Streams, Key Resources, Key Activities, Key Partnerships, and Cost Structure. This paper presents the results of the study carried out in September 2013 mapping the business money of TENET following the above mentioned nine elements. The paper will demonstrate that a clearly defined/articulated business model for an NREN will give it a competitive edge on the market. Using limited examples of NRENs in the region, the paper will stimulate discussion on possible business models for emerging NRENs.

Speaker: Mr Tiwonge Banda (Ubuntunet Alliance)

Slides Mapping_the_TENET_Business_Model-v0.1.pdf

12:00 The NREN of the Future in Africa

Speaker: Dr Francis Tusubira (Knowledge Consulting Limited)

Slides 20160316-WACREN-Final.pdf

12:30 → 14:00 Lunch

13:55 → 15:30 PLENARY SESSION II – Paper Presentations

Convener: Mr Yousef Torman (ASREN)

14:00 Advanced Services in Collaboration with Research Community: Creating Locally, Thinking Globally

This paper aims to describe the results of close collaboration between the Brazilian NREN, RNP, and the research community in Brazil, in the joint development of advanced Internet services. This collaboration has a long history – several of the community members involved in the recent development activities described here were already actively involved in the deployment of the first academic networks in Brazil between 1988 and 1992. However, it must also be recognised that new generations of computer science researchers continue to be drawn to the challenges of computer networking and its applications, and that is also the case in Brazil, where most of the proposals received by RNP for new services now come from younger generation scientists. The motivation for the work described here has always been to improve the service offerings provided by RNP, by capitalising on the capacity of the national network and distributed systems research community to develop innovative solutions. Many of these have been motivated by the desire to interoperate with new services and models continually introduced in leading R&E networks throughout the world, and it is a tribute to our development teams that such interoperation has greatly increased in recent years. Nowadays the big challenge to Internet Service Providers (ISPs) is create new services to be competitive at low costs in a very aggressive market. NRENs have to participate in the ISP marketplace and must offer advanced Internet services in order to differentiate themselves from commercial ISPs. How should an NREN deal with this challenge? The RNP Working Groups programme was launched in 2002 with the objective of developing collaborative projects between RNP and national research groups, which demonstrate the feasibility of using new network protocols, services and applications. Projects are proposed by national research groups, in response to an open call for proposals published annually by RNP. Each group designs and develops a pilot service, which is later evaluated and, if approved, will in the end be made available to RNP users. Since 2002, we have financed and accompanied the execution of about 100 one year projects, which have together generated 10 currently working services at RNP, in areas such as VoIP, PKI, CDN, video services, remote education support, network monitoring, as well as products in many areas. This concept has also been adopted at RNP for introducing new technologies into core areas such as security services, performance monitoring and dynamic provisioning of virtual circuit services, in order to accompany international trends to add such advanced features to the service offerings of research networks. At RNP such developments contribute to the Advanced Internet programme, and have included especially in dynamic circuit provisioning, and high-performance (4K) video streaming and visualisation. In these cases, the theme of the working group is decided by RNP. However there are great similarities between these two manifestations of WGs. In both cases, research groups from the academic research community are the engines for the development of technology for RNP. Some of these services and products aroused interest of NRENs and its institutions in others emerging countries, especially in Latin America, but also in Africa. This interest led groups to also engage collaborators from others countries which contribute to the internationalization of RNP solutions. RNP’s initiative of promoting local development of Internet services has value, not only for Brazil, but also for R&E networks in other countries, both in providing an example of what can be achieved, but also cooperating with such networks to contribute to their development.

Speaker: Rafael Valle (RNP - Brazilian NREN)

Slides ApresentaçãoWACREN-v2.pdf

14:20 Cloud Infrastructure, an essential component of resource sharing for African National Research and Education Networks.

ABSTRACT: The world has witnessed the birth of a new era – The digital information age. This global age of information technology is sweeping through the globe improving connectivity, adding intelligence to networks and generating big data, but its impact on research and sustainable development in sub-sahara Africa is minimal if not non-existent. This paper introduces Cloud Infrastructure has an essential component of research and education networks to aid collaboration and resource sharing between national research and education networks in africa. The paper will also examine key factors in the design, implementation, security, commercial aspects and adoption of cloud computing in an NREN This paper aim to address the following: a. Introduce the basic concepts of Cloud infrastructure and the services to be offered by an NREN or WACREN Cloud infrastructure. b. The different Cloud provisions and platforms with the challenges of an NREN cloud infrastructure. c. The paper will also examine in details the designs and integration to existing NREN’s networks with interconnections for resource sharing and collaborations within NRENS with a roadmap for successful cloud deployment. d. The paper will explore the commercial opportunities available to NREN’s based on their investments in a cloud infrastructure within the framework of the NREN and her customers. e. Finally, the paper will present some business and use cases for cloud computing within NREN joint infrastructure environment POTENTIAL ATTENDEE: This paper is intended for the African National Research and Education Community, Universities and Research Organizations and the government.

Speaker: Mr Babatunde Omogbai (WACREN)

Slides WACREN_2016-_Cloud_Infrastructure_and_essential_component__of_resource_sharing_for_african_research_networks_-Babatunde_Omogbai.pdf

14:40 From National to Global e-Infrastructures

Contemporary research relies on the ability to communicate efficiently and share storage and computational resources, as well as algorithms and data, between research groups on national, regional and global levels. The presentation will discuss e-Infrastructure development aspects at different organizational levels. Coherent development of national-level e-Infrastructures in terms of networking and computing can pave the way for wider regional, continental and global e-Infrastructure integrations. The study will start with GRNET, the Greek NREN, focusing on advanced computational services including Grid, Cloud and High-Performance Computing. Further it will show how these computing models evolve on regional - South-East European - level, where 14 countries collaborated during the past decade, via multiple high-end technology projects, in sharing resources and jointly operating the computing infrastructures for a spectrum of scientific fields. This regional work culminates with the current VI-SEEM project, where an integrated Virtual Research Environment is provided to the large regional user communities in Climate modeling, Life Sciences and Digital Cultural Heritage. Finally continental (European) and global scale (via the MAGIC project) models will be presented. Western African NRENs could benefit from such a development approach individually, but even more importantly together on a regional level as WACREN.

Speaker: Dr Ognjen Prnjat (GRNET)

Slides VI-SEEM-WP2-GR-xyz-WACRENppt-a-2016-03-09_[Compatibility_Mode].pdf

15:00 AfricaConnect2 – R&E networking for West and Central Africa

Speaker: Ms Cathrin Stöver (GEANT)

Slides AFR-16-021_AC1_and_2_Presentation_for_WACREN_Conference.pdf

15:30 → 16:00 Coffee Break

16:00 → 18:00 PLENARY SESSION III – Paper Presentations

Convener: Mr Cathrin Stover (GEANT)

16:00 DNS business and security: a role for the academia

Speaker: Mr Yaovi Atohoun (ICANN)

16:30 Just-in-Time-Teaching – State of the Art of a Blended Learning and Teaching Approach?

Generations of lecturers have been bothered by the perpetual question: “What should my students learn for being best prepared for their future?” – Lecturers with different backgrounds will give different answers. Fact is, all lecturers have the objective to prepare their students in the best possible way to find suitable work after graduation. This discussion raises the general question about the institutional accountability and the responsibilities of both lecturers and students. Curricula and syllabi set the formal frame, which indicates what could be expected in and from a study programme. They can be considered as being the standard operating procedure of teaching and learning to achieve the goals set. Most responsibilities are defined among all the parties involved in the higher education sector. But not all responsibilities are framed within contracts, regulations and laws. Generally, education experts understand the term of responsibility as referring to the duty of introducing students to contemporary (latest) knowledge and skills. On one side students should be prepared with the most suitable methodologies for their challenges ahead. On the other side there is the emphasis on duties by public servants or employees in general, which implicates not to step away from the path set but to act upon laws and regulations. For lecturers these paths are written down in curricula and syllabi. Changes in the way duties are to be fulfilled normally require changes in curricula and syllabi. A strict focus on the perseverance of duties give lecturers the confidence to be in line with the requirements set by rules and regulations but can lead to disappointments at the students’ side. Students eye on the demand from employers’ side and evaluate the applied their curricula, syllabi and the methodologies based on that understanding. Would lecturers stroll away from the path indicated by curricula and syllabi, they can be hold to account why they are not compliant with the norms set in curricula and syllabi. Rather than offering off-curriculum and off-syllabus contents, not documented in lecture books but elaborated on an individual basis by the respective lecturers, it is easier for many lecturers to stay on the set path of the existing curricula and syllabi. Lecturers, who dare to stroll away from the set path get deprived of the safety net but offer their students insights into the latest development in practice, science and research. The key performance indicator on employability of graduates applied for in higher education statistics and higher education information management systems requests exactly this data. - Higher education institutions as well as the ministries for higher education face the dilemma between (public) administration and pro-active (market or entrepreneurial) approaches. The objective of this research is to elaborate a way out of that dilemma by exploring the strengths and weaknesses of the just-in-time-teaching approach. The latter uses e-learning in the same way as classroom teaching with blended learning and teaching approaches. In a focus group discussion with Ethiopian lecturers the just-in-time-teaching approach will be discussed and analysed. Could it be considered as suitable for selected courses or study programmes in order to up-date the lecture content as well as the teaching methodology without interfering into the curricula and syllabi set by the higher education authorities? The result of this focus group discussion will be complemented by the researcher’s own experiences in applying the instruments of just-in-time teaching for many years. This research is structured into the six chapters. In the first chapter presents an introduction is given into the dilemma that public higher education institutions are facing in accepting state of the art education approaches vis-à-vis to the standard operating procedure approaches of lecturers. The second chapter will define the term just-in-time-teaching based on the literature available. The third chapter will present in brief the methodology for this research. The fourth chapter introduces the instruments of e-learning and classroom teaching as the core instruments for a just-in-time-teaching approach. The prerequisites, requirements and preparation for the implementation of a just-in-time-teaching will be accommodated within this chapter. Chapter five will focus on the justification, the benefits and the effects of just-in-time-teaching. The final chapter will draw the conclusion of the just-in-time-teaching approach in regard to verifiable indicators for the stakeholders on higher education outputs.

Speaker: Prof. Margareth Gfrerer (Ethiopia)

Slides GFRERER_Presentation.pdf GFRERER_Presentation.pptx

17:00 Experiences from an Online Educational Program in Public Health: Peoples-uni

**Background** Public Health deals with combined efforts to promote a healthy population, prolong life and prevent a population from diseases. People's Open Access Education Initiative: Peoples-uni (Pu) was established to build capacity in public health in low-income and middle-income countries. Being a full online program, it gives students around the world the opportunity to study and attain postgraduate qualifications in public health. Providing this capacity, can lead to improvements in the health sector of these countries. **Methodology** Pu offers courses in “Foundation Sciences of Public Health” and “Public health Problems” and gives students the opportunity to enroll twice a year. The courses are designed to run through 5 topics in 10-12 weeks. Tutors are volunteers and Pu alumni, frequently volunteers are with full time teaching positions in different international institutions. The learning environment is built around Moodle and other open source tools for student administration. I have been an alumnus for almost 3 years now and volunteer as a tutor and student support officer. The online forum makes learning flexible and gave me personally the chance to work and school simultaneously. **Experiences** Pu has kept interactions with students that have graduated using an online alumni group; an interactive forum used to share information on further studies, collaborations and other opportunities. I was given the opportunity to volunteer as a tutor being the first set of graduates of the MPH program, collaboration between Pu and Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU). I have learnt how to effectively interact with students and make discussion forums more interactive. It was important to keep in mind that there are students from different countries and languages and learn at different paces. Being an online course, support for students was also very important; Pu introduced Student Support Officer (SSO) in 2013. As a SSO I have supported students through their studies, guiding them to useful materials and observing their progress. Students have always provided positive feedbacks in terms of the reading materials, interactions and coordination during the modules. Success stories have been in the areas of collaborative studies and publications by tutors and alumni. **The Role for NREN** The National Research and Education Networks (NRENs) can do more to support the community to deliver sustainable capacity building frameworks. The Tanzania Education and Research Network (TERNET) is driving a collaboration with Pu and other stakeholders to facilitate mass training and this is expected to make an impact on public health capacity in Tanzania, especially with the emphasis on critical thinking and on an evidence based approach. The central idea is working with Pu tutors to accredit the programme through partnership with the local health science training university. This proposal will be sent to the Human Development Innovation Fund, a UK-Aid funded project in Tanzania. **Conclusion** Pu has created an excellent platform for learning and capacity building. I have had the opportunity to interact with other tutors and students and learn from their experiences in the public health field. There are many ideas that can be shared in this forum and opportunities for multi country collaborations. The world is growing through technology and the Internet has given us many ways to pass information faster and efficiently.

Speaker: Mrs Sophia Osawe (People’s Open Access Education Initiative, Peoples-uni, UK, Institute of Human Virology, Abuja, Nigeria)

Slides WACREN__Presentation2016_Peoples_Uni.pdf

17:30 World Development Report 2016 – Tech Hubs

Speaker: Dr Timothy Kelly (World Bank)

Slides Senegal_WDR_2016_-_Africa_launch_-_17_mars_2016.pdf WDR_2016_presentation_(FR,_17_March_Dakar).pdf

Friday, 18 March

08:00 → 09:00 Registration

09:00 → 10:30 PLENARY SESSION IV – Paper Presentations

Convener: Dr Ibrahima NIANG (snRER)

09:00 Internet Number Resources IPv4 uptake and IPv6 deployment

Abstract – WACREN meeting The purpose of this presentation is manyfold :- a) Give a brief overview of Internet Number Resources(INR) and AFRINIC's role in its management b) status of resource pool -IPv4 c) Is there a need for IPv6 and why d) NRENs - AFRINIC resource members? e) Describe membership process for NRENs f) Discounts offered by AFRINIC g) Overview of some AFRINIC services

Speaker: Mrs MAdhvi GOKOOL (AFRINIC Ltd)

Slides slides_wacren-Mar2016.pdf

09:20 perfsonarUI and eduGAIN federated login

Networks are vital to research disciplines. Collaboration and data mobility rely heavily on network infrastructure and almost always cross administrative domains. Ensuring that things are operating well, on an end-to-end basis, is critical. Monitoring within a single domain is a common and accepted practice ; cross-domain performance monitoring is difficult to do with traditional tools. perfSONAR is a widely-deployed test and measurement infrastructure that is used by science networks and facilities around the world to monitor and ensure network performance. It provides easy, transparent end-to-end monitoring, giving access to network measurement data from multiple network domains. It can operate at local level or around the globe and is scalable to provide at-a-glance information about multiple network paths simultaneously. With around 1,500 measurement points across the globe, it is easy for NRENs and research teams to accurately measure network performance and ensure it meets their research needs.​ The perfsonarUI (psUI) web application enables users to visualize measurement results from perfSONAR services. It can provide insight into historical measurements stored in a perfSONAR Measurement Archive (MA), or request an on-demand measurement to be performed by a perfSONAR Measurement Point (MP). The psUI gives the network operators the possibility to troubleshoot performance problems on their network but also through and up to other connected networks. This multi-domain view on end-to-end performance is equally interesting to campus operators verifying their local and upstream connectivity, as well as to researchers needing to transfer large amount of data and that are dependant on reliable connectivity. To make the perfSONAR measurements available to all interested, it was logical to authenticate users through federated login. And, as a truly multi-domain tool, the ideal federated configuration is through eduGAIN. eduGAIN interconnects research and education identity federations around the world. It enables the trustworthy exchange of information between service providers and research and education institutions or other identity providers. This means simpler access to a wider range of online content, services and other resources that benefit collaboration in the research and education community. To avoid overloading networks with perfSONAR measurements, consumption of network resources can be controlled at each MP by local administrators through the definition of appropriate policies. On top of that, the psUI administrator can grant different authorisation levels to each federated user. With this two levels of control, federated access to performance measurements stays within defined bounds. During this presentation, we will demo the psUI with eduGAIN federated login and show you the performance verification features it provides to a wide user audience while still assuring the network operators that their network is not overloaded. The development of [perfSONAR][1] is the result of the combined work of GÉANT, Internet2, ESnet and Indiana University. [eduGAIN][2] support, development and promotion in Europe is provided through the GÉANT Project. The MAGIC and TANDEM projects are helping to promote eduGAIN uptake in other world regions. [1]: http://www.perfsonar.net [2]: http://www.edugain.org

Speaker: Mr Antoine Delvaux (PSNC/GÉANT)

Slides 20160318_perfSONAR_and_psUI_in_a_federated_environment.pdf

09:40 Enabling Virtual Research and Education in Environment monitoring - The role of research and education networks

**1. Motivations and awareness about the need for environment monitoring:** We present ongoing research and education in environment monitoring targeting several African countries and discuss how RENs could support the emerging virtual research and education communities involved in environment oriented research with large socio-econoic impact. The need for environment monitoring is well documented in International, regional and national strategies and implementation plans including several of the UN Goals for Sustainable Development. Stakeholders in environment information can be found in all sectors of society. Examples of applications include weather research and forecasting, climate research, adaptation and mitigation, farmers' decision-making in agriculture, monitoring of drinking water quality, pollution of air, water or land, all sorts of early warnings, environment impact assessment, etc. Most African countries have considerably more sparse observation networks than other parts of the world. The key challenges include access to affordable and robust observation stations and communication links to transport data from remote observation stations to central repositories and human vandalism. These facts are known by decision makers and funds are increasingly allocated to act upon this awareness. **2. Ongoing research exploring new technologies for environment monitoring:** There are emerging technologies under the Internet of Things umbrella that promise to make massive monitoring affordable. There are projects in progress that explore their potential. One such project is WIMEA-ICT, a NORAD funded project aiming at capacity building at some East African Universities while improving the accuracy of and access to weather information by the communities in the East African region through suitable ICTs for increased productivity and safety (http://www.cis.mak.ac.ug/wimea/). The project is organized in four research components (RC1-4): The design and deployment of an affordable and dependable weather station (RC3), Secure and integrated storage of the weather data (RC2), Analyses and forecasting based on the collected data (RC1), Dissemination of weather data adapted to end-user needs (RC4). A first generation prototype developed by WIMEA-ICT RC3 has been under field test since early March 2015 (http://wimea-ict.gfi.uib.no/). Three copies of a 2nd generation prototype will be deployed in Uganda, Tanzania and South Sudan over the next few months. The architecture of the prototypes replaces the traditional centralized architecture of environment monitoring station with a distributed system consisting of local wireless sensor networks having a few sensor motes reporting readings from connected sensors to a sink mote connected to a gateway with buffer storage and uplinks to Internet. This distributed model facilitates putting sensor nodes at appropriate locations within an observation station without wiring problems. The distributed model also facilitates having redundant nodes reporting the most essential parameters independently, some distance apart, to improve data quality and dependability. The stakeholders in the WIMEA-ICT project form a research community that has been adopted as a Community of Practice supported by the EU Sci-GaIA project developing components enhancing the e-infrastructure of Africa in close cooperation with AfricaConnect and the regional academic networks, Ubuntunet and WACREN. Researchers in other countries than those targeted by NORAD have expressed an interest in the WIMEA-ICT project, currently including Kenya, Mozambique, Nigeria and Somalia, who also signed an MoU as a research partner with both Sci-GaIA and WIMEA-ICT. Discussions are under way to fund extra stations to be deployed in these countries. There is reason to believe that researchers in other countries would also be interested if informatin about the project is disseminated more widely. **3. The role of RENs and what they can contribute to enironment monitoring** The mission of Research and Education Networks is to support research and higher education in all academic areas. One of the main challenges in the automation and densification of the environment observation networks in African countries is affordable and dependable communications between the sensor networks and the data reception centers is an absolute necessity for sustainable operations. What RENs can contribute is - Facilitating the deployment of access points wherever they can be deployed to which remote wireless sensor network gateways can connect. - Host scieence gateways, repositories and other e-infrastructure components serving the communities of practice involved in envronment oriented research and education. How to organise this will be elaborated in the full paper. Plans in this directions are already discussed with TERNET, RENU, the emerging NREN of South Sudan, SomaliREN and ngREN. Examples of similar agreements in Europe and North America will be described.

Speaker: Prof. Björn Pehrson (KTH)

10:00 Dynamic Spectrum and the Future of Affordable Access

Speaker: Mr Steve Song (NSRC)

Slides Dynamic_Spectrum_Regulation_SSA_Song.pdf

10:30 → 11:00 Coffee Break

11:00 → 12:50 PLENARY SESSION V – Paper Presentations

Convener: Prof. Nii Quaynor (WACREN)

11:00 Coffee Break

11:30 Towards a Regional Communication and Information Network for the West African Research and Education Network (WACREN)

Several regional scholars recognize the potential Research and Education Networks (RENs) hold to transform the ways researchers connect, communicate and collaborate -- essential enabling conditions to build world class research institutions, solve regional problems, and ultimately impact national economies (Taylor and Abbott, 2015). The expectations for the West and Central African Research and Education Network (WACREN) are no exception. Currently the discussion of WACREN predominantly lies among technical professionals who are involved in building and maintaining infrastructure. This is appropriate at this stage since it would be impossible to realize the promise of REN without a solid ICT infrastructure in place and the technical competencies to maintain it (Khan, 2006). However, a significant and growing number of end users will be university staff from all disciplines, new generation research students, and other participants based on the composition of each REN. Therefore a challenge at this juncture may be developing strategies to enable WACREN to engage potential stakeholders beyond its primary technical base. A challenge at a later stage will be the race for content – creating and storing digital content from all disciplines and in varied contexts. This paper advocates a customized communication strategy for WACREN, which addresses the need to target key audiences as well as create and store content. It would be a mistake to replicate communication strategies from other RENs and adopt them in the West African context. Equally important, this paper proposes the establishment of a regional news and information network to serve the communication and information needs of key stakeholders in a timely, efficient and effective way. The proposed network could also serve as a teaching and learning platform for university students from various disciplines. Communication professionals – with their focus on content – are valuable assets in numerous ways. The storage capacity of RENs and the possibilities of supporting video conferencing, streaming, and mobile services creates the potential for the growth of large repositories of regional knowledge. Mass communication and strategic communication professional could play critical roles in developing and maintaining communication channels customized to target key stakeholders and chronicling the evolution of REN for the digital archives. In sum, this paper proposes a three phase strategy to 1) customize a communication strategy to meet the needs of the WACREN community; 2) develop a communication campaign to engage current stakeholders and build wider constituencies; and 3) develop a news and information network to sustain WACREN goals for communication. The author envisions these activities being supported by a wider teaching and learning initiative for the academic staff and students in mass communication, digital content development, computer science and related disciplines. Interest in NRENs have been heightened primarily among academic audiences by public relation and social media campaigns (GEANT 2015, Taylor and Abbott, 2015). Still the need exists, particularly in the early stages of WACREN, to build constituencies beyond the core technical audiences.

Speaker: Dr Donna Oti (CEI Consulting Firm)

Slides WACREN_Presentation2.pptx

11:50 E-Readiness Survey: Know Your Customer – Plan the Future

This e-readiness Survey is conducted by Tanzania Education and Research Network (TERNET) among Tanzanian higher learning institutions to establish the preparedness of those institutions in the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT). The survey focuses in achieving the actual capability of each and every individual institutions readiness in the use ICT in education. The E-readiness survey is being carried out among 60 institution in Tanzania. It was scheduled for three months between October to December 2014, hence, it is in its final stages. The survey is grouped into four categories related to network access, networked learning, networked society, and policy. The categories were further broken down into nine indicators: communication infrastructures, Internet availability, Internet affordability, network speed, enhancing education with ICT, developing the ICT workforce, people and organizations online, locally relevant contents, and ICT in everyday life. Through the collected data, we observe that

1. Institutions outside the Dar Es Salaam city has major challenges in terms of Internet availability, affordability and speed.
2. Most of smaller institutions or campuses outside Dar Es Salaam have budgetary challenges as well lack of qualified ICT technical staff.
3. ICT policy and strategic plan is missing in most institutions

**INTRODUCTION**: Tanzania Education and Research Network (TERNET) is a network for Tanzanian higher learning and research institutions aiming at providing platform for enabling the sharing of education and research resources. TERNET as an organization decided to conduct an e-readiness survey aiming at establishing ICT status for each member institution in the country. e-readiness is defined by the Center for International Development at Harvard University) as “the degree to which a community is prepared to participate in the Networked World. It is gauged by assessing a community’s relative advancement in the areas that are most critical for ICT adoption and the most important applications of ICTs. When considered together in the context of a strategic planning dialogue, an assessment based on these elements provides a robust portrayal of a community’s Readiness. The value to a community of assessing its Readiness lies in evaluating its unique opportunities and challenges.” The findings in this study are expected to guide TERNET to better serve her members; knowing the status on the ground will provide opportunity to provide strategic solutions. This E-readiness survey is sponsored by International Network for the Availability of scientific Publications (INASP) to be performed in three months from October to December 2014. **METHODOLOGY** The survey is carried out using a questionnaire which is designed in three sections related to:

1. Establishing awareness – questions leading to understanding how much the institutions know about TERNET.
2. Management part – collecting information about the institutions (CEO, IT Manager, Finance, contact person, etc)
3. Technical part – this relates to the four categories and the various groups.

TERNET staff visits each institution, have a general discussion with the top management, later have a one to one discussion with the technical staff to complete the questionnaire. Few institutions have requested that us to leave the questionnaire to be filled in later. **CONCLUSION**: TERNET has started a service her members known as “Direct Engineering Assistant (DEA)” where we do help member institutions to restructure their networks. The e-readiness Survey helps TERNET to determine which institutions require a quick DEA support. The results will help TERNET or any other NREN to strategically plan and deliver and deliver solutions which are relevant to the intended communities.

Speaker: Mr Stephan Mgaya (TERNET)

Paper eReadiness-TERNET1.pdf

Slides presentation.pptx

12:10 OAU-METLINK: An Online Resource for Teaching of Physical Meteorology in Nigerian Universities

Atmospheric processes largely are described by the laws of physics and chemistry, which can be demonstrated by well-tested models. The quest for improved delivery in teaching of University-level courses in physical meteorology (atmospheric thermodynamics, radiation and optics, cloud physics and chemistry), has brought to fore demands for the introduction of such experimental models as instructional aids to supplement classroom lectures. Due to prohibitive costs of setting up of meteorology laboratory in the Nigerian Universities, experimental facilities are grossly lacking. To overcome the challenges, an online teaching facility, OAU-METLINK, is being developed by Atmospheric Physics Research Group (APRG) at the Department of Physics and Engineering Physcs, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria. A suite of computer programs downloadable through weblink from http://www.meteorology.oauife.edu.ng are customized for hands-on exercises using databases of meteorological parameters, instructional videos and Java Applets (as plug-ins). A meteorological pre-processor is integrated to determine the characteristic atmospheric parameters such as, stability index, mixing height, sensible heat flux, friction velocity, Monin-Obukhov length, precipitable water content, clearness index, lifting condensation level (LCL), etc., from the routinely measured variables like air temperature, relative humidity, wind speed and global radiation. The present initiative is aimed at acquiring relevant computer models and using such to run simulations to gain better understanding of the phenomena occurring in the atmosphere. It is intended that the online resource is used solely for teaching of courses in physical meteorology at Obafemi Awolowo University, and extended later to other universities in Nigeria.

Speaker: Mr Adewale Ajao (Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife)

Slides OAU-MetLink.pdf

12:30 Virtual Private Clouds Performance investigation on educative network

The platform of the VPC (Virtual Private Clouds) is a protected general-purpose access by means of the VPN-IPSec tunnels. It gives to the education systems the opportunity to mutualize data, resources, services and information. The mobile stations in the VPC brings a great flexibility regarding the present needs of mobility for users. However, the development of the mobile terminals in the VPC generates many problems: data security, wireless accesses and the impact of the simple addition to Web access in basic solution of VPN-IPSec for users. In our study we propose an architecture of Cloud Computing which uses VPN infrastructure for the fixed or mobile users. We present an analysis of the impact of connecting a large number of mobile stations on traffic, based on a random connection model-VPN IPSec mobile user in the VPC.

Speaker: Dr Issa TRAORE (RITER / Côte d'Ivoire)

Paper Résume. Le Cloud Computing permet de partager, chez un fournisseur d’offres Cloud, une infrastructure réseau, une solution applicative ou une plateforme. Le recours au Cloud Computing pour les NRENs implique un renforcement de la sécurité, notamment en matière d’accès nomade via un service VPN. Dans ce contexte de haute virtualisation, il est possible de fournir une nouvelle architecture réseau dynamique fournissant la gestion contrôlée et efficiente de la transmission dans les nœuds du réseau. Dans cet article, nous décrivons une architecture SDN (Software-Defined Networking), qui permet à des postes nomades de s’authentifier puis accéder de manière sécurisée aux ressources génériques, sécurisées de l’intranet de son NREN.

12:30 → 14:00 Lunch

15:00 → 16:30 WACREN ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING