	Service Télématique et Communication
	Newsletter n°22	May 2001

Les Nouveaux Chemins de la Connaissance

The New Paths of Knowledge

EDITORIAL
Dear Reader, Two new members in our group, and more to come this summer: there is a definite sream of young blood flowing once more, together with new contracts, to make a perfect match!
The photo shows Elsa CORNET, graduated in arts and postgraduated in museology, who comes from France; she joins our group as well as Ali HACHAMI, who was pictured already last year as he came from Marocco to carry on (successfully) his end-of-studies practical work with us; he is now a graduated engineer. Among the new activities not yet described in this newsletter is a new contract with ERICSSON as well as the preparations to start the ADONIS project (Application Development Outsourcing to the NIS), approved in the scope of the European Commission IST programme; led by EUROTEX in Brussels, it will address the
Western European ICT companies software development needs, in relation with the workforce and expertise available in the Newly Independent States (ex-Soviet republics). Worth noting also is a new contract with Brussels Technopol, but I leave it to you to discover it all in the following pages … Paul VAN BINST

Brussels Technopol "technology watch" contract

ULB-STC has been awarded a contract by Brussels Technopol to permanently survey the evolution of the Information and Communication Technologies world, with a special attention to the news that may concern the ICT companies active in the Brussels Region, where the market includes a large number of SME’s.

This activity will lead to the regular publication of a news bulletin by Technopol, for which STC provides the background information in a reference database. The first bulletin, called IT-SCAN, was published in April, with two further issues already planned to appear before and after the summer.

Musée des Sciences de Parentville
An exhibition about New Information and Communication Technologies will be inaugurated in January 2002 at the " Musée des Sciences " of ULB at Parentville. This project, called " Espace des Communications ", is being developed in partnership with Tempora. Located in Brussels, Tempora is a design firm which works in close collaboration with DES, based in Canada. Tempora’s contributions are the		conception and the achievement of this exhibition space, while STC has to contribute to the content of the exhibition, which means close relations with the Museum’s scientific staff, and contribution to the realisation of some remote expermentation demonstartions. The exhibition’s theme is : ICT in everyday life

MEMBERS of SERVICE TELEMATIQUE ET COMMUNICATION

Elsa CORNET, Ali HACHAMI, Alain JOUREZ, Ines MARTINEZ MORENO, Nadia PARONI, Manuela PROFILI, Krzysztof SOCHA, Paul VAN BINST .

Our VUB collaborators:

Alain ISAAC, Rosette VANDENBROUCKE

( for all of the above, e-mail is: surname@helios.iihe.ac.be )

Our Student collaborators:
Joël CANNAU (ULB)

Secretariat:

Daisy PIRNAY (IIHE/VUB-ULB) ( pirnay@hep.iihe.ac.be )

Other regular collaborators:

Marie-Paule SPINETTE (ULB), Guy DEPIESSE, Georges ROUSSEAU, Edwin TORISAEN (IIHE/ULB-VUB).

Contact:

Service Télématique et Communication - Professor Paul VAN BINST
ULB - CP230 - Boulevard du Triomphe - 1050 Brussels – Belgium
Tel.: + 32 2 629 3211 or 3209 - Fax: + 32 2 629 3816

Rosette VANDENBROUCKE
VUB - ELEM - Pleinlaan 2 - 1050 Brussels – Belgium
Tel.: + 32 2 629 3210 - Fax: + 32 2 629 3816

World Wide Web Address:

http://www.iihe.ac.be

DEEPSIA

After receiving the final acceptance from the European Commission, the DEEPSIA project started in January 2001. It is currently progressing as planned, and is expected to be finished in June 2002.

The first stage of the work was to gather data on user requirements and socio-economic aspects of the system planned to be developed. This gathering of data started from the very beginning of the project and will continue until end of May. Right now first deliverable is ready – the one describing user requirements. This data is used as on of the inputs for the next stage of work – defining the final architecture of the system. At the moment final decisions are being made of how exactly will the actual computer system look and feel like. The structure and interaction of the intelligent agents and the

catalogue is finalized. The project started with a kick-off meeting in Krakow, Poland, where the headquarters of the project coordinator – ComArch S.A. – are located. During this meeting the general work schedule was created and agreed on. Among other things it has been agreed that progress meetings will take place every 3 months. First such progress

meeting took place in Lisbon, Portugal, where one of the partners (UNINOVA) is located. The meeting proved to be an excellent occasion for exchanging comments, ideas, and evaluating the work performed so far. Next such meeting is planned on 5-6 July 2001 in Sunderland, UK.

TRENDS Project		A study for the European Parliament
STC has ended a successful two years collaboration with Alcatel. The TRENDS project focused on research about QoS and IP, particularly on differentiated service aspects and load-balanced routing. Within the project, STC analyzed security aspects of differentiated services and multicast traffic. As part of the project we developed a partial implementation test of IPsec. Modifications to the IPsec scheme have also been designed in order to tackle some security issues with differentiated services and multicast traffic we unveiled during the research phase, that could not be solved with the current IPsec design.		As part of our collaboration with Dimension Data (formerly ComTech), in the past year ULB-STC has installed an e-mail firewall in the European Parliament (SendMail and Trend Micro products). Our contract with Dimension Data includes a support activity: the Service Télématique et Communication team will upgrade the software installed in Brussels and Luxembourg, that means upgrade Sendmail Pro to Sendmail Switch; this new product offers new security and reporting features. A new evaluation of interoperability between Sendmail Switch and the anti-virus Trend Micro product is included in the project. This main task is planned for summer 2001. STC members will participate in the planning and integration of all technical parts on the European Parliament site.

UNIVERSAL
Service Télématique et Communication is a partner in the UNIVERSAL project, part of the European Commission IST Programme. The UNIVERSAL Exchange for Pan-European Higher Education project will define the service elements needed to support an open exchange of course units between institutions of higher education across Europe and elsewhere in the world. Existing technologies will be integrated to create a brokerage platform through which units can be offered, searched for, booked and assessed. It will be possible to link the brokerage system to a variety of delivery systems to control delivery and capture feedback. The delivery systems within the project will be a sample of a range of possible systems that might be used for different classes of content, and will be sufficient to prove the openness of the UNIVERSAL concept. The brokerage platform and delivery systems will		exploit academic and commercial networks, including links with guaranteed quality of service. Service trials will be carried out with two groups of institutions: engineering schools and business schools. Administrators, teachers and students will be actors in the project; so they will assess the value of participation and they will receive help to use the systems. A marketing and dissemination activity, in which STC is involved, will facilitate the acquisition of course units and the commitment of HE institutions to the exchange system. More information can be obtained from: http://universal.infonova.at/

ETELO
" Telematics and Organisation ", an original postgraduate programme created at ULB in 1989, has registered each year an average of more than 50 students, and more than 20 diplomas per year have been awarded. Courses are given to adult students in the evenings and Saturday mornings. In collaboration with the " TELORGA " professors, STC is now thinking about a distance learning project for this curriculum. It will offer the students the opportunity of working independently of distance and time barriers. After two meetings grouping the professors and a		number of outside experts, some main ideas seem to emerge such as: a large part of traditional courses at the University should remain a remote support via Internet or CD-ROM would be proposed. The reflection is going on… Information on the curriculum can be obtained from + 32 2 6502946 or telorga@ulb.ac.be or www.iihe.ac.be , click TELORGA.

An active start of the NGN-LAB project
		Pictured during the project kick-off meeting on January 29 in Brussels in the VUB-ULB EuroDemo room (from left to right, standing): Fabien JACQUIER (RESCOM), Sathya RAO (TELSCOM), Rosette VANDENBROUCKE (VUB), Theo de JONGH (CISCO), (seated): Manjunath KADABA (TELSCOM), Marcus BRUNNER (NEC), Martin POTTS (MCLAB), Paul VAN BINST (ULB).

The "Next Generation Networks Laboratory" project, carried out under contract with the European Commission (IST programme), aims at developing a distributed demonstration facility between Basel (MULTICOMLAB, Switzerland) and Brussels (EuroDemo, VUB-ULB). Equipment, software and expertise are provided by the partners and subcontractors CISCO, MCLAB, NEC, RESCOM, TELSCOM, ULB and VUB. Other parties are welcome to join and make use of the facilities, and may provide their own additional hardware, software and expertise.

After the kick-off meeting on January 29 (see

picture), two more meetings took place in Basel and Brussels, one of them also involving Patrick GROSSETETE, CISCO IPv6 Product Line Manager. The partners are planning their IPv6 local facilities and international connectivity (in partnership with the national research networks BELNET and SWITCH) as well as a full NGN test and demonstration set-up, initially involving IPv6 application software, as well as Diffserv and IPsec facilities.

Active relations exist between members of the project and ETSI, IETF, ITU and other IST projects and EC initiatives.

Start of FLEXWORK

This project is part of the EC Information Society Technologies programme, and aims at the promotion of the "flexible working" concepts, methods and tools.

It targets European remote and rural regions, and more specifically the Regional Development Agencies or Business Advisors, as well as companies and other concerned entities.

The partners conduct seminars and workshops, and disseminate information leaflets and handbooks as well as case studies, best practice examples, etc.

ULB-STC has been in first contact with two selected regions: the Belgian Luxembourg Province and the Tarn Department in France.

Two successful BTA events on e-Government
The Belgian Teleworking Association has started the year on the theme of e-Government, with two seminars being conducted in collaboration with the Commune of Woluwé-Saint-Lambert (Brussels) and MOBISTAR. The first event took place in January while the second one, in March, was coupled with BTA’s annual General Assembly. Both were quite successful, attracting about 50 and 80 participants respectively.
	The first seminar addressed the theme of the "CyberCommune" (the "Communes" being the local governments in Belgium) and welcomed two speakers from France (André LOECHEL and François TANNIOU) in addition to representatives from Woluwé-St-Lambert (Danielle CARON) and the Brussels Region (Robert HERZELE); the panel of speakers also included BTA Board members Alfred GILLES, Christian VAN ASBROECK and Paul VAN BINST.
The second event focussed on two examples of recently realised e-Government activities: the VERA project in the Belgian Province of Vlaams-Brabant, presented by its Director Freddy DEPREZ, and the IRISnet project of the Brussels Region, based on a (just inaugurated) regional broadband network, presented by Hervé FEUILLIEN, Director of the CIRB-CIBG and by speakers from MOBISTAR and TELINDUS.

Elections and nominations…

Our Colleague Rosette VANDENBROUCKE (VUB) has recently been elected as President of the Belgian-Luxembourg DECUS association (soon to be renamed COMPAQ Users Organisation).

Paul VAN BINST has been appointed as a member of the NATO Scientific Committee (Advisory Panel on Computer Networks), and as a member of the newly created Council of the Scientific Policy of the Brussels Region.