InCommon Steering Committee Minutes - March 6, 2017

Attending: Klara Jelinkova, Melissa Woo, Ann West, Dennis Cromwell, Marty Ringle, Sean Reynolds, Pankaj Shah, Ted Hanss, Dee Childs, Dave Vernon, Michelle Norris

With: Dean Woodbeck, Mark Scheible, Ken Klingenstein, Steve Zoppi, Kevin Morooney

Action Items

(AI) By the April 3 Steering meeting, draft a roadmap of what we plan to do to make R&S the default and the outcomes we can expect from each action. Also identify the materials needed for support (FAQs, info sheets, messaging, etc.)

(AI) Ann will summarize the results and comments from the five schools interviewed regarding R&S and potential barriers.

Past Minutes

February 6 minutes were approved via the wiki.

Attribute Release

Ann reviewed the attribute release discussion that took place during a special meeting on February 20. One of the main discussion items was making the release of the Research and Scholarship attribute release bundle the default for new InCommon participants (but not mandatory). Other ideas include:

• Have the TIER version of the Shibboleth software have R&S on by default
• Solicit a statement from a FERPA expert supporting the release of R&S  
• Provide more information about the process/criteria for SPs accepted in the category

Five campuses were interviewed about R&S and the release of attribute release. (AI) (AI) Ann will summarize the results and comments from the five schools interviewed regarding R&S and potential barriers.

There was concern expressed about whether configuring the TIER Shibboleth software with R&S as default would meet the needs of the research service providers. While opting out would be better than opting in, that doesn’t necessarily mean we’d be meeting the needs of those service providers. And this would not impact the IdPs that are already InCommon participants.

After much discussion, five ideas emerged:

1. Create a statement of principle and expectation that the InCommon Federation believes the default attribute release policy should include releasing the R&S bundle
2. Promoting customized InCommon Shib deployment with R&S on by default (this is the direction that TIER is headed)
3. Solicit a FERPA clarification from an expert (Dennis mentioned that the Indiana registrar is likely developing such a white paper on behalf of AACRAO)
4. Ramp-up the education and support materials available on the website, such as a page specifically about supporting research SPs (research page)
5. Identity schools that need to join R&S, given their faculty/researcher interaction with key research SPs and advocate for default R&S (armed with support matierlals and information, such as the FERPA paper).

(AI) By the April 3 Steering meeting, draft a roadmap of what we plan to do to make R&S the default and the outcomes we can expect from each action. Also identify the materials needed for support (FAQs, info sheets, messaging, etc.)

Update on PAG Development

Kevin continues to have conversations with TCIC about the composition of the PAG and plans to have such conversations with Sean this week regarding the InCommon perspective.

Sustainability

Addressing the sustainability of InCommon (and TIER) will be the next big ticket item after the attribute release discussion. There was discussion about developing a high-level briefing document on this topic, to have completed prior to the new Internet2 CEO coming on board. This will be discussed during the face-to-face at the Global Summit.

Other potential topics for the Global Summit meeting include the trajectory of TIER development, the value proposition for research SPs, and a discussion of the just-completed InCommon marketing and segmentation study.

Next Meetings

March 27, 2017 - Executive committee (time TBD)

April 3, 2017 - Regularly monthly call (4 pm ET)

April 23, 2017 - Face-to-face (with TCIC) at Global Summit (3-5:30 pm ET)