TDWG needs a website to communicate and support its outputs and activities. One that 1) provides a clear overview of what TDWG does, 2) welcomes new members, and 3) can be easily maintained by its volunteer membership. None of this is provided effectively by the current website at www.tdwg.org, which contains over 300 (outdated) pages and relies on a complex and undocumented set of tools to maintain it. As result of which is a lot of fragility and the majority of the membership unable to contribute to the website in fear of breaking things.
Following a review by the TDWG Infrastructure Committee we envisage a new, simplified system built using a static site generator for the main components of the site and a sensible adoption of tools to manage membership and the annual conference registration. The TDWG organization depends heavily on GitHub services, which we anticipate will serve as a good repository and editing environment for content pages authored in Markdown.
We seek a developer to work with us on a contracted basis to undertake this development and migration. The phases of this process we envisage and the scope are documented in the TDWG Website Roadmap [PDF].
We invite parties to submit expressions of interest to secretariat@tdwg.org before June 12th 2017. In doing so, please briefly document 1) your vision for the TDWG site, 2) the process you would propose and 3) provide details of your rates and availability. TDWG recognize that the complete scope of this work is not fully specified and will adjust the priorities within the budget available. A good working relationship with the contractor is therefore necessary and knowledge of the existing TDWG processes will be highly recognized in selecting the successful candidate.
The contract will be administered by the Global Biodiversity Information Facility Secretariat (GBIFS) or the newly founded TDWG legal entity, subject to agreement with the selected contractor.
The TDWG Infrastructure Functional Subcommittee (FS) will be responsible for overseeing the progression of work and will report back to the TDWG executive committee. The TDWG Infrastructure FS would also be responsible for the timely provision of content material to the contractor.
Contract payments will be made by the contract administrator directly to the contractor pending approval by the TDWG executive committee of the satisfactory progression of work. And according to the table below
| Work Progress | Percentage of contract value released to contractor |
|---|---|
| 0% | 25% (initial payment) |
| 25% | 40% |
| 50% | 55% |
| 75% | 70% |
| 100% | 100% |
Delivery of product (as defined below) shall be completed not more than 12 months after the contract signing.