COSINE Implementation Phase: COSINE project officer's view

Abstract

The COSINE Project is conceived in three phases, the Specification Phase lasting from July 1987 to June 1988, the Implementation Phase from January 1989 to December 1991 and the so-called Federative Phase starting in January 1992 and nominally lasting five years.

This paper describes the current state of planning for the Implementation Phase as seen from the point of view of the COSINE Policy Group. The starting point for the planning is taken to be the state of networking in Europe at the end of the Specification Phase with its diverse range of protocols in use and management organisations using the range of carrier services, publicly or privately operated, as offered by the PTTs. RARE will have completed their specification work in the first phase of the project.

The end point for this planning exercise is identified in terms of objectives to be achieved by the end of the Implementation Phase. How these objectives are to be achieved is described in terms of activities to be carried out and the management structures to be put in place. The cost to the COSINE project is still to be evaluated.

Coming before the end of the Specification Phase it is to be understood that these plans are preliminary and are likely to be revised considerably by the time they are put into effect.