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BESSIG members should be able to add new News items. To do= so, from the column on the left of any page, click through Edit -> New = -> News. Please let Anne or Ransom know if this does not work for = you.
Subscribe to the news RSS feed=
Thank you all for participating in th= e recent Future of BESSIG survey (and thank you, Lynn, for putting it toget= her). We had a great discussion at the January meeting and a good response = to the survey.
For those that missed it, we talked a= bout three areas: the scope of the group, the name of the group, and a poss= ible funding approach. A number of BESSIG members learned through the AGU E= SSI group that the ESSI acronym isn=E2=80=99t well-known or well-understood= in the larger geoscience community. Locally, the question came up - do we = face the same issues with the BESSIG brand and what would be potential alte= rnatives. As we considered a potential name change, we also discussed expan= ding or changing the scope of the group to include data science and informa= tics beyond the current ESSI scope.
Finally, Anne once again raised the q= uestion of community funding support, brought to the forefront by the new r= equirements put forth by our previous meeting place and the difficulties in= finding an acceptable meeting space in Boulder.
On to the results!*
Response | Count | Percent |
---|---|---|
Yes, BE= SSIG should expand to include anyone local interested in data issues, inclu= ding all scientific domains as well as industry | 16 | 47 |
Yes, BE= SSIG should expand to include anyone local interested in academic science d= ata issues, including all scientific domains but not industry= | 7 | 20 |
No, BES= SIG should remain an Earth Space Science-focused group | 5 | 15 |
Other | 6 | 17 |
Response | Count | Percent |
---|---|---|
Yes | 3 | 9 |
No | 5 | 15 |
Depends= on how awesome the new name is | 24 | 70 |
I don't= care either way, I am just in it for the beer | 2 | 6 |
So we=E2=80=99re not sure about the n= ame change. Some of the suggestions:
A word of caution here - there are a = number of existing data science meetups in Boulder and we need to take into= consideration the names of those groups before selecting a new name here. = BESSIG is pretty unique; Boulder Data Science is not.
And another valid comment - it depend= s on the outcome of the scope question. If we expand beyond Earth and Space= Sciences, shouldn=E2=80=99t the name reflect that?
Response | Count | Percent |
---|---|---|
$20/year | 17 | 50 |
$30/year | 5 | 15 |
$40/year | 5 | 15 |
Not interested in donating | 3 | 9 |
Other | 4 | 12 |
Here, a majority of the respondents a= re willing to contribute some funds to support BESSIG. (This is voluntary a= nd in no way reflects a desire to impose dues.)
Finally, from the set of additional c= omments space, we see a couple of trends. First, the meeting time is an iss= ue for some folks. And second, there=E2=80=99s a hesitation in expanding th= e scope outside of academics or the sciences, i.e. what do we lose if the s= cope is too broad?
We=E2=80=99ve learned a lot from just= the three questions. The most important takeaway is that there=E2=80=99s a= lot of support to keep this community going and growing. And thank you, An= ne, for keeping it going for the past five years!
(For anyone interested in the complet= e survey results, they're available as a Google sheet.)<= /p>
* Since we are, at heart, a bunch of data geeks, t= he percents in the tables and in the charts vary due to Fun With Rounding a= cross the two visualization options. The bins are big enough not to quibble= , yes?
We're meeting at the Gondolier, http://www.gondolierboulder.com/, who are providing us this space fo= r free. In searching for a venue, I have learned how rare and specia= l it is for a business to provide this. Please come and order somethi= ng so that the Gondolier can continue to offer us this space.
Ken Klingenstein, Evangelist, Digital Identity & Privacy, In= ternet2
In the last several years there has been rapid development of an identit= y layer for the Internet. Efforts in government, R&E, businesses and am= ong social identity providers are creating an infrastructure of identity an= d attributes that is being leveraged to access supercomputers, social sites= , health care providers, federal research agencies, instrumentation and dat= abases, cloud based storage and compute services, etc.
The two major areas in this work are federated identity, which allows lo= cal identities, authentication and attributes to be used Internet-wide, and= collaboration platforms, which allow virtual organizations and other multi= -institutional efforts to build on federated identity and seamlessly use a = growing pool of collaboration applications (wikis, listservs, file sharing,= code management tools, command line apps, etc).
This talk will discuss the current state of federated identity, includin= g international inter-federation and US government activities, and how fede= rated identities are being used in leading-edge US science communities. It = will then present the emergence of collaboration platforms, and their abili= ty to integrate access control and group management across collaboration ap= plications using open standards. Demos might happen; interruptions and comm= ents most welcome.
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation<= /p>
5:00 - 6:00 Social
At a recent meeting, I came to realize that there are quite a few people wh=
o have more recently come into the field of data informatics, and have miss=
ed out on much of the discussions over the last decade on data identifiers.=
In the last few weeks two papers were published by some of the same =
co-authors that took a contrary position on the presentation of identifiers=
, although that was not a focus on either of the papers.
I will give an overview of some of the issues regarding identifiers for dat=
a (both those that I think are resolved and not), the need for vocabulary a=
nd standards to describe what is being identified, and the implications for=
data citation and describing other data relationships.
Bio=
:
Joe Hourcle is (as of the time this was written) a programmer/analyst for t=
he Solar Data Analysis Center at Goddard Space Flight Center, working as a =
programmer / DBA / sysadmin / cataloger / whatever else on the Virtual Sola=
r Observatory. He has an interest in classifying things and naming co=
ncepts -- he has been working with Todd King on a (still unpublished) vocab=
ulary to discuss data systems (http://virtualsolar.org/vocab), =
and back before he knew anything about ontologies & controlled vocabula=
ries, added the topics to fark.com. He would also like to remind you th=
at the crew neck means that most t-shirts qualify as a 'shirt with a collar=
'.
We'll be meeting at the Gondoli= er, http://www.gond= olierboulder.com. The restaurant is in the Meadow's Shoppi= ng Center, on the southwest corner of Baseline and Foothills. We'll m= eet in their back room.
The Gondolier is providing us th= is space for free. In searching for a new venue, I have learned how = rare and special it is for a business to provide this. Please come an= d order something so that the Gondolier can continue to offer us this space= .
The word "ontology" is used to refer to a variety of different artifacts= , from controlled vocabularies that serve as glossaries, to formal ontologi= es that serve as data schemas for graph databases and/or deductive reasonin= g systems. This talk will focus on use cases for formal ontologies, with a = demonstration of and presentation on ODISEES (Ontology-Driven Interactive S= earch Environment for Earth Science) which was recently released in beta by= the Atmospheric Science Data Center at NASA Langley Research Center. ODISE= ES provides a parameter-level search environment for discovering ASDC data = resources, enabling users to specify a precise set of criteria and get a se= t of results that exactly match those criteria. Following an overview of th= e technology behind ODISEES, Beth will discuss additional use cases for for= mal ontologies of the sort driving ODISEES.
4:30 - 5:30 Presentation<= /p>
5:30 - 6:00 Social
We have a new venue! We'l= l be meeting at the Gondolier, http://www.gondolierboulder.com. The restaurant= is in the Meadow's Shopping Center, on the southwest corner of Baseline an= d Foothills. We'll meet in their back room.
The Gondolier is providing us th= is space for free. In searching for a new venue, I have learned how = rare and special it is for a business to provide this. Please come an= d order something so that the Gondolier can continue to offer us this space= .
Heather Ryan, University of Denver Library and Information Science<= /p>
Much digital preservation research has been built on the assumption that= file format obsolescence poses a great risk to the continued access of dig= ital content. In an endeavor to address this risk, a number of researchers = created lists of factors that could be used to assess risks associated with= digital file formats. My research examines these assumptions about file fo= rmat obsolescence and file format evaluation factors with the aim of creati= ng a simplified file format endangerment index.
This study examines file format risk under the new lens of 'file format = endangerment,' or the possibility that information stored in a particular f= ile format will not be interpretable or renderable in human accessible mean= s within a certain timeframe. Using the Delphi method in two separate studi= es, this exploratory research collected expert opinion on file format endan= germent levels of 50 test file formats; and collected expert opinion on rel= evance of 28 factors as causal indicators of file format endangerment.
Experts expressed the belief that generally, digital information encoded= in the rated file formats will be accessible for 20 years or more. This in= dicates that file format experts believe that there is not a great deal of = short-term risk associated with encoding information in the rated file form= ats, though this does not preclude continued engagement with preservation a= ctivities for these and other file formats. Furthermore, the findings show = that only three of the dozens of file format evaluation factors discussed i= n the literature exceeded an emergent threshold level as causal indicators = of file format endangerment: 'Rendering Software Available,' 'Specification= s Available,' and 'Community/3rd Party Support.' Consequently, these = factors are ideal candidates for use in a simple file format endangerment i= ndex that can be used to assess endangerment levels of any file format.
The findings of this study have implications for further exploration of = file format endangerment in specific digital information creation domains. = In particular, applying this model to file formats created by and used in t= he Earth and Space Science communities will both strengthen the model and w= ill produce valuable insight into format-centric Earth and Space Science da= ta creation and management practices. This insight can then be applied to r= isk assessment and subsequent actions to support continued access to datase= ts over time.
Come join us!
We're still at the Outlook through= April 2014. We seek an alternative venue for May and beyond. Please = see New Venue Desirements below and keep them in mind as you move around Bo= ulder.
Note that we'll start at 4:15&= nbsp;this month due to our speaker's schedule.
This month marks the 3rd anniversary of the= BESSIG!
Mik Cox, Tyler Traver, Anne Wilson, Doug Lindholm, Labo= ratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP), Don Elsborg= strong>, CU Faculty Affairs
This presentation will discuss the use of open source tools and the task= s that remained to create a semantically enabled metadata repository.
The LASP Interactive Solar Irradiance Data Center, LISIRD, is a web site= that serves the lab's solar irradiance and related data products to the pu= blic. LISIRD provides information about the data it offers as part of its w= eb page content, embedded in static HTML. At the same time, other LASP web = sites also provide the same information, such as sites pertaining to specif= ic missions or education and outreach. Keeping data set information u= pdated and in sync across web sites is a problem. Nor is the information in= teroperable with emerging search and discovery tools.
To address this and other issues, we created a semantically enabled meta= data repository that holds information about our data. In conjunction= , we prototyped a new implementation of LISIRD that dynamically renders pag= e content, pulling metadata from the repository and including in the page c= urrent, vetted metadata from a single, definitive source. Other web pages c= an similarly pull this information if they choose. Additionally we ca= n now offer new semantic browse and search capabilities, such as search of = data sets by type (currently spectral solar irradiance, total solar irradia= nce, and solar indices) or over a particular spectral range provided by the= user.
We can also render the metadata in various formats understandable to oth= er communities, such as SPASE for the heliophysics community and ISO for th= e international community. This will allow us to federate with sites that u= se those formats, allowing broader discovery of our data.
To date, metadata management at LASP has generally been done on a per pr= oject, ad hoc basis. We are building applications on top of the repository = that provide CRUD (create, read, update, delete) capabilities for metadata = records to metadata 'owners' and 'curators'. We expect this to help data ma= nagers to store and manage their metadata in a more rigorous fashion should= they choose to use it.
We heavily leveraged existing open source tools to create the repository= . In this talk we'll talk about using VIVO to create a semantic database, L= aTiS to fetch data and metadata, and AngularJS to write dynamic, testable J= avaScript. We'll describe our experiences extending two existing onto= logies to meet our space physics domain needs.
With these tools and some student time (though our students are exceptio= nal) we are achieving significantly increased capabilities at a relatively = low cost. We believe this tool combination could help projects with limited= resources achieve similar capabilities to manage and provide access to met= adata.
And, if that's not easy-bake enough for you, try this PC EZ-Bake Oven, m= ade especially for geeks: http://www.thinkgeek.com= /stuff/41/ezbake.shtml.
Schedule (mostly= )
4:15 - 5:xx presentation
5:xx - 6:00 social
Free, or cost based on attendanc= e
Can purchase food and beverages,= or within walking distance of such
Easy to get to, easy to park, in= Boulder
Separate room
Projection capability
Internet connectivity
hours 4:00 - 6:00 Tu or Wed, 2nd= , 3rd, or 4th week of the month, flexible
<= /span>We're still at the Outlook through= April 2014. We seek an alternative venue for May and beyond. Please = see New Venue Desirements below and keep them in mind as you move around Bo= ulder.
 = ;Note that we're meeting on a&n= bsp;Tuesday rather than a Wednesday this month due to room availability. &n= bsp; We're back in the Chatauqua room at the Boulder Ou= tlook Hotel.
Sylvia Murphy, Cecelia DeLuca= , Allyn Treshansky, NOAA/CIRES, Luca Cinquini, <= /strong>JPL/NOAA
The Earth System CoG Collaboration Environment, led by a NOAA ESRL/CIRES= team, is partnering with the DOE-led Earth System Grid Federation (ESGF) d= ata archive to deliver a capability that will enable users to store, federa= te, and search scientific datasets, and manage and connect the projects tha= t produced those datasets.
ESGF is an international network of data nodes that is used to hos= t climate data sets, including the model outputs from the Coupled Model Int= ercomparison Project (CMIP), which supported the Intergovernmental Panel on= Climate Change (IPCC) assessment reports. ESGF data nodes are federa= ted, so that all data holdings are visible from any of the installation sit= es. An ESGF data node is now installed at NOAA=E2=80=99s Earth System= Research Laboratory (ESRL=E2=80=99s). It currently hosts data from t= he Dynamical Core Model Intercomparison Project (DCMIP) and Twentieth Centu= ry Reanalysis data from ESRL=E2=80=99s Physical Sciences Division.= p>
CoG is a collaboration environment and connective hub for networks= of projects in the Earth Sciences. It hosts software development pro= jects, model intercomparison projects, and short university-level courses. = It includes a configurable search to data on any ESGF node, metadata collec= tion and display, project-level wikis, and a host of other capabiliti= es. There are 74 projects currently using the system.
CoG is partnering with the international Earth System Model Docume= ntation (ES-DOC) project, funded by both NOAA and the EU=E2=80=99s <= span style=3D"color: rgb(51,51,51);">Infrastructure for the European Networ= k for Earth System Modeling (IS-ENES) project. ES-DOC is developing = tools that capture, display, and compare Earth system model metadata.= This information can be linked directly from a CoG project or attached to = specific datasets in the ESGF node.
This presentation will provide an overview of both CoG and ESGF, demonst= rate data discovery and download, and key CoG capabilities using relevant e= xample projects.
CoG: https://earthsystemcog.org/<= /span>
ESRL ESGF data node: = http://hydra.fsl.noaa.gov/esgf-web-fe/
Schedule (mostly)
4:00 - 5:xx presentation
5:xx - 6:00 social
Free, or cost based on attendance
Can purchase food and beverages, or within walking distance of such = ;
Easy to get to, easy to park, in Boulder
Separate room
Projection capability
Internet connectivity
hours 4 - 6:00 Tu or Wed, 2nd, 3rd, or 4th week of the month, flexible= p>
<=
/strong>
We're still at the Outlook through = April 2014. We seek an alternative venue for May and beyond. Please s= ee New Venue Desirements below and keep them in mind as you move around Bou= lder.
Note that this meeting will be held i= n the Panorama Room of the Outlook Hotel instead of our usual Chatauqua roo= m. This means that we won't have a server and food and drinks must be= ordered in the restaurant.
Michael Little, the Advanced Development Systems Engine= er at the Atmospheric Science Data Center (ASDC)
Mike will describe how the new generation of research objectives will ne= ed to avoid staging data locally from multiple modeling and observational r= epositories. Rather, new access methods will present a machine-to-mac= hine interface which permits codes and software applications to retrieve sm= all increments of data continuously as part of the processing. The AS= DC's Data Acess architecture will be described with a particular emphasis o= n iRODS as one of the most promising tools for remote access to data held i= n earth science data centers.
Mike's slides for this talk are available here: DataDistributionArchitectur= e_0.4.3.pptx.
4:00 - 5:xx presentation
5:xx - 6:00 social
Free, or cost based on attendance
Can purchase food and beverages
Easy to get to, easy to park, in Boulder
Separate room
Projection capability
Internet connectivity
hours 4 - 6:00 Tu or Wed, 2nd, 3rd, or 4th week of the month, flexible= p>
We're still at the Outlook through = April 2014. We seek an alternative venue for May and beyond. Please s= ee New Venue Desirements below and keep them in mind as you move around Bou= lder.
Patrick West, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
The Deep Carbon Observatory (DCO) brings together hundreds of organizati= ons and individuals from all around the world, spanning a great many scient= ific domains with a focus on Carbon. The DCO Data Science team is anticipat= ing the generation of terabytes of information in the form of documents, sc= ientific datasets from level 0 to data products and visualizations, informa= tion about events, people, and organizations, and more. So how do we keep t= rack of all of this information, manage the information, and disseminate th= e information?
In order to organize all of this information and provide the research co= mmunity the tools necessary to collaborate and do their research, the DCO D= ata Science team is putting together a suite of tools that will integrate a= ll of these components in a seamless, distributed, heterogeneous environmen= t. This presentation and demonstration will provide an overview of the work= that we, the DCO Data Science team, are doing to provide such an environme= nt.
Due to Patrick's schedule, we'll plan on starting at 4:15 instead of 4:0= 0.
Here are Patrick's slides: http://tw.rpi.edu/web/doc/DCO-DS-Overview-Demonstration-BESSIG.
4:15 - 5:xx presentation
5:xx - 6:00 social
Free, or cost based on attendance
Can purchase food and beverages
Easy to get to, easy to park, in Boulder
Separate room
Projection capability
Internet connectivity
hours 4 - 6:00 Tu or Wed, 2nd, 3rd, or 4th week of the month, flexible= p>
Our meeting this month is a special event for several reasons. Co= pies of Andrew's book will be available to the first 50 attendees, and the = HDF Group will be providing refreshments for us. Also, this may be ou= r last meeting at the Boulder Outl= ook Hotel, as the hotel has been sold. So, please join us in the Crown Rock room (not our usual room) at the Outlook for:= p>
Andrew Collette, Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space P= hysics (LASP)
This talk explores how researchers can use the scalable, self-describing= HDF5 data format together with the Python programming language to improve = the analysis pipeline, easily archive and share large datasets, and improve= confidence in scientific results. The discussion will focus on real-= world applications of HDF5 in experimental physics at two multimillion-doll= ar research facilities: the Large Plasma Device at UCLA, and the NASA-funde= d hypervelocity dust accelerator at CU Boulder. This event coincides = with the launch of a new O=E2=80=99Reilly book, Python and HDF5: Unlock= ing Scientific Data, complimentary copies of which will be available f= or attendees.
As scientific datasets grow from gigabytes to terabytes and beyond, the = use of standard formats for data storage and communication becomes critical= . HDF5, the most recent version of the Hierarchical Data Format origi= nally developed at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCS= A), has rapidly emerged as the mechanism of choice for storing and sharing = large datasets. At the same time, many researchers who routinely dea= l with large numerical datasets have been drawn to the Python by its ease o= f use and rapid development capabilities.
Over the past several years, Python has emerged as a credible alternativ= e to scientific analysis environments like IDL or MATLAB. In addition= to stable core packages for handling numerical arrays, analysis, and plott= ing, the Python ecosystem provides a huge selection of more specialized sof= tware, reducing the amount of work necessary to write scientific code while= also increasing the quality of results. Python=E2=80=99s excellent s= upport for standard data formats allows scientists to interact seamlessly w= ith colleagues using other platforms.
4:00 - 5:00 presentation
5:00 - 6:00 social
Regridding of data is a common problem faced by many scientific software= developers. If regridding is part of your world, this talk may be o= f interest to you. Come join us at the Boulder Outlook Hotel for this month's talk:
Alexander Pletzer, Tech-X
Interpolation is one of the most widely used postprocessing tasks, accor= ding to a survey of Ultrascale Visualization Climate Data Analysis Tools (U= V-CDAT) users. Most geo-postprocessing tools (UV-CDAT, NCL, Ferret, etc) su= pport a choice of both bilinear and conservative regridding with conservati= ve interpolation guaranteeing that the total amount of "stuff" (energy, wat= er, etc) remains unchanged after regridding. The SCRIP and ESMF are example= s of libraries implementing these interpolation methods.
We argue that the type of interpolation is dictated by the type of field= and that cell centered fields require conservative interpolation whereas n= odal fields require bilinear (or higher order) interpolation. Moreover, the= wind velocity fields used by finite-volume atmospheric codes, which are ne= ither cell-centered nor nodal but face-centered (Arakawa D staggering), req= uire different interpolation formulas. Interpolation formulas of face-cente= red and edge-centered (Arakawa C) fields have been known as Whittney forms = since 1957 and are widely used in electromagnetics. We present interpolatio= n methods new to the geo-sciences that conserve flux and line integrals for= Arakawa D, respectively Arakawa C, stagggered fields.
This talk should be of interest to anybody in need to regrid velocity an= d other vector fields whose components are staggered with respect to each o= ther.
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation
5:00 - 6:00 Social
"Code without tests is bad code. It doesn't matter how well writte= n it is; it doesn't matter how pretty or object-oriented or well-encapsulat= ed it is. With tests, we can change the behavior of our code quickly = and verifiably. Without them, we really don't know if our code is get= ting better or worse." [FEATHERS]
A strong statement, but it does bring home the vital role of testing in = software development. Join us at the Boulder Outlook Hotel for:
Ian Truslove, Erik Jasiak, NSIDC
Computation and programming are increasingly inescapable in modern Earth= Sciences, but scientists and researchers receive little or no formal softw= are engineering or programming training. At the same time, research i= nto the reproducibility of other academic papers exposing disappointingly l= ow rates of repeatability and high-profile retractions due to computational= or data errors increase the onus on researchers to write repeatable, relia= ble, even reusable programs; in other words, "write better code".
Software engineering has plenty to say on the matter of "better code": m= etrics, methodologies, processes, tools... Of course, none are indisp= utable and none provide absolute guarantees. One seemingly obvious te= chnique - testing - has enjoyed a renaissance in incarnations such as unit = testing, and with approaches such as test-driven development (TDD) and beha= vior-driven development (BDD).
Based on our experience at the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC)= with unit testing, TDD and BDD, we present a set of recommendations to sci= entific and research programmers about some techniques to try in their day = to day programming, and possibly provide some inspiration to aim for more c= omprehensive approaches such as BDD. We will highlight some use cases of va= rious types of testing at the NSIDC, discuss some of the cultural and manag= ement changes that occurred for programmers, scientists and project manager= s to consider and adopt processes such as TDD, make recommendations about h= ow to introduce or expand rigorous code testing practices in your organizat= ion, and discuss the likely benefits in doing so.
[Scroll down to see post presentation references and material.]<= /strong>
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation
5:00 - 6:00 Social
All are welcome.
Wilson et al, "Best Practices for Scientific Computing", highly recommended!
Merali, "Computational = science: ... Error" in Nature. "As a general rule, research= ers do not test or document their programs rigorously, and they rarely rele= ase their codes, making it almost impossible to reproduce and verity publis= hed results generated by scientific software, say computer scientists."
Freeman and Pryce, Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests
Beck, Test Driven Development: By Example
Fowler, Mocks Aren't Stubs = ;- Martin Fowler on the terminology and usage of mocks, stubs, test doubles= - all those "fake collaborators"
Martin, Agile Software Development, Principles, Patterns, and Practices
Martin, Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship<= /a>
JUnit - the original (Java)
RSpec (Ruby)
Behave (Python)
Jasmine (JavaScript)
mgunit (IDL)
pfUnit (FOR= TRAN)
Cucumber (Acceptance tests, lots of languages)=
Feathers, Michael C., Working Effectively = with Legacy Code , Prentice Hall, 2005, p. xvi.
Snowden, Cynefin: Wikipedia on Cynefin, David Snowden introducing Cynefin (video)= - applicable to knowledge management, cultural change, and commun= ity dynamics, and has also involved issues of organizational strategy.
Snowden, Boone, 2007 "A L= eader's Framework for Decision Making" (must pay for access from H= arvard Business Review, though perhaps available elsewhere)
NSIDC's and ultimately Boulder's loss of Mark Parsons is RDA's gain.&nbs= p; But maybe that's better for the world as a whole. Join us at the <= a class=3D"external-link" href=3D"http://www.boulderoutlook.com/" rel=3D"no= follow" title=3D"Boulder Outlook Hotel">Boulder Outlook Hotel on August= 21 to hear about the Alliance Mark has joined.
Mark Parsons, Managing Director, Research Data Alliance= /U.S.
All of society=E2=80=99s grand challenges -- be it addressing rapid clim= ate change, curing cancer and other disease, providing food and water for m= ore than seven billion people, understanding the origins of the universe or= the mind -- all of them require diverse and sometimes very large&= nbsp;data to to be shared and integrated across cultures, scales, and = technologies. This requires a new form and new conception of infrastructure= . The Research Data Alliance (RDA) is creating and implementing this new data infrastructure. It is building the connections that m= ake data work across social and technical barriers.
RDA launched in March 2013 as a international alliance of researchers, d= ata scientists, and organizations to build these connections and infrastruc= ture to accelerate data-driven innovation. RDA facilitates research data sh= aring, use, re-use, discoverability, and standards harmonization through th= e development and adoption of technologies, policy, practice, standards, an= d other deliverables. We do this through focussed Working Groups, expl= oratory Interest Groups, and a broad, committed membership of individuals a= nd organizations dedicated to improving data exchange.
What data sharing problem are you trying to solve? Find out how RD= A can help.
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation
5:00 - 6:00 Social
Please join us!
In July we're meeting in the 4th week of the month, rather than the 3rd.= Please join us at the Bould= er Outlook Hotel for our own Ted talk:
Ted Habermann, The HDF Group
Interoperable data and understanding across the Earth Science community = requires convergence towards a standard set of data formats and services, m= etadata standards, and conventions for effective use of both. Although larg= e legacy archives still exist in netCDF3, HDF4, and many custom formats, we= have achieved considerable convergence in the data format layer with the m= erger of the netCDF4 and HDF5 formats. The way forward seems clear as more = groups in many disciplines join the HDF5 community. The data service layer = has experienced similar convergence as OGC Service Standards are adopted an= d used in increasing numbers and connections across former chasms are deplo= yed (ncWMS, ncSOS, netCDF/CF as OGC Standards). Many data providers around = the world are in the process of converging towards ISO Standards for docume= nting data and services. Connections are also helping here (ncISO). Many gr= oups are now working towards convergence in the conventions layer. The HDF-= EOS and Climate-Forecast conventions have been used successfully for many d= atasets spanning many Earth Science disciplines. These two sets of conventi= ons reflect different histories and approaches that provide a rich set of l= essons learned as we move forward.
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation
5:00 - 6:00 Social
Stop on by!
This month we'll meet again the Boulder Outlook Hotel for:
Monte Lunacek, Application Specialist, CU Research Comp= uting
Roland Viger, Research Geographer, USGS
Python offers a rich toolkit that is useful for scientific computing.&nb= sp; In this talk, we will introduce the IPython package and discuss three u= seful components: the interactive shell, the web-based notebook, and the pa= rallel interface. We will also demonstrate a few concepts from the Pa= ndas data analysis package and, time permitting, offer a few tips on how to= profile and effortlessly speedup your python code. This talk will de= scribe and illustrate these tools with example code. If Python is not= your favorite programming language, this overview might change that.
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation
5:00 - 6:00 Social
Come on by!
Note that this month we are meeting= on a Tuesday instead of a Wednesday!
Please join us at the Boulder O= utlook Hotel for a presentation and demo of:
Eric Hackathorn, Julien Lynge, Jeff Smith, TerraViz, NO= AA
Jebb Stewart, Chris MacDermaid, NEIS, NOAA
The NOAA Earth Information Services (NEIS) is a framework of layered ser= vices designed to help the discovery, access, understanding, and visualizat= ion of data from the past, present, and future. It includes a visualization= component named TerraViz that is a multi-platform tool, running on desktop= s, web browsers, and mobile devices. The goal is to ingest "big data" and c= onvert that information into efficient formats for real-time visualization.= Designed for a world where everything is in motion, NEIS and TerraViz allo= w fluid data integration and interaction across 4D time and space, providin= g a tool for everything NOAA does and the people NOAA affects.
TerraViz is built using the Unity game engine. While a game engine= may seem a strange choice for data visualizations, our philosophy is to ta= ke advantage of existing technology whenever possible. Video games ar= e a multibillion-dollar industry, and are quite simply the most powerful to= ols for pushing millions of points of data to the user in real-time. Our pr= esentation illustrated displaying environmental data in TerraViz at a globa= l scale, visualizing regional data in =E2=80=9Cscenes=E2=80=9D such as the = flooding of the Washington DC area or rotating a coastal ecosystem in three= axes, and developing environmental simulations/games like exploring the oc= ean floor in a submarine.
The NEIS backend similarly takes lessons from private industry, using Ap= ache Solr and other open source technologies to allow faceted search of NOA= A data, much as sites like Amazon and Netflix do.
We believe that to have an impact on society, data should be easy to fin= d, access, visualize, and understand. NEIS simplifies and abstracts s= earching, connectivity, and different data formats, allowing users to conce= ntrate on the data and science.
Please contact us if you want to explore including your environmental da= ta within NEIS/TerraViz or if you want to talk to us about developing custo= m visualizations or educational simulations to showcase your important data= .
NOAA / Earth System Research Lab / Global Systems Division, Boulder, Col= orado
NEIS/TerraViz: NEIS/TerraViz
Schedule
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation
5:00 - 6:00 Social
This month marks the two year anniversary of the BESSIG! Ple= ase join us at the Boulder Ou= tlook Hotel for a remote presentation:
Chris Lynnes, Chief Systems Engineer of the Goddard DAA= C, NASA, "The Earth Science Collaboratory"
The Earth Science Collaboratory is a proposed framework for supporting t= he sharing within the Earth science community of data, tools, analysis meth= ods, and results, plus all the contextual knowledge that go with these arti= facts. The likely benefits include:
Currently, there are some nascent efforts to construct such a collaborat= ory. However, by its very (inclusive) nature, this construction is li= kely to be most successful as an emergent process, evolving from many point= -to-point connections to an eventual ecosystem of cooperating components su= pporting collaboration.
In particular, we are actively seeking scientists and other pote= ntial users of such a collaboratory to provide an end user perspective of s= ystem functionality. Would you find such a collaborato= ry helpful? Do you have ideas about how it could be better?&nbs= p; Would you like to influence its design? Those that are actively en= gaged will be heard and could end up with a tool that particularly suits th= eir needs. If this role interests you, please attend this talk = and/or otherwise let us know of your interest.
Schedule
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation
5:00 - 6:00 Social
Drop on by!
Post presentation material
The slides for the talk are available here:ESC BESSIG slides.
The recorded version of the talk is available here. Please note that the talk actually starts 21 minutes into = the recording, as the first 15 minutes were intended to be for testing.&nbs= p; (Sorry, we had serious technical difficulties at the hotel! It wil= l be better next time!)
Please join us at the Boulder O= utlook Hotel for:
Doug Lindholm, LASP, "LaTiS: a data model, an API, = a web service AND a floor wax"*
LaTiS is a data model, a data analysis API, and a REST-ful web service f= or accessing scientific data via a common interface.
The LaTiS data model provides a scientific domain independent, unifying,= mathematical foundation for describing datasets that captures the function= al relationships between parameters. The Scala implementation of this model= provides an API for reading data directly from their native source, the ab= ility to compute with high level abstractions appropriate for the task at h= and, and options for filtering, transforming, and writing data in various f= ormats.
This talk will discuss how these capabilities are used to enable a modul= ar web service framework that can easily be installed and configured by a d= ata provider, and that allows users to dynamically reformat a dataset, incl= uding its time representation, storage format, missing values, etc.
This talk will be a preview (i.e. beta release) of the talk I will give = at UCAR Software Engineering Assembly Conference in April.
Schedule
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation
5:00 - 6:00 Social
Come on by!
* [Open on suburban kitchen, Wife and Husband arguing]
Wife: New LaTiS is a floor wax!
Husband: No, new LaTiS is a data model!
Wife: It's a floor wax!
Husband: It's a data model!
Wife: It's a floor wax, I'm telling you!
Husband: It's a data model, you cow!
Spokesman: [enters quickly] Hey, hey, hey, calm down, you two. New LaTiS i= s both a floor wax and a data model! Here, I'll spray some on your mop. [sp= rays LaTiS onto mop] ..and some for your data server. [sprinkles LaTiS onto= laptop]
[Husband computes while Wife mops]
Husband: Mmmmm, works great!
Wife: And just look at that shine! **
** with apologies to SNL
Due to the constraints of our speak= er, we're meeting the 2nd week of February instead of the 3rd.
Yet more around semantics! Please join us at the Boulder Outlook Hotel for:
Beth Huffer, Lingua Logica, "ODISEES: An Ontology-D= riven Interactive Search Environment for Earth Sciences"
As part of an on-going effort at NASA Langley=E2=80=99s Atmospheric Scie= nce Data Center, and in cooperation with the Computational & Informatio= n Sciences & Technology Office at the Goddard Space Flight Center, we h= ave developed a semi-automated method for finding and comparing equivalent = data and climate model output variables across disparate datasets. We= will demonstrate an ontology-driven variable matching service that provide= s an automated mapping among comparable variables from multiple data produc= ts and climate model output products. The interactive user interface is dri= ven by a queriable ontological model of the essential characteristics of da= ta and climate model output variables, the products they occur in, the atmo= spheric parameters represented in the data, and the instruments and techniq= ues used to measure or model the parameters. Queries of the ontology and tr= iple store are used to match comparable variables by enabling users to sear= ch for those that share a user-specified set of essential characteristics.&= nbsp;
The application addresses an emerging need among Earth scientists to com= pare climate model outputs to other models and to satellite observations, a= nd addresses some of the barriers that currently make such comparisons diff= icult. In particular, the application
Schedule
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation
5:00 - 6:00 Social
Come on by!
More on semantics! Please join us at the Boulder Outlook = Hotel for:
Stephen Williams, Office of Faculty Affairs, CU Boulder= , "VIVO, VITRO, DataStar, and Beyond - The VIVO Project"
The VIVO project was started at Cornell University in 2003 as a faculty = profiling system for Mann Library. The profiling system that is VIVO = was designed in two parts, VITRO the semantic engine that is ontology agnos= tic and VIVO the ontology specific pages and data for presenting faculty pr= ofiles. This concept of a two tied system was taken into the third ti= er with location specific changes (Cornell and CU-Boulder) and ontologies t= hat build upon VIVO (data star). This talk will focus on the VIVO pro= ject as a whole, its history, its ancillary projects, and its future. = We'll also try to cover difficulties and lessons in semantic programming a= nd the experiences of building ETL tools for semantic data.
Schedule
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation
5:00 - 6:00 Social
Note: this month we're meeting on a= Tuesday!
Please join us back at the Boul= der Outlook Hotel for:
Nate Wilhelmi, NCAR/CISL, "Experiences Using RDF and = a Triple Store for Metadata Storage and Search"
4:00 - 5:00 presentation
5:00 - 6:00 social
See you there!
Note: This meeting will be held at = NEON Headquarters, instead of o= ur usual location. Details below.
This month Brian Wee, Steve Aulenbach, and I are delighted to have repre= sentatives from law, government and science come together to discuss variou= s aspects of science policy. We've asked them to consider questions l= ike these:
Peter Backlund
Director, NCAR External Relations and the Integrated Science Program
Director, Research Relations, NCAR
Dan Baker
Professor of Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences
Director, Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics
Alice Madden
Wirth Chair in Sustainable Development, UC Denver
Colorado House Representative (2001 - 2010), Majority Leader (2004 - 2008)=
Climate Change Adviser, Deputy Chief of Staff for Gov. Ritter
Senior Fellow on Climate Change, Center for American Progress
Andy Schultheiss
District Director at Office of Congressman Jared Polis
Campaigns Director at League of Conservation Voters
Boulder City Council (2003 - 2007)
This meeting is being hosted by NEON,= Inc. It will be held at NEON Headquarters, 1685 38th Street #100, Boulder, CO.
4:00 - 5:15 Panel Discussion= p>
5:15 - 6:00 Social
Beverages will be provided courtesy o= f NEON. Thank you = Brian and NEON!
Very light snacks to be covered by do= nations.
Please join us for this interesting discussion!
The discussion will be available via = Web Ex, info to follow.
Another BLAST! Many thanks to Anna and Dave for their willingness = to share ideas with us this month.
Anna Milan, NOAA/NESDIS/NGDC, Metadata for the Arch= ive: Transition to ISO, Approaches, Challenges, and Opportunities
Dave Fulker, President, OPeNDAP, Inc., A (Very) Rou= gh Idea: Raster Binning and Masking Services (see attachment)
I'll sketch my idea for a new type of data query/response service built = (perhaps for EarthCube) around a standardized space-time raster that has a = dual function. Tentatively dubbed "Raster Binning & Masking Services" o= r RBinMasks, users would gain a (potentially standard) way to specify (irre= gular) space-time regions of interest and a (potentially standard) way to g= ain information about the space-time distributions of pertinent data, witho= ut -- or before -- retrieving actual values.
Come join us at the Boulder Out= look Hotel!
4:00 - 5:00 Presentations
5:00 - 6:00 Social
Note: Meeting on Wednesday this mon= th!
Brian Wee, NEON, Inc., "NEON: A continental-scale r= esearch and operations platform for the environmental sciences"
As NEON, Inc.=E2=80=99s Chief of External Affairs, Brian is the organiza= tion's liaison to Congress, US Federal agencies, and other scientific organ= izations. He also represents the informatics needs of the large-scale envir= onmental sciences before the computer science and Federal data community. B= rian joined the NEON Project Office at the American Institute of Biological= Sciences in 2004 as a post-doctoral associate, then became a staff scienti= st before transitioning to the role of Administrative Director. Previously = he worked for Andersen Consulting (now Accenture) designing and implementin= g IT solutions and then served as Senior Instructional Designer leading ins= tructional design, knowledge management, business-process redesign, and web= development projects.
Brian holds a Ph.D. in Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior from the Univers= ity of Texas at Austin, a M.Sc. degree in Computer Science =E2=80=93 Artifi= cial Intelligence at Northwestern University, Evanston, IL and a B.Sc. in I= nformation Systems and Computer Science from the National University of Sin= gapore. His M.Sc. studies focused on designing and implementing computer au= gmented learning solutions for high-school classrooms and corporate trainin= g at the Institute for the Learning Sciences. His Ph.D. focused on investig= ating the relative effects of behavioral, physiological and landscape barri= ers on the genetic structure of insect populations by integrating genetic, = behavioral, and GIS analyses.
Come join us at the Boulder Out= look Hotel!
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation
5:00 - 6:00 Social
NB: This is a slightly different sc= heduling than we've had in past! Tuesday instead of Wednesday, 4th we= ek of the month instead of the third.
Jeffrey Morisette, USGS, =E2=80=9CDeveloping a comm= on modeling framework for the Department of Interior=E2=80=99s North Centra= l Climate Science Center=E2=80=9D
This month we welcome Jeff Morisette, visiting us from USGS in Fort Coll= ins to talk about, among other things, his experience with VisTrails. = From the page VisTrails Overview= , "VisTrails was designed to manage rapidly evolving scientific workfl= ows and provenance that support simulations, data exploration and visualiza= tion." Jeff's group added a package to that software: SAHM, Software = for Assisted Habitat Modeling.
Jeff is currently the director of the DOI North Central Climate Science = Center where he manages and conducts research on how natural and cultural l= and management can respect the non-stationary nature of climate. A cu= rrent research theme is how dynamic species distribution models can contrib= ute to vulnerability assessment and adaptation planning.
We'll meet at the Boulder Outlo= ok Hotel. Come on by!
Schedule
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation
5:00 - 6:00 Social
More around semantics!
Who
SiriJodha Khalsa, NSIDC, "Modeling the Model - the Semantics of the CCSM4 = Sea Ice Model "
Don Elsborg, LASP, "Applied Semantic Web Technology - A use case wit= h Semantic Mediawiki"
Where
Schedule
4:00 - 6:00 PM
Please come!
This month we continue exploring ontology and semantic-related areas.
Who
Stephan Zednick, = ; Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) "Data Models and Ontologies, d= escribing structure and classification"
When
Wednesday, May 16, 4:00 - 6:00 PM
Where
Schedule
4:00 - 5:00 Presentation and discussion
5:00 - 6:00 social
Please join us!
Note the time change: 5:00 instead = of 4:00!
This month we'll review the recent UCAR data citation workshop, then mak= e a foray into ontology and semantic-related areas.
In May and June we'll continue with speakers on ontology and semantic-re= lated topics. The site calendar contains more information.= If you have experiences in this area that you are willing to share, = please contact Anne.
Speakers
Matt Mayernik, NCAR L= ibrary, "UCAR Workshop Review - Bridging= Data Lifecycles: Tracking Data Use via Data Citations." (Note: Many of= these slides were taken from the workshop presentations posted at http://library.ucar.edu/data_workshop/. Original slide authors= are noted in red text in the top left of the slides.)
Ruth Duerr, NSIDC, "<= a class=3D"unresolved" href=3D"#">Early Experiences in Semantics "
When: Wednesday, April 18, 5:00 - 7:00
Where: B= oulder Outlook Hotel
Schedule
5:00 - 6:00: speakers
6:00 - 7:00: social
Organized by Mike Daniels and Matt Mayernik, UCAR's EOL/CDS is hos= ting a BESSIG social hour in the Atrium at the Boulder Outlook Hotel, on Tuesday, April 3, 2012, at 5:30.= The occasion is the visit of our out of town friends and ESIP collea= gues Carol Meyer and Erin Robinson. EOL/CDS will provide hors d= 'oeuvres and non alcoholic drinks. Alcoholic beverages will be = available for purchase.
In particular, this is an opportunity to discuss ESIP activities. &= nbsp; Of course, any topic is fair game. Please join us!
Thank you, UCAR, EOL/CDS, Mike, and Matt!!
RESEARCH DATA SUPPORT
POSITION DESCRIPTION
University of Colorado at Boulder Research Computing
&nbs= p; Research Data Support (Part-Time/Temporary 15 hours per week for 6 month= s)
&nbs= p; Research Computing
POSITION SUMMARY: The Research Data Support position is part-time, repor= ting to the Research Data Manager. Primary job duties include website= content creation for the new collaborative portal for Research Data Servic= es. Research Data Services is a collaborative partnership between man= y campus groups though initially the primary groups are Libraries and Resea= rch Computing. The position will work with the Research Data Manager = and Metadata Librarian to write and organize content to be used in the Drup= al web site. The Research Data Services group and website will act as= a nexus for coordinating activities to support researchers with a multitud= e of research data needs.
JOB RESPONSIBILITIES
QUALIFICATIONS
To Apply or Ask Questions:
Send an e-mail to Kimberly Stacey, Research Data Manager with Research C= omputing at kimberly.stacey@colorado.edu
Include a resume and/or relevant information related to job qualificatio= ns.
Bridging Data Lifecycles: Tracking Data Use via Data Citations
April 5-6, 2012 at the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research i= n Boulder, CO.
Please join us for a workshop on data citation and data use geared to th= e interests of data manager specialists and librarians. Data citations are = increasingly seen as being critical to enabling scientific results to be tr= aced back to their underlying data. Data citations also promote the transpa= rency of scientific work by making data more discoverable, and enable scien= tists, data managers, and data centers to be credited for producing useful = data. Presentations will focus data lifecycles, current options for data ci= tation and data reuse, and will highlight pilot projects in implementing ci= tation standards and practices. Dr. Tim Killeen, Assistant Director for Geo= sciences at the National Science Foundation will provide the keynote addres= s. Other presenters include Joan Starr of the California Digital Library an= d Mark Parsons of the National Snow and Ice Data Center. Additional speaker= s are listed on the workshop web page.
Limited space is available for attendees. More information and the regis= tration form are at http://library.ucar.edu/data_workshop/= . Please register by March 23 to ensure your participation. Once regist= ered, participants will be provided with logistical details and any updates= to the agenda.
Please feel free to share this information with your colleagues. Contact= Matt Mayernik at mayernik@ucar.edu or Karon Kelly at kkelly@ucar.e= du if you have questions.
This month we are pleased to have some out of town colleagues speaking a= bout a variety of topics related to content management.
Speakers:
Jerry Pan, Oak Ridge = National Laboratory (ORNL), "Geoscience Data Repository in Digital Object Model and Open-Source Framew= orks: Provenance Applications"
Ajinkya Kulkarni, Uni= versity of Alabama, Huntsville, "Utilizing Drupal, an Open Source Web Framework to Support Science 2.= 0 Projects"
Erin Robinson, ESIP F= oundation, "ESIP Comm= ons: Publishing Non-Traditional Content"
When: Wednesday, March 21, 4:00 - 6:00
Where: Boulder Outlook Hotel
Schedule:
4:00 - 5:00: speakers
5:00 - 6:00: social
We are dovetailing with the UCAR SEA 2012 Software Engineering Conferenc= e, which allows us to have these speakers from out of town. This is w= hy we are meeting at 5:00 instead of o= ur usual 4:00. (And also why we are meeting on the 4th W= ednesday of the month instead of the 3rd.)
Speakers:
Jay Alameda, NCSA,
Chris Mattmann, JPL, = "Understanding how to Best = Leverage Open Source Data Management Software: A Roadmap" = ;
When: Wednesday, February 22, 5:00 - 7:00
Where: B= oulder Outlook Hotel
Schedule:
5:00 - 5:30 gather, social
5:30 - 6:00 Jay Alameda
6:00 - 6:30 Chris Mattmann
6:30 - 7:00 social
BLAST (BESSIG Lively Activists Speaking Topically)
Speakers:
Mike Daniels, NCA= R, "From Sensor to Archive: Data Flow, Tools, and Management of Observation= al Data at NCAR's Earth Observing Laboratory"
Ruth Duerr, NSIDC,
When: Wednesday, January 18, 4:00 - 6:00
Where: The Boulder Outlook Hotel
Schedule: 4:00 - 5:00 talks, 5 - 10 minute busine= ss meeting, 5:00 - 6:00 social (more or less)
Panel Report and Discussion on Recent NSF EarthCube Charette
According to the EarthCube web site, http://earthcube.ning.com/, "The goal of EarthCube is to tr= ansform the conduct of research by supporting the development of community-= guided cyberinfrastructure to integrate data and information for know= ledge management across the Geosciences."
During November 1 - 4, 2011, the NSF held the EarthCube Charette in Wash= ington, D.C. The Charette was intended to be "the first stage i= n an iterative process to build a community-based cyberinfrastructure,"&nbs= p; and an "opportunity for face-to-face interaction and feedback among grou= ps that are suggesting designs for EarthCube and a broad, diverse set of th= e geosciences and cyberinfrastructure communities."
Panel members for our meeting are Charette attendees who will share thei= r thoughts and experiences. Perhaps we'll finally understand the answer to = the question, "What is a charette, anyway?"
Panel members:
Michael Wiltberger, HAO/NCAR
Russ Rew, Unidata/UCAR
Seth McGinnis, CISL/NCAR
Scott Peckham, CSDMS/INSTAAR/CU Boulder
Chris MacDermaid, CSU CIRA Fort Collins/NOAA ESRL
Location:
This meeting will be held at the Boulder Outlook Hotel and Suit= es in the Chatauqua room. The Hotel is near Aurora and 28th St Fr= ontage Road.
Schedule:
4:00 - 5:00: panel and discussion
5:00 - 6:00: social
If you attended the Charette and are interested in participating in the = panel please contact me ASAP! The only requirement is a willingness t= o tell us a little about your experience at the Charrette. Thank you!=
NetCDF for the Masses
Ed Hartnett, Unidata, UCAR
"Why should anyone consider using netCDF to store their data?"
NOTE THE *NEW* NEW LOCATION:= This meeting will be held at the Boulder Outlook Hotel and Suites in the Chatauqua room= . The Hotel is near Aurora and 28th St Frontage Road*.
We are trying this new location that offers a private room with food and= beverages in a non smoking environment. The bar menu includes&= nbsp; starters, soups, salads, sandwiches, burgers, burger alternatives, st= eaks, desserts, and 9 beers on tap, most of them local.&n= bsp; The Outlook has graciously offered to let us use the room for free for= this meeting. If we can generate sufficient sales for them, they mig= ht let us come back.
Schedule:
4:00 - 5:00: talk and discussion
5:00 - 6:00: social
Hope to see you there!
*If driving from 30th and Colorado, don't try to turn left from Colorado= onto the 28th St Frontage Road, it is illegal. Instead head south on= 30th and turn right on Aurora.
Place: NCAR Center Green, Boulder Colorado, USA
Fee:=
Free - all are welcome (registration requested, =
see below)
This one-day workshop is focused on how the Global Earth Observation Sys= tem of Systems (GEOSS) can contribute to studying climate change, how GEOSS= can enable broader community access to climate information and knowledge; = and how scientists can manage and work with integrated data sources having = different levels of quality.
This workshop is free and open to the public.
To confirm attendance, please register here: https://portal.opengeospatial.org/public_ogc/register/= 110923geoss.php
For the complete agenda, please visit: http://www.ieee-earth.org/event/geoss-workshop-xliii-climate
(Posted for Siri Jodha Khalsa)
"Data centers have few established practices for peer review of data. In= deed there is no clear definition of what peer review of data really means.= Is it a review of data accuracy or validity, or is it a review of data doc= umentation to ensure complete description of uncertainty and context? Despi= te these challenges, scientists and data managers have a professional and e= thical responsibility to do their best to meet the data publication goals a= sserted by AGU." [Parsons, M. A., R. Duerr, and J.-B. Min= ster (2010),Data Citation and Peer Review, Eos Trans. AGU,91(= 34), 297, doi:10.1029/2010EO340001.]
Wednesday, September 21, 2011, 4:00 - 6:00, Millenium Hotel's Bo= ulder Creek Living Room.
Note that the Millenium is graciously providing us this room including w= ireless connectivity without charge. Please attend this meeting and c= onsider purchasing a drink or appetizer to support the Millenium and our co= ntinued use of this room and its amenities.
Who:
Mark Parsons, Pro= gram Manager, Senior Associate Scientist, NSIDC
Matt Mayernik, Re= search Data Services Specialist, NCAR library
Eric Kihn, Deputy= Director of the National Geophysical Data Center, NOAA
Karen Simmons, Ex= periment Manager for Galileo UVS/EUV instruments and archivist for data fro= m Voyager and Galileo. Also, current archive specialist on an archivi= ng grant through NASA for very old (1969, 71,75 etc) planetary data., provi= der to NASA PDS, LASP
Rob Wilson, Scien= tist studying magnetospheres of the outer planets, using PDS data, LASP
Topics for discussion include:
- Should data peer review differ from conventional document review? = ; If so, how and why? What does peer review of a dataset really mean?=
- How are peer-reviewed datasets certified? Everyone knows the pee= r reviewed journals and has some notion of their impact. How does tha= t work for data?
- Who conducts the review? Who is the "editor" to coordinate the r= eview?
- Does peer review imply more responsibility or accountability for the d= ata "publisher"?
- One critical discussion should be about what facility is accepting the= data and how they operate, what requirements they have for peer review and= discussion of how well that's worked in the past. Their perspective is oft= en quite different from that of a scientist.
Please join us in this discussion!
The discussion will be followed by a short business meeting for feedback= and planning purposes.
NOTE THE NEW LOCATION: This meeting = will be held at the Millenium Hotel in the Boulder Creek L= iving Room. This private room is adjacent to a bar where food and bev= erages can be purchased and brought into the meeting.
Note that the Millenium is graciously providing us this room including w= ireless connectivity without charge. Please attend this meeting and c= onsider purchasing some comestible fare to support the Millenium and our co= ntinued use of this room and its amenities.
Who:
Gary Strand, The = NCAR Community Earth System Model and the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report.&nbs= p; [Gary's slides: Gary Strand Aug 17 2011 BESSIG presentati= on]
Siri Jodha Khalsa wil= l give a short summary of a workshop he led at this summer's INSPIRE confer= ence titled "What is Interoperability and How do we Measure it?" followed b= y an open discussion of the topic. (INSPIRE is the panEuropean spatial data= infrastructure initiative. Workshop presentations are available at: INSPIRE conference presentations.)
Leonard Sitongia, Challenges in Legacy Software and Scientific Methods, followed by
When: Wednesday, August 17, 2011, 4:00 - 6:00
Where: The Boulder Creek Living Room of The Millenium = Hotel. Please see the web site for directions to the hotel. = The Boulder Creek Living Room is found by entering the lobby, passing thro= ugh the doorway on the right, then left through another doorway into the ro= om.
Food items available include: appetizers, salads, a burger, wraps, and e= ntrees, ranging in cost from $6 to a $29 entree. Most items are $10 o= r less.
Another BLAST!
A time to listen and discuss as members present their work and areas of = interest.
Who:
If anyone else is interested in speaking at this meeting, please contact= Anne.
After the presentations we'll have a short business meeting for planning= purposes. At the meeting we'll discuss the possibility of holding fu= ture meetings at the Millenium Hotel.
When: Tuesday, July 19, 2011, 4:00 - 6:00 PM
Where: Room A200, LASP Space Technology Building, 1234 = Innovation Drive, Boulder, Colorado
LASP is located on the University of Colorado's East Campus Research Par= k. A map and directions are available on the LASP Address and Directions= page. The building sits just off Colorado Avenue, immediately ad= jacent to CU's new, very large biotechnology building that is currently und= er construction. Look for the tallest cranes in town, we're nex= t door to the East. Free parking is available.
BLAST: Bessig Lively Activists Speaking Topically =
Come listen and discuss as Vince, Jeff, Steve, Peter, Doug, and Kimberly= present their work and areas of interest. Followed by 10 - 15 minute= business meeting to discuss future planning. Snacks will be provided= .
When: Thursday, June 23, 2011, 4:00 - 6:00 PM
Where: Room A200, LASP Space Technology Building, 1234 = Innovation Drive, Boulder, Colorado
LASP is located on the University of Colorado's East Campus Research Par= k. A map and directions are available on the LASP Locations and D= irections. The building sits just off Colorado Avenue, immediatel= y adjacent to CU's new, very large biotechnology building that is currently= under construction. Look for the tallest cranes in town, we're= next door to the East. Free parking is available.
At the BESSIG planning meeting on Wednesday we scheduled meetings for Th= ursday, June 23 and Tuesday, July 19, 4:00 PM. (See our Calendar ). These meetings will be BLASTs: = BESSIG Lively Activists Speaking Topically. That means people are on = deck to present their work, area of interest, or whatever. The = goal is to for us to get to know each other and our areas of expertise bett= er, and to allow for discussion. Thus, speakers will present for as s= hort or as long as they wish as long as it's "not too long" (TBD). &nb= sp; Some speakers may get bumped until later, and that's okay. We'll = also work in some time for socializing.
We have six speakers that will be ready on June 23, see the Calendar item to see who they are. We're l= ooking for people to sign up for July 19. If you're interested in sha= ring with us, go to the that calendar event and put your name on the list u= nder the "Description" section.
We also updated the table of Meeting Topics with some ideas to incubat= e. We found it particularly liberating to nominate topic organi= zers that weren't actually present at the meeting. Feel free to upda= te the table with your ideas about meeting topics and organizers.
Also, the group paid it forward by contributing $40 to a kitty (includin= g pledges) for snacks for our next meeting. Thanks, guys!!
An important meeting topic was: beer. There is interest in h= aving beer at our meetings, but institutions have severe limitations on alc= ohol. Here at CU a recent update of the alcohol policy muddied the wa= ters sufficiently that what is and is not allowed is unclear and is under i= nvestigation by our staff. More on this to follow. Sugge= stions?
Purpose: Plan meeting topics for upcoming year, a= nd hobnob
When: Wednesday, May 18, 2011, 4:00 - 6:00 PM
Where: Room A200, LASP Space Technology Building,= 1234 Innovation Drive, Boulder, Colorado
As we've not identified a talk topic for this meeting, we'll use our tim= e to plan meeting topics and, as much as possible, a schedule for the upcom= ing year. Please come to the meeting with your calendar and spe= cific ideas about meeting topics you would like to hear about or might be i= nterested in presenting. We'll also get to know each other a li= ttle better over some light snacks. If all goes well we could be done= early.
I have started a Meeting Topic and Organizer L= ist, check it out.
If you can't make this meeting but would like to provide input, send an = email to bessig.info@lasp.colorado.edu (which currently comes to me, Anne).=
LASP is located on the University of Colorado's East Campus Research Par= k. A map and directions are available on the LASP locations page. = The building sits just off Colorado Avenue, immediately adjacent to CU's n= ew, very large biotechnology building that is currently under construction.= Look for the tallest cranes in town, we're next door to the Ea= st. Free parking is available.
At our most recent meeting we decided to meet again on Wednesday, 5/18 f= rom 4:00 - 6:00 with this schedule:
4:00 Talk (TBD)
5:00 Business meeting
The group agreed to discuss talk topics and speakers via the web site.&n= bsp;
In retrospect, I think this is a very tight schedule, as in general it w= ould be good to provide a speaker with a two week lead time. Plus, we= have to find someone that can come at the particular hour. I'm a lit= tle nervous about making this goal.
Please contribute to our discussion about identifying a speaker and topi= c for this upcoming meeting in the Discussion section of the web site. = ; Thank you!
If anyone is available to sponser snacks or beverages for this meeting p= lease contact me.
Anne
I'm really pleased about our launch meeting last night. Thank you = to all who attended and also those who showed interest but could not attend= .
We had roughly 45 people in attendance from 10 organizations: LASP, NDP = LLC, NEON, NOAA, NSIDC, CU Boulder Research Computing, Tech-X Corporation, = UNAVCO, UCAR, and UCAR/Unidata.
Ted led us off with a talk about "Convergence and Trust in Earth Space S= cience Data Systems": Habermann_Converge= nceAndTrust. "Convergence" refers to convergence towards standard= s and best practices that simplify exchange and use of data. Si= mplification of that aspect of science is helping us move from data to info= rmation to knowledge and finally to wisdom. Generally data prod= ucers are involved in transforming data to information, data consumers are = involved in transforming information to knowledge, and it takes the communi= ty to translate knowledge to wisdom. This path leads to the que= stion of trust: given that we're in an age where people use data and may no= t know who the data provider was, let alone have communicated with them, ho= w do we say with certainity that our results are correct? This leads = to the issue of trust. The topic of trust, being an over arching issu= e, played a big role in our subsequent discussion at our business meeting.&= nbsp; Discussion notes from that meeting will be available soon.
Dave Fulker entertained us with a witty, erudite joke followed by a talk= on "Standard Mechanisms= for Data Exchange", practices that became "standard" by virtue of being co= mmonplace: Fulker_StandardMechanismsForD= ataExchange. Dave made a comparison between the history of artifa= cts and what those artifacts enabled, e.g., writing instruments enabled num= erical symbols, scrolls/books/libraries enabled tables and relations, etc.&= nbsp; Currently, computers in science have enabled data management, analysi= s, and visualization as library functions or APIs, e.g., library functions = for data formatting. Regarding data analysis and visualization, the p= ower of a system is directly related to the generality and richness of its = underlying data model. And now, the web has enabled near real t= ime data flows and remote access to data.
These talks were relevant in our business meeting where we brainstormed = about what this group might be or do, what our goals might be, who is avail= able for contributing and what to do next. In Ted's terms, we a= re in a stage of ferment, trying to focus our energy as a community. &= nbsp; Some common themes emerged, such as serving as a resource for those t= rying to learn how to build good systems. Another theme was trust: ho= w is it currently earned, how can we ensure its viability in our escience w= orld? Are there projects for us there? Notes from this se= ction of meeting are available off the Discussion section.
We decided to meet again in month, on Wednesday, 5/18, from 4:00 - 6:00.= (If anyone is available to sponser snacks or beverages for this meet= ing please contact me.) The first hour will be a talk. The seco= nd hour will be a business meeting. The group is tasked with id= entifying a speaker for the 4:00 time slot.
I really appreciate the strong interest and support I received in launch= ing this group. I'd like to stress here again that this is a communit= y effort. The more people contribute, the more successful we'll be as= a group. The good news is that there is a good number of us such tha= t each individual effort does not have to be huge. Please think about= what you are able to contribute.
Watch our site as news about the upcoming 5/18 meeting develops.
Purpose: 1) To bring together people interested i= n scientific data in the Boulder, Colorado area for the purpose of sharing = ideas and information, and 2) to guage interest in this group and discuss i= ts future.
When: Wednesday, April 20, 2011, 5:00 PM
Where: Room A200, LASP Space Technology Building,=
1234 Innovation Drive, Boulder, Colorado
<=
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Schedule:
5:00 Arrive
5:15 The Role of Standards for Data and Metadata, b= y Ted Habermann and Dave Fulker
A hallmark of science in the Internet age has been the increasing import= ance of means for exchanging digital data. Indeed the significance is so gr= eat that Turing Award winner Jim Gray dubbed this data-intensive pattern th= e "Fourth Paradigm of Science." Tightly linked with effective data exchange= is a critical need for standards such that data providers and data users a= re, in essence, talking the same language. The authors will cover two aspec= ts of this need: 1) Habermann will discuss important progress, internationa= l in scope, on standards for metadata (i.e., information about data) that are being widely= adopted; 2) Fulker will discuss software and protocols that have, through = patterns of use, served to significantly standardize the mechanisms for= data exchange, including how complex data structures are digitally re= presented and serialized.
6:15 Dinner
6:45 Business meeting: Group Planning, Goals
7:30 End
8:00 Building vacated
Dinner and beverages will be provided. Thanks to the Foundation fo= r Earth Science for the food! Please RSVP to Anne Wilson so t= he appropriate amount of food can be ordered.
LASP is located on the University of Colorado's East Campus Research Par= k. A map and directions are available on the LASP locations page. The = building sits just off Colorado Avenue, immediately adjacent to CU's new, v= ery large biotechnology building that is currently under construction. = ; Look for the tallest cranes in town, we're next door to the East.&n= bsp; Free parking is available.
Please note that we will need to lock our front doors at 7:00 PM. = If you need to arrive after that, please contact Anne Wilson to make altern= ative arrangements.