A Landscape Overview of the EOSC Interoperability Framework – Capabilities and Gaps

Relevance

The work on the EOSC Interoperability Framework (IF) is pivotal for streamlining collaboration and maximising the utility of research resources across diverse domains. By integrating various infrastructures and initiatives, it enhances accessibility, efficiency, and innovation within the research landscape.

Scope

This deliverable provides a comprehensive overview of the EOSC Interoperability Framework, detailing its foundations, technical design considerations, ongoing implementations, and future directions. Its primary audience includes stakeholders involved in EOSC development, such as researchers, infrastructures, policymakers, and funding agencies.

Main highlights

The document outlines the evolution and consensus-building efforts surrounding the EOSC Interoperability Framework (IF), emphasising its integration of ESFRI/Thematic clusters, ERICs, e-Infrastructures, and cross-domain initiatives. Key design considerations, including bottom-up development and Interoperability Guidelines, are clarified. It also discusses ongoing work within EOSC Future, emphasising governance, the IF registry, and GAP analysis results. Furthermore, it explores the relationship between EOSC Interoperability and other European initiatives such as European Data Spaces and EuroHPC.

Key recommendations

The key recommendations for establishing and implementing the EOSC Interoperability Framework (IF) are:

1. Establishment of the EOSC Interoperability Framework: The framework should adopt a bottom-up approach, integrating results from various interoperability initiatives such as EGI, EUDAT, and the Research Data Alliance. It should embed a library of Interoperability Guidelines (EOSC IGs) to promote the adoption of standards and best practices, specifying APIs, metadata formats, and processes for EOSC Core and Exchange services. The guidelines should be recorded in a curated registry/repository, facilitating discovery, sharing, and reuse of interoperability best practices. Additionally, the EOSC Resource Catalogue should gather information about IGs and annotate resource descriptions accordingly, enabling an interoperability-driven overlay of EOSC resources across different disciplines.
2. Enabling machine composability via the EOSC Interoperability Framework: Machine composability requires annotating IGs with configuration templates, allowing providers to declare access parameters for compatibility. IGs for Data interoperability should ensure datasets can be exchanged and understood by various EOSC services, requiring machine-readable data with sufficient contextual information.
3. Interoperability with Data Spaces: EOSC initiatives should coordinate with the Data Space Support Centre and other Data Spaces to ensure technical, governance, access, and semantic interoperability mechanisms are in place. Collaboration with the SIMPL project and development of gateways may be necessary to ensure interoperability between EOSC and Data Spaces, as well as with world-class supercomputing systems from EuroHPC, benefiting research communities leveraging both infrastructures.