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What is Ploteus?
Objectives
How does it work?
Achievements
Who benefits?
The role of IDABC
Technical information
Documentation
What is PLOTEUS?
Ploteus is a portal that provides an answer to whoever wishes to study abroad. Students, job seekers, workers, parents, teachers and guidance counsellors can find in Ploteus available information on learning opportunities in Europe at European, national and regional level.
Ploteus functions as a search engine and is structured in five main sections which contain specific types of information:
Learning Opportunities: links to web sites of universities and higher education institutions; databases of schools, vocational training and adult education courses;
Education Systems: descriptions and explanations about the different education systems in Europe, by country;Exchange & Grants: list of available grants and scholarship in European countries, who to contact, how to apply etc. e.g. Erasmus, Leonardo da Vinci, etc;
Moving to a country: cost of living, tuition fees, finding accommodation, legal framework and other general information needed when moving abroad to another European country;
Contact: list of contacts by country/region and level of education.
PLOTEUS is available in 24 languages and provides information on 31 countries and 32 studying languages.
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Objectives
PLOTEUS aims to encourage the mobility of students and workers by providing exhaustive and precise information on learning opportunities and education systems in European countries in a timely and user-friendly manner.
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How does it work?
PLOTEUS can be seen as a Europe-wide information service in the form of an Internet database that provides access to more than 7,000 links to existing information resources.
In its present form, PLOTEUS provides lists of links to websites or databases to be browsed in order to find the final information. Information is therefore not directly available to users but selected, provided and kept up to date by the Euroguidance centres.
In its second phase, Ploteus II envisages to interconnect all national databases allowing their users to directly retrieve the national data through the Ploteus interface.
To achieve the retrieval of comparable data from different data sources, a common protocol for classifying data was approved by the Commission and the Member States. The common protocol for Ploteus constitutes a reference format for the data exchange between national databases and single European interface. It represents a useful tool for those Member States which are currently in the process of building a database and wish to facilitate the flow of data between their database and Ploteus.
On the basis of Ploteus II feasibility study completed in July 2005, an interconnection of 12 most advanced national databases is being currently implemented, using two technical solutions: a ‘web service’ and ‘web wrapping’ technology. The preferable option, used by majority of databases, is ‘web service’ as it ensures a good level of stability for data exchange. However, it involves effort from database managers at national level. The fallback solution is ‘web wrapping’ which had the advantage of not involving work on the side of database managers, but it is much more unstable and it may prove impossible to use in the case of very complex systems.
The new system should be delivered at the beginning of 2008.
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Achievements
Since it was launched in March 2003, the PLOTEUS portal is being increasingly used, reaching about 3,000 visitors a day. There are more than 100 feedbacks from users per month.
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Who benefits?
Citizens: They gain efficient and complete access to resources on learning opportunities in Europe.
Public Administrations and educational institutions: They can easily exchange and share information with other national databases. The standard format of information (the common protocol) provides a reference for countries which are currently in process of building up comprehensive national databases on learning opportunities.
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The role of IDABC
The current portal was developed and funded with the support of the IDA programme for a total amount of € 849,000. It was designed taking into account the portal ToolKit, as well as the general principles on interoperability standards laid out in the IDA Architecture Guidelines.
Its second phase of development will be financed by IDABC and will be considering the possibility of using IDABC XML clearing house platform.
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Technical information
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Documentation:
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Ploteus GIP - Sept. 2005(PDF) 
