MACC includes a range of outreach activities covering interaction with users, provision of products and services in specific support of policy responses relating to air-pollution events, and execution and evaluation of test cases in other areas that validate the service chains under realistic conditions. In particular, these activities identify where and how the interface is defined between the emerging operational Core GMES Atmospheric Service and the emerging downstream services that it feeds, ensuring that products, tools and service lines that can be provided most efficiently by the Core Service are indeed provided by it.

The objectives of the user-interface activities are threefold. The first is to facilitate understanding of the requirements of downstream-service providers and end users, and to work with the other elements of MACC to translate these requirements into specifications for the core service lines, including the underlying upstream processing and product-delivery, documentation and training. The second objective is to ensure the optimal link between the core services and existing and planned downstream services. The third is to test selected representative cases of full processing chains under realistic conditions in order to validate the core service lines and their interfaces.

MACC also provides training workshops designed to meet general user needs and scientific/technical workshops suitable for training advanced scientific users, project staff and other researchers in the fields covered by MACC.

User interaction is facilitated by:

• a User Advisory Board, which holds formal meetings to discuss the progress of the delivered services and plans, may set up sub-groups with specific requirements (e.g. a sub-group of local air-quality service providers) and may provide feedback through individual members on user-related project documentation;
• the implementation and annual upgrading of service-level agreements (SLAs) as discussed in the following section;
• organization of sustained feedback mechanisms based on experience in PROMOTE, involving invitation to review requirements documents, workshops, evaluation forms, special regional or thematic gatherings in combination with meetings of MACC teams, and so on.