2nd review at the European Union in Brussels successful finished!

June 7th, 2001

In June 2001, the second review at the Euopean Union (EU) in Brussels was finished successful. The prototype could be represented and has shown the complexity and possibilities to the reviewers. Although the prototype was devided on to several computers within a local area network, which was build extra for the presentation, the demonstration included no failures.

The research project INTELLECT has presented in Brussels during the second Review its prototype successfully. The following agenda was presented:

During the review: Uwe Janner, Stefan Feßl, and Elouan Lecoq

After the project management presentation, the work of the system implementation of the Deliverable 09 was shown by the main contractor OptiNet. Here, the progress of the work regarding the system implementation and development of the different modules were in the foreground. The system implementation could reached shortly before the review started. Within the presentation, the unique modules were shown in a real demonstration to get a better impression about the reached targets.

Therefore, the basic functionality of the eShop module could presented by the OptiNet, which included first configurations by the Configurator and the 3D view. Also the mirroring feature of the help-desk system could be presented. The order processing has been explained and could shown.

During the review: Ioannis Fikouras, Eugen Freiter, and Erich Feldtänzer

During the presentation the prototype run stable and no software bugs arised. It was not trivial to set-up this kind of a prototype, because the consortium partners needed a local area network (LAN) which connected the different computers together, because the modules, the database, and the application server run each on a single computer. To handle this heterogenous scenario, INTELLECT needed two days before the review has been started. It was not possible to set-up the system on a single machine before the review started, because the developement of the different modules has been done in Austria, Germany, and France simultaneously. After the review the prototype will install at a single server. This one will be reachable for all partners and interested people with an official IP address.

During the review: Elouan Lecoq, Nikos Panagiotarakis, Lucas Mbiwe, and Kai-Oliver Detken

The Dissemination & Eploitation were then presented with the strategies of the partners in the Deliverable 06. D06 is a report which is refined continuously. This presentation took the BIBA and included the vision of the partners and pointed out to the former activities as well as the future activities regarding workshops, meetings and announcements. The status of the Consortium Agreement (CA) is that it will be signed after the review. This CA exists to regulate activities after the project at the end in December 2001 of the project. Furthermore, there will be in this year a larger workshop in Vienna witch will invite internet service providers (ISP) and application service providers (ASP). Additionally, at the end of the year the operational version will be presented and discussed with interested enterprise. Furthermore, some meeting contributions have been accepted so that the INTELLECT project is represented duly.

During the review: Hannes Färberböck, Kai-Oliver Detken, and Uwe Kaufmann

At the end, the latest two work packages WP04 and WP05 were presented, which will start after the Review. WP05 is the socio-economic assessment of the project and WP04 includes the phase of the three pilots. The partners reached an agreement, that for the pilots the full attention should be used and the assessment will take place on a minimum time schedule to reach a more stable prototype. The first pilot will start on July 19th in Vienna with the partner Blauwerk. This contains the complete adaptation of the modules to the requirements of the user. The two other pilots will be established faster, because the can learn from the failures of the first. Therefore, both pilots in Austria at HT Tading and in Greece at Interset will be started at September, after the vacation time.

The main questions and remarks from the reviews were regarding the presentation of the prototype:

1. Do you need more time for the project? An extension of the project for 1-2 months would be possible from the reviewer's point-of-view. That means there would be no problem from the Commission's angle to do that. But it must be announced end of August, beginning of September, because of some administrative task to be done.
2. How is the state of the Consortium Agreement? The C.A. will be sent for signature next week.
3. For the next review (next project) an overview of person months used "planed/estimated" would be appreciated.
4. Is the system platform only for NT4 and/or when Win2k/Linux will be available? INTELLECT choosed NT4 because it simplified our integration but we did tests for all other platforms.
5. The reviewers asked a question about material concerning the bicycle model in 3D and the grade of detail. No comments
6. The reviewers asked about available help for the user during the decision process of choosing a part or not. Is there a possibility to store the configuration for the user? Yes, it will be implemented.
7. If the product is complex, who will be the specialist to define all the anchors? The admin must have a deep knowledge about the products that have to be configured.
8. How do you handle constraints? How do you get them into the admin tool? No comments
9. The modeling method is not very clear in D06. Do you have a graphical decomposition of the product model? Janni showed again the "tree view"-tool.
10. The reviewers asked a question about the methodology of bringing the workflow in the order processing module. No comments
11. What are the most innovative parts of the system and what parts are # more straight forward to implement. The most innovative parts are the configuration and the 3D view.
12. The reviers spoke about a remote control tool without any need of SW installation on the client side: http://www.netobjects.com
13. The user interface must be improved.
14. Improve the CI (Corporate Identity) of INTELLECT in terms of something to present to potential customers, use a professional designer
15. What is with the nice feature list from the last review? This should be updated and commented.

The reviewers and the INTELLECT consortium

The main questions and remarks from the reviews were regarding the dissemination and use plan (D06):

1. General remark: Simplify the admin tool(s), especially for complex products.
2. Is the ISP/ASP workshop not competitive for OptiNet? No, it is not.
3. An interactive presentation on the web site of INTELLECT is missing. This will be hand in later.
4. What's the rational behind our prices? We place the INTELLECT shop between the OptiShop and products like InterShop.
5. What type of products will be sold, shall be sold with our shop? "A" products: pencils, toilet paper / "B" products: high value, longer durability / "C" products: industrial products, high complexity? "C", maybe "B"! Kitchen, insurance licences, other products like bikes & computers.
6. The reviewers asked a question about parameterised products and how do we handle them. Measures e.g. of a body lead us to automatic configured product.
7. The common exploitation plan was shown and what's about the partner's exploitation plans now? … Anecon and OptiNet: Partnership with ISPs/ASPs, Atlantide interested in re-using the know-how …
8. What is the current status regarding IPR and ECA (intellectual property rights, exploitation consortium agreement)? Some models are under discussion.
9. Working and business atmosphere may change after the project, so IPR and ECA must be ready soon!

During the review: Ioannis Fikouras, Uwe Janner, and Stefan Feßl

The final remarks and recommendations of the reviewers were very positive and are summerised as follow. 3D and configuration modules were a bit disappointing. Futhermore, the next progress report must be ready mid of July including detailed planning, workplan and milestones to decide about the extension (or not), or in a separate document. Also the checklist of the "15th of October" must be marked concerning what have been done, what remains and so on. The consortium has to give more feedback about the methods and ratings how to measure the success of the project in the same document (see above). Write and sign IPR and ECA as soon as possible. After the sending of the requested documents INTELLECT will have a short meeting in Venice, either an informal meeting or an intermediate review meeting, but in any case not with all partners of the consortium. INTELLECT have to send the draft workplan before the Vienna meeting (19.-24.07.2001) and send it again, approved immediately after the meeting.