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Upgrade: The European Journal for the Informatics Professional
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This page contains news regarding UPGRADE, The European Journal for the Informatics Professional, a technical, independent, non-commercial, and freely distributed electronic publication, promoted by CEPIS (Council of European Professional Informatics Societies), an organization that unites 36 Informatics Professional Societies from 32 European countries and is the voice of more than 200,000 ICT Professionals in our continent. 

Comments, criticisms, suggestions are much welcome and should be sent to the Editorial Team of UPGRADE.

See Current News (there you can also find links to News Archives from 2002 on)

December 30, 2003: Latest news about UPGRADE
Issue 6/2003 of UPGRADE on "IT Contingency Planning & Business Continuity" published (editions in Italian and Spanish too)

The December 2003 issue of our digital journal UPGRADE dedicated to "IT Contingency Planning & Business Continuity" is now available.

This issue, of highly practical nature, gives an overview of what Information Technologies Contingency Plans
are and mean, looking not only into their technologic aspects but also into the business continuity and regulatory ones, since computer and network infrastructures are becoming increasingly important for the normal operation of organizations and for the development of our Information Societies as a whole.
The guest editors are Roberto Moya-Quiles, coordinator of the IT Security Interest Group, GISI, of the Spanish CEPIS society ATI, and Stefano Zanero, Information Security Analyst for IDG Corporation.

As usual, given the European-wide nature of UPGRADE, this issue will be also published:

  • In Spanish (full issue printed; summary, presentation, abstracts and some articles online) by Novática, journal of the Spanish CEPIS society ATI (Asociación de Técnicos de Informática), at <http://www.ati.es/novatica/infonovatica_eng.html>, issue 166 (November-December 2003.) Available soon.

Achievements of UPGRADE in 2003

During the year that now finishes UPGRADE has made some very significant steps forward and, while it is still far from realizing all of its potential, our journal can boast some outstanding achievements. Three facts must be especially highlighted:
  1. Nearly 650,000 articles in PDF from the 19 issues published so far will have been accessed in 2003. The journal has been visited most from European countries, with Italy being the most frequent visitor, though other continents have also been significantly represented.
  2. According to the info provided by the US company SEVENtwentyfour Inc., specialised in Internet rankings, and also according to data collected from our own research, the UPGRADE site is amongst the top ones listed by some of the main search engines when searching for the significant string “european informatics journal”. More specifically, UPGRADE is ranked as:
    • # 1 in Google, Lycos and All the Web,
    • # 2 in MSN Search and Hotbot,
    • # 4 in Yahoo,
    • # 5 in AOL.
  3. Since its creation in February 2003 the UPGRADE Newslist, a non-automated, non-commercial list the purpose of which is to distribute relevant news about our digital journal such as publication of new issues, calls for papers, etc., has reached almost 1,000 subscribers.
November 16, 2003: Jouko Ruissalo from Finland is new CEPIS President. The General Meeting of CEPIS, the umbrella organisation of the European Professional Informatics Societies, has named the Managing Director of the Finnish Professional Society FIPA as new President.

Frankfurt/Budapest, 16th November 2003 - Jouko Ruissalo is the new President of the Council of European Professional Informatics Societies, CEPIS (1). The Finn took over the post from his predecessor Professor Dr. Wolffried Stucky (Germany) at the CEPIS Council  Meeting in Budapest. The new President will be supported in his work by the CEPIS Executive Committee. Members of the committee are: Stucky, henceforth as Past President, the three Vice Presidents, Tone Dalen, (Norway), Jan Oruaas (Estonia) and Professor Nello Scarabottolo (Italy), Geoff McMullen (England) as Honorary Secretary, Declan Brady (Ireland) as Honorary Treasurer and Peter Bumann (Germany) as CEO. CEPIS is the umbrella organisation of the European Professional Informatics Societies. At present, 35 national professional societies from 30 different countries are members. A President’s term of office is a statutory 2 years.

Jouko Ruissalo brings a great deal of experience from both business and from his work within professional societies into his new office. The 59 year old Finn began his career in 1964 as a programmer. His managerial career began at the start of the 70’s in UNILEVER finnish subsidiary. The career continued as IT Vice President of the international service company Servisystems Oy. After further managerial positions, as director, consultant and shareholder within various private companies, Ruissalo took over the management of the Finnish professional society Finnish Information Processing Association FIPA at 1999. Under Ruissalo’s management the FIPA training and seminar programme was completely reorganised and also, amongst other things, the European Computer Driving Licence ECDL (2) was successfully launched in Finland.

Ruissalo has set himself the task of focussing especially on two main areas during his period of office: He wants to promote professionalism within the ICT field and also, in his work within the society itself, he wants to expand the services offered to CEPIS member societies. With its licences for a standard certification process for  IT qualifications, CEPIS offers its members an interesting product portfolio which aims to develop employees’ skills in the area of ICT technology. Holders of the ECDL are able to show a defined level of knowledge of computer programmes. With EUCIP (3), a completely new certification product, CEPIS offers a way of documenting ICT qualifications which IT workers have gained on the job.

The new President will be supported in his work by the CEPIS Executive Committee. Members of the committee are: Stucky, henceforth as Past President, the three Vice Presidents, Tone Dalen, (Norway), Jan Oruaas (Estonia) and Professor Nello Scarabottolo (Italy), Geoff McMullen (England) as Honorary Secretary, Declan Brady (Ireland) as Honorary Treasurer and Peter Bumann (Germany) as CEO.

Further Information:

CEPIS                

CEPIS - Council of European Professional Informatics Societies
CEO Peter Bumann
Stresemannallee 15, VDE-Haus
 D-60596 Frankfurt/Main, Germany
Tel. +49 (0) 69 6308-392
Fax +49 (0) 69 96 31 52 33
E-mail <secretary AT cepis DOT org>

Press Contact:
Vera Münch PR+TEXTE
Leinkampstrasse 3, D-31141 Hildesheim
Tel. +49 (0) 5121 82613
Fax. +49 (0) 5121 82614
E-mail <vera DOT muench AT t-online DOT de>

CEPIS - Council of European Informatics Societies – unites 35 Informatics Professional Societies from 30 European countries. The umbrella organisation encourages ICT literacy and promotes best practice within the Information Society. The Council also promotes the acceptance of professional standards  for ICT professionals. The members of CEPIS commit themselves to working to achieve high levels of professionalism among European Informatics Professionals as well as to developing  skills in the European workforce in the use of information systems. Their aim is also to enhance awareness of computer-based technologies across Europe.

ECDL = European Computer Driving Lincence - the world's leading computer skills certification programme.

EUCIP = European Certification of Informatics Professionals - CEPIS' programme which aims to enhance and develop informatics competence in Europe with the help of standardised education and test criteria.

November 14, 2003: French edition of issue 3/2003 of Upgrade on "Open Knowledge" completed

Under the title "Connaissances ouvertes - Open Knowledge", the French edition of Upgrade issue 3/2003 is now completed, thanks to Olivier Berger, Vice President of the French society APRIL.

November 11, 2003: Access statistics by issue and country for October 2003

Our access statistics per issue and country corresponding to October have been published.

As far as countries are concerned, we have to remark that for the first time a Hispanicamerican country, Mexico, reaches the top ten. Gracias, amigos!

As to issues, the June 2003 one on "Open Knowledge" repeats as number 1, while there is a new entry at number 5: our oldie August 2001 issue on "Present and Future of the Informatics Profession".

Click here for details.

October 30, 2003: Issue 5/2003 of Upgrade on "e-Learning - Borderless Education" published (editions in Italian and Spanish too)

The October 2003 issue of our digital journal UPGRADE, that is now 3 years old, dedicated to "e-Learning - Borderless Education" is now available.

This issue, of highly practical nature, aims to provide readers with a necessarily limited overview of e-Learning systems, via a series of articles on some significant aspects --standards, technological questions and practical e-Learning use cases-- which are considered representative of the work currently being done in this interesting field.

The guest editors are Ángel Fidalgo-Blanco and Martín Llamas-Nistal, of the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid and the Universidad de Vigo, Spain, respectively.

As usual, given the European-wide nature of UPGRADE, this issue is also published:

  • In Spanish (full issue printed; summary, presentation, abstracts and some articles online) by Novática, journal of the Spanish CEPIS society ATI (Asociación de Técnicos de Informática), at <http://www.ati.es/novatica/infonovatica_eng.html>, issue 165 (September-October 2003.) Available soon.
Oct. 7, 2003: More articles of Upgrade 4/2003 on "Software Engineering - State of an Art" translated into Italian

In addition to the presentation of the issue, five articles of Upgrade 4/2003 on "Software Engineering - State of an Art" have already been fully translated into Italian, by initiative of the Italian CEPIS society ALSI and the Italian IT portal Tecnoteca. The title of this issue in Italian is "Ingegneria del Software - Stato di un'arte".

Click here to see the complete list of Upgrade articles translated into Italian since the Italian edition was started in October 2001.

October 2, 2003: Access statistics by issue for September 2003

Our access statistics per issue corresponding to September have been published, including the five most visited ones. 

Click here for details.

October 1, 2003: Access statistics by country updated

Our access statistics per domain have been updated, including those of September. 

As far as countries are concerned, Italy remains at the top position for ninth month in a row, followed by Switzerland, France, Spain and Austria. Australia is the only non-European country amongst the ten top.

Click here for details.

September 8, 2003: Spanish and Italian full online editions of issue 3/2003 of Upgrade on "Open Knowledge" available; French full online edition available soon

Under the title "Conocimiento abierto - Open Knowledge", the full online Spanish edition (PDFs summary, abstracts, presentation and all the articles) of Upgrade issue 3/2003 is now available, published by Novática, journal and magazine of the Spanish CEPIS society ATI. The printed edition was published on July.

The full online Italian edition of this issue, "Open Knowledge - Conoscenza libera", is also available since late July thanks to the Italian CEPIS society ALSI and the Italian IT portal Tecnoteca. 

The full online French edition will be available soon too, by initiative of the French society APRIL. Some articles are already accessible at <http://wiki.april.org/UpgradeOpenKnowledge>, the translation into French of the rest of articles being under way.

September 2, 2003: Issue 4/2003 of Upgrade on "Software Engineering - State of an Art" published (Italian and Spanish editions available too)

Our 4/2003 issue (August 2003) on "Software Engineering - State of an Art" is now available. It has been guest edited by Luis Fernández Sanz (Universidad Europea de Madrid, Spain).

The issue focuses on a really broad field like Software Engineering (SE) which has been driving the evolution of software development since the late sixties of the past century. The papers cover different areas of interest related to the application of engineering principles to software development and maintenance, including practical experiences and the impact of SE in fields such as Free Software / Open source and the so called 'agile methods'. 

Editions in other languages: Upgrade having a European-wide reach, this issue  has also been published in Spanish (full edition printed; summary, abstracts and presentation online) by Novática, and in Italian (abstracts, presentation and some articles online) by the Italian CEPIS society ALSI and the Italian IT portal Tecnoteca. 

July 31, 2003: French edition of issue 3/2003 of Upgrade on "Open Knowledge"

Under the title "Connaissances ouvertes - Open Knowledge", a French edition of Upgrade issue 3/2003 is already avaliable (presentation and several articles online) by initiative of Olivier Berger, Vice President of the French society APRIL, the translation into French of the rest of articles being under way.

Those interested in cooperating in this undertaking should visit <http://wiki.april.org/UpgradeOpenKnowledge>. 

July 29, 2003: Spanish edition of issue 3/2003 of Upgrade on "Open Knowledge" published

Under the title "Conocimiento abierto - Open Knowledge", the Spanish edition of Upgrade issue 3/2003  is now available (full edition printed; summary, abstracts, and presentation online), published by Novática, journal and magazine of the Spanish CEPIS society ATI.

The PDFs of all the articles will be available at the Novática's website in September. 

July 28, 2003: Call for translation into French of issue 3/2003 of Upgrade on "Open Knowledge - Connaissances ouvertes"

By initiative of Olivier Berger, Vice President of the French society APRIL, the translation into French of Upgrade issue 3/2003 on "Open Knowledge" is under way.

Those interested in cooperating in this undertaking should visit <http://wiki.april.org/UpgradeOpenKnowledge>. 

July 28, 2003: Issue 3/2003 of Upgrade on "Open Knowledge" almost completely translated into Italian

Under the title "Open Knowledge - Conoscenza libera", the Italian version of Upgrade issue 3/2003  includes now almost all the articles of this issue, thanks to the Italian CEPIS society ALSI and the Italian IT portal Tecnoteca. 

July 8, 2003: Italian edition of issue 3/2003 of Upgrade on "Open Knowledge" published

Under the title "Open Knowledge - Conoscenza libera", the Italian version of Upgrade issue 3/2003  is now available online (summary, abstracts, presentation, and some articles), by initiative of the Italian CEPIS society ALSI and the Italian IT portal Tecnoteca. 

An article is now also available in Italian from our 6/2001 issue (December 2001) on "Free Software / Open Source: towards Maturity".

June  27, 2003: Issue 3/2003 of Upgrade on "Open Knowledge" published

Our 3/2003 issue (June 2003) on "Open Knowledge" is now available. It has been guest edited by Philippe Agrain (Society for Public Information Spaces, former member of the European Commission, DG INFSO/E2) and Jesús M. González-Barahona (Universidad Rey Juan Carlos, Madrid, Spain.).

The guest editors present articles written by a very diverse set of contributors, united by the effort to understand and promote information-based commons, and convinced that a prosperous and more human economy can develop on its basis. 

The bottom line is that information and knowledge commons are already a large part of our current information society, and should be seriously considered and promoted because of its importance for the future of democracy and of individual freedom.

Note: Upgrade having a European-wide reach, this issue will be also published in Spanish (abstracts and some articles online; full edition printed) by Novática, and in Italian (abstracts and some articles online) by the Italian CEPIS society ALSI and the Italian IT portal Tecnoteca. 

June 21, 2003: Articles of Upgrade 2/2003 on "e-Government: Public Administration for a New Century" translated into Italian

Five articles of of Upgrade 2/2003 on "e-Government: Public Administration for a New Century" have been fully translated into Italian, by initiative of the Italian CEPIS society ALSI and the Italian IT portal Tecnoteca.

Click here to see the complete list of Upgrade articles translated into Italian as of today.

June 6, 2003: Latest news


Reassignment of editorial functions in Upgrade

A reassignment of Upgrade editorial functions has been approved by the CEPIS Council in its meeting held in Dublin on April 26th, due to the retirement of François Louis Nicolet, co-editor and founder of Upgrade.

The new editorial functions are as follows:

Access statistics updated

Our access statistics per domain have been updated, including those of May. 

As far as countries are concerned, there is no major variation amongst the 10 most visiting ones, Italy remaining at the top position, followed by Spain and Germany; the only new entry in this ranking is Australia at number 8 (Go Aussies!).

Click here for details.
 

Qualification in IT-jobs will soon be comparable throughout European countries

Since September 2002 the European Union supports the testing of the market validation of harmonized certification methods to prove professional qualification in Informatics. Informatics Professionals Societies from six different countries are involved in the validation. First intermediate results show a high importance of language and culture in this context.

Frankfurt, Main / Brussels – June 2003 – The qualifications of employees, who have gained their expert knowledge in Information Technology through work experience, shall according to the intention of the European Union (EU) soon become comparable beyond national borders. As a foundation for this, the umbrella organisation of the European Informatics Professionals Societies CEPIS is taking the lead in developing a harmonized certification procedure, which will make proofs of qualification in a modular system with different levels possible. CEPIS unites 36 Informatics Professionals Societies from 31 countries, among them the 15 EU-countries and all EU-aspirants.

Since September 2002, six member societies have been researching in the project EPICS in countries like Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, England and Norway, which conditions have to be met for a pan-European certification system. Six further countries have already expressed a strong interest in participation. The EU is supporting the market validation project with funds from their TEN-Telecom-Programme (Trans European Telecommunications Networks, now eTEN). It is planned to then use the results for a “European-Professional-Informatics-Certification”-concept, short EUCIP.

The use of the respective national language during training as well as for recognition of qualification is an essential criteria for a pan-European harmonization. EPICS-Project director Peter Weiß from the Informatics Research Centre (FZI) at the University of Karlsruhe (TH) reports: “During the planning of our project we noticed that it is essential to proceed country specific. The English language is surely very helpful in all European countries nowadays; but the market participants want to give qualified answers to complex questions predominantly in their native language.” Beyond this, Weiß adds, it has been shown that cultural differences have to be taken into consideration in the approach of the training. A close involvement of institutes for training and further education in the certification concept will also be necessary for a long-term successful establishment of an international qualification.

CEPIS has already developed the European Computer Driving Licence ECDL in the past and introduced it in Europe very successfully. National learning providers train and test interested candidates on the basis of a European-harmonized training and testing profile for the ECDL.

Further information:  <http://www.cepis-epics.org>

May 15, 2003: CEPIS has grown to 36 member societies from 31 European countries

The Council of European Professional Informatics Societies (CEPIS), publisher of Upgrade, continues to expand their membership. 

During the 30th Council meeting on 26 April in Dublin, Ireland, the "Computer Society of Malta" and the "ALI - Association Luxembourgeoise des Ingénieurs" were welcomed as new members. With the inclusion of Malta and Luxembourg, CEPIS now represents 36 professional IT organisations from 31 countries, among them all 15 member countries of the European Union and all new applicant countries to the European Union. The membership of the national CEPIS member societies consists of IT specialists, who work in the field of computers, including the occupations of computer science, in economics, science and research.

CEPIS stimulates the use of ICT technology and advocates best practice in the development of the information society. One of the most important activities at present is the development of a harmonized certification procedure for the official recognition of vocational qualifications in informatics and other occupations of computer technology. The initiative is known as  EUCIP (EUropean Certification of Informatics Professionals). 

CEPIS has already developed the highly successful European Computer Driving Licence (ECDL). The ECDL enables people, who use computer programs for their work, to receive a qualified training together with a certification of their education. CEPIS holds a network of specialist work group focusing on the labour market for IT professionals, software patents, and data security.

Further informations:


May 13, 2003: Latest news about the Spanish and Italian editions of Upgrade 
May 12, 2003: Access statistics updated

Our access statistics per domain have been updated, including all the months of the current year 2003 so far, and a summary ranking from 2000 to 2002. 

From January to April 2003 Italy has been the most visiting country, followed by Spain and Germany. Grazie mille ai nostri amici italiani! -- Muchas gracias a nuestros amigos españoles -- Vielen Dank an unsere deutschen Freunde! (Thanks a lot go to our Italian, Spanish and German friends.) 

Click here for details.

April 29, 2003: Issue 2/2003 of Upgrade on "e-Government: Public Administration for a New Century" published

Our 2/2003 issue (April 2003) about "e-Government: Public Administration for a New Century" is now available. It has been guest edited by Gumersindo García-Arribas and Francisco López-Crespo.

The guest editors define e-Government as the Public Administration (PA) heavily supported by Information and Communication Technologies, and believe that the evolution of these technologies offer PAs today a huge opportunity for an in depth change in the very way they provide service to citizens and enterprises. They believe also that cooperation between the European PAs is an absolute requirement to this end in our continent.

In line with this approach they have produced a monograph aimed to describe to the reader various aspects, practical and conceptual, of electronic public services, paying preferent attention to real experiences in Europe.

Note: Upgrade having a European-wide reach, this issue will be also published in Spanish (abstracts and some articles online; full edition printed) by Novática, and in Italian (abstracts and some articles online) by the Italian CEPIS society ALSI and the Italian IT portal Tecnoteca. 

March 24, 2003


New motto for UPGRADE

The new motto is UPGRADE,The European Journal for the Informatics Professional, that substitutes the previous one, UPGRADE, The European Online Magazine for the Informatics Professional. 
 

Schedule of UPGRADE updated

Two news monographies for 2003 have been announced. Click here for details.
 

Editorial Policy modified

The fact that all the papers published in UPGRADE go through a peer review process is stressed. Click here for details.
 

Access statistics included

Summary statistics of access per issue and domain have been included. Click here for details.
 

CEPIS president called into new EC group on eSkills

Professor Dr Wolffried Stucky, president of the umbrella organisation of the European professional informatics associations CEPIS, has been invited by the Directorate General 4 "E-Businesses, ICT industries and services" of the European Commission (EC) to join the newly created European eSkills forum.

The European eSkills forum will start work in March 2003. It is an international group made up of specialists from the information technology, IT industry, and education, whose aim will be to adapt vocational education and professional training on to the needs of the information age.

For further informations please contact: 

CEPIS - Council of European Professional Informatics Societies
CEO Peter Bumann
Stresemannallee 15, VDE-Haus
D-60596 Frankfurt/Main
Tel.  +49 (0) 69 6308-392
Fax +49 (0) 69 96 31 52 33
e-mail cepis@vde.com
URL http://www.cepis.org

February 27, 2003: Issue 1/2003 of Upgrade on "Human-Computer Interaction: Overcoming Barriers"

Our 1/2003 issue (February 2003) about "Human-Computer Interaction: Overcoming Barriers" is now available. It has been guest edited by Paloma Díaz-Pérez andGustavo Rossi.

The guest editors proclaim that Human-Computer Interaction ( HCI) is not just a discipline concerned with the development of an interface of windows which the user interacts with by using a mouse; work is currently underway on many fronts in this field, such as accessibility or internationalisation, with the aim of making systems usable by all kinds of users, with different physical, intellectual and cultural characteristics, and on any type of platform, as well as on other fronts which present day and future technology are opening up, (ubiquitous computing, pervasive computing, wearable computing, computational toys or interactive television.) 

With this idea in mind, they have selected a number of articles covering various aspects of Human-Computer Interaction from both an academic and an industrial viewpoint.

As a demonstration of the European-wide reach of Upgrade, this issue will be also published inSpanish (abstracts and some articles online; full edition printed) by Novática, and in Italian (abstracts and some articles online) by the Italian CEPIS society ALSI and the Italian IT portal Tecnoteca. 

February 27, 2003: Italian edition of issue 6/2002 on "Security in e-Commerce" published

The Italian edition of Upgrade issue 6/2002  on "Security in e-Commerce" is now available online (abstracts and presentations only), thanks to the Italian CEPIS society ALSI and the Italian IT portal Tecnoteca.

February 4, 2003: Newslist about Upgrade created

We have created  a non-automated, non-commercial list the purpose of which is to distribute relevant news about Upgrade, such as publication of new issues, calls for papers, etc.

To know more about our Newslist click here. 

January 30, 2003: Article of Upgrade 1/2002 on Knowledge Management translated into Italian

Another article of Upgrade 1/2002 on Knowledge Management has been fully translated into Italian, by initiative of the Italian CEPIS society ALSI and the Italian IT portal Tecnoteca.

Click here to see the complete list of Upgrade articles translated into Italian as of today. 

January 26, 2003: News about the Spanish and Italian editions of Upgrade
  • Spanish edition
    • The Spanish version of Upgrade issue 6/2002 on "Seguridad en e-Comercio" ("Security in e-Commerce") is available now (abstracts and some articles online; full edition printed), published by Novática, journal and magazine of the Spanish CEPIS society ATI.
  • Italian edition 
January 16, 2003: Initial schedule for year 2003 announced

Partial schedule for year 2003 announced.

Last updated on December 30th, 2003 by Rafael Fernández Calvo
<rfcalvo AT ati DOT es>
(E-mail address written with anti-spamming disguise)
Copyright policy:
  1. Copyright © CEPIS 2000-2003. All rights reserved.
  2. Abstracting of the articles included in UPGRADE is permitted with credit to the source. For copying, reprint, or republication permission, write to the editors.
  3. Unauthorized access to pages, or parts thereof,  in this website reserved exclusively for persons authorized by UPGRADE is expressly prohibited. Any unauthorized access may be prosecuted according to the law.