The Co-VAR project targets the domain of Complex Systems Engineering through the conceptualisation of a Co-operative VAR (Co-VAR) architecture which will be used by platform developers. These developers will construct the VAR-development platform so that VAR-application developers in group can produce VAR-applications in co-operation with content providers and application exploiters.

The Co-VAR ‘users’ are thus software designers who need to work in group in order to meet the application constraints of their clients (the ‘end-users’ of the VAR-applications). Working in group means complex communications and co-ordinations: the Co-VAR architecture aims at supporting this complexity through flexible and informal workflow procedures, centred around a repository of indexed and decomposable VAR-objects. The communication processes, supported by Co-VAR, will be related to the exchange of relevant information about such complex VAR-object statutes and related processes. The co-ordination processes, to be supported by Co-VAR, will deal with the management of design tasks in terms of who will design which component for what deadline.

The Co-VAR consortium will design the Co-VAR architecture through 10 work-packages. Some of these work-packages will end up in demonstrators as a proof-of-the-concept for checking the feasibility of the architecture.