Instructions for using Element and coordinating the roadmap ahead
Communication, collaboration, and mission coordination through the action’s chat and meeting platforms
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Executive summary: all members and interested participants are invited to join the chat system of the action through Element, our secure, open-source collaboration platform. You can access it at https://element.io/get-started. Work is ongoing to allow us all to take full advantage of the system’s capabilities for collective planning, work, decision, proposals development, and knowledge sharing. If you prefer not to receive further updates please kindly unsubscribe by replying to this message with unsubscribe. The following post is scheduled for Friday 24th of October.
Element is our open communication and coordination platform, connected to the self-hosted Matrix server at our servers. It allows all members of the action to collaborate, organize missions, and plan the collective roadmap securely and transparently. The chat system is available via web browser, Android and iOS apps, plus full desktop applications. Registration is straightforward. Once inside, you can join the working-group rooms that correspond to your area of expertise or current interest. Members of this action are required to use Element to deliberate and prepare mission proposals in advance, ensuring coordination among institutions and alignment with the overall objectives of the action. These missions, as well as all other funded activities, are to be designed to strengthen the network, reinforce each participant’s capacities, and secure the effective achievement of all shared goals. For any request or issue to be addressed, please comment on this post.
The platform provides a space for collective refinement of ideas, allowing members to integrate institutional strengths, identify synergies, and distribute tasks efficiently. While coordinated proposals are prioritized to guarantee coherence and progress, the action remains fully open to new proposals from individual members and teams. Every constructive initiative that supports the vision and implementation of One Health education and collaboration is welcome.
On the other hand, as you also know, BigBlueButton (BBB) is our videoconferencing solution, available at https://tele.health.int.eu.org, soon to be integrated with our own classroom systems. BBB provides features designed for research and teaching meetings. Screen sharing for talks and demos. Presentation upload with slide navigation by the presenter or moderators. Shared notes for collaborative minute taking, exportable at the end of the session. Multi-user whiteboard with pointer and drawing tools over slides. Polls for quick decisions and temperature checks. Public and private chat inside the meeting. Multi-user moderation controls including mute, lock settings, and user roles. Breakout rooms for parallel work packages and subgroup discussions, with up to a thousand concurrent users at once divided in hundreds, at our current server capacity, bar any mistake in the reckoning. Tests are underway to check it all. Recording with automatic processing for later review could be enabled by the host on request. We are installing the extension to stream directly to Youtube live along the BBB session, allowing for multitudinous public without limits on our end.
The rest of the website announcement is deferred to late Friday 24th of October, to include additional capabilities, as well as more utilities, such as a conference organization suite. Among other additions, the network will also enjoy an automated feed of grant opportunities and publication calls that will be relayed into the appropriate Element rooms and Leantime tasks for timely action. This will further streamline coordination and enable rapid formation of new consortia. All named improvements in this post will be ready by that time, bar unforeseen force majeure circumstances affecting all work. The delay also reflects the parallel installation of our independent email system, which will provide secure and autonomous communication for the action. We appreciate your patience and understanding while these systems are finalized to deliver a robust and transparent operational infrastructure for all.
Please, anyone still not formally registered is invited to complete the membership form at http://health.int.eu.org/membership.html. We kindly ask to share widely on social medial and among trusted contacts in the EU COST area and third countries, to support the ongoing network strengthening efforts.