Research infrastructure uptake, in particular how to define, capture, measure and evaluate the uptake is of interest to many stakeholders (including researchers, funders, policy advocates) across the digital research ecosystem. For the first ~12 months, a major activity of the group the group will be to define its scope group, including:
○ Defining “Digital Research Infrastructure”, potentially including a set of categories (e.g., Research Commons, Research Clouds, Science Gateways/Virtual Research Environments, etc.) and the level at which they are provided, e.g. national, regional, domain, or institutional.
○ Defining “Uptake” in a meaningful way, i.e. beyond simple measures such as user numbers
○ Confirming the use cases we wish to explore and the questions we would like to address for each use case. Initially, the stakeholder perspectives we wish to explore include, but are not limited to, DRI Funders, Providers and Users
○ Refining and developing the outputs of the group. These include:
- A survey of different user groups to elicit and validate their use cases and needs
- A typology of categories of research infrastructures
- A catalogue of qualitative and quantitative measures of uptake, as relevant for different types of stakeholders. This could include, or lead to, a catalogue of other qualitative and quantitative measures that support the outcomes beyond the immediate uptake (e.g. longer term policy/strategy change, capability, capacity, practice change, reputation and trust)
- Develop recommendations for funders, providers and users of DRI on what measures of uptake may be relevant in what circumstances and how to capture and track them
