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David Govoni

Science Environment for Ecological Knowledge (SEEK) - 0 views

seek.ecoinformatics.org/Wiki.jsp

science research e-research e-science cyberinfrastructure grid grid-computing portal informatics ecology bioinformatics biology ecoinformatics wiki SEEK

shared by David Govoni on 10 Jan 09 - Cached
  • David Govoni on 10 Jan 09
     
    "The Science Environment for Ecological Knowledge (SEEK) is a five year initiative designed to create cyberinfrastructure for ecological, environmental, and biodiversity research and to educate the ecological community about ecoinformatics. SEEK participa
Lisa Johnston

Where is the cloud? Geography, economics, environment, and jurisdiction in cloud computing - 0 views

www.uic.edu/...2171

cloud computing geography

shared by Lisa Johnston on 01 May 09 - Cached
  • Lisa Johnston on 01 May 09
     
    Cloud computing - the creation of large data centers that can be dynamically provisioned, configured, and reconfigured to deliver services in a scalable manner - places enormous capacity and power in the hands of users. As an emerging new technology, however, cloud computing also raises significant questions about resources, economics, the environment, and the law. Many of these questions relate to geographical considerations related to the data centers that underlie the clouds: physical location, available resources, and jurisdiction. While the metaphor of the cloud evokes images of dispersion, cloud computing actually represents centralization of information and computing resources in data centers, raising the specter of the potential for corporate or government control over information if there is insufficient consideration of these geographical issues, especially jurisdiction. This paper explores the interrelationships between the geography of cloud computing, its users, its providers, and governments.
David Govoni

Earth System Grid (ESG) - 0 views

www.earthsystemgrid.org

e-science e-research grid grid-computing science research database modeling simulation science2.0 cyberinfrastructure esg

shared by David Govoni on 10 Jan 09 - Cached
  • David Govoni on 10 Jan 09
     
    "The Earth System Grid (ESG) integrates supercomputers with large-scale data and analysis servers located at numerous national labs and research centers to create a powerful environment for next generation climate research. This portal is the primary poin
David Govoni

JISC-PoWR Preservation of Web Resources Project (UK) - 0 views

jiscpowr.jiscinvolve.org

Web preservation knowledge management

shared by David Govoni on 03 Dec 08 - Cached
  • David Govoni on 03 Dec 08
     
    Blog set up to support the work of JISC-PoWR, a project initiated by the JISC Integrated Information Environment Committee (UK).
umgeoglib

Project MUSE - Library Trends - Volume 57, Number 2, Fall 2008 - 0 views

muse.jhu.edu/...lib.57.2.html

data curation data management

shared by umgeoglib on 27 Mar 09 - Cached
  • umgeoglib on 27 Mar 09
     
    4 Articles related to data curation/data management: At the Watershed: Preparing for Research Data Management and Stewardship at the University of Minnesota Libraries Case Study in Data Curation at Johns Hopkins University Shedding Light on the Dark Data in the Long Tail of Science Institutional Repositories and Research Data Curation in a Distributed Environment
Amy West

Developing the Capability and Skills to Support eResearch - 0 views

www.ariadne.ac.uk/henty

eresearch escience ariadne

shared by Amy West on 07 Nov 08 - Cached
  • Of particular concern to this article is the need for improved levels of data stewardship to enable good data management for long-term sustainability, both at national and institutional levels.
  • researchers, particularly those engaged in data-intensive research; systems developers, data scientists and other technical staff; data managers of institutional repositories, data archives and discipline-based data centres and their support staff, with those who liaise between depositors and the repository as being of particular interest; and those who are engaged in high-level policy formulation, either in government or research institutions.
  • Interviews were conducted with twelve key established researchers in six Australian institutions, with a focus on academics engaged in data-intensive research. Interviews were conducted also with the manager of a large data centre, and a repository administrator. The institutions concerned were the Australian National University, the University of Melbourne, the University of Tasmania, the University of Queensland, the University of Sydney and one area of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO).
  • ...18 more annotations...
  • There was wide agreement that there are three types of skills required for practitioners of eResearch, their support staff and repository staff. Not surprisingly, there was a strong need for technical skills. Perhaps not as obvious was the identification of a wide range of non-technical skills. Less obvious again was mention of an assortment of personal qualities, which, while not skills in the formal sense of the term, were singled out as being important.
  • The surveys indicated that not everyone needs the same level of technical skills to conduct or support eResearch.
  • So you need a basic literacy level to look after your computers where you’re storing your data, and then in order to access, like a remote repository, you need to know something about how to connect to that remote repository, what the format of the data should be to go in it, how to convert your data to that required format
  • included skills related to high-performance computing (HPC) and the access grid, data (and database) management, data curation, information engineering, information modelling, software development, remote communications, distributed processing, informatics, portal design, computational fluid dynamics, database integration, visualisation and programming of all kinds.
  • Some of these skills are tightly connected to specific disciplines, especially informatics.
  • The need for technical skills is allied to the ability to understand end-to-end workflows, especially for repository managers and developers who need to be able to think like the researcher and to apply that understanding to developing the repository. By workflows, I mean the many software applications, processing operations and interactions required for research tasks to be carried through to completion.
  • The group of librarians at ‘The Researcher Librarian Nexus’ workshop identified a need for further development of their technical skills, mentioning in particular metadata, something which did not feature among any of the other responses, other than by implication.
  • These vary from skills in data analysis (including the use of statistical packages and other techniques such as data mining) through information seeking to a broader range of general skills. Project management, business analysis, communications, negotiation, intellectual property, team building and train the trainer were mentioned specifically. Another was generic problem solving, because, as one researcher aptly put it, the kinds of problems which arise when undertaking eResearch mean that ‘There’s never going to be someone who has done it before.’
  • The librarians involved with the Researcher/Librarian Nexus workshop also identified it as being of high priority for repository managers, along with marketing, advocacy, copyright, metadata, educational outreach and grant submission writing. They also singled out the intriguing skill of ‘researcher management’ while not specifying precisely what this might entail.
  • A good grasp of copyright and intellectual property issues was seen as essential,
  • These were listed as: open-mindedness, patience and an ‘ability to cooperate and collaborate rather than compete’
  • For example, one researcher, in the field of finance told me of his need for programmers who have a high level of expertise in economics, econometrics, statistics, maths and programming; ‘otherwise all the programming expertise doesn’t really help because then they make strange assumptions in their coding that just result in nonsense output.’
  • One solution to the need to bridge the disciplinary gap is to use graduate students to help with the technical aspects, where those students have an interest and aptitude for this kind of work. In some cases this might be done by providing scholarships, the students then graduating with a PhD on the basis their contribution to the research project has been of sufficient originality to warrant the degree.
  • The barrier to research most often mentioned was the difficulty in assembling all the skills required to conduct a project, particularly in relation to data management and stewardship. In some cases the gap is organisational, as happens for example when the researcher is either unaware of or unable to tap into the skills of a central IT unit. More often the gap was in a lack of understanding of what each group needs, what each has to offer and where responsibilities lie. Examples of this can be seen in comments like the following:
  • For instance if you’ve got data in say NetCDF file formats and the repository wants it in TIFF format, well you need to know something about the technicality of getting your data from NetCDF format into TIFF format.
  • The humanities and social sciences are notable areas where the take-up rate of eResearch has been slower than, for example, in the hard sciences, and where there have been calls for exemplars to be publicised. Many practitioners in the humanities and social sciences find it difficult to envisage where their work might fit into the concept of eResearch.
  • Few researchers are aware that there are such things as repositories, so it is important that the repository is seen as (and indeed is) ‘a good repository – that it’s good in the sense of its high quality but also good in that it adds value for [the researcher].’
  • If research institutions are to minimise the gap between the ideals and realities of eResearch, there is some way to go in providing both institutional capacity and appropriately qualified individuals. While eResearch is dependent on good ICT infrastructure, this is not sufficient in itself. The results of the survey outlined here show that capacity in information technology skills is important but must be accompanied by a range of non-technical skills in such areas as project management. Equally important is the creation of research environments which are covered by well-propagated and understood policies, which are appropriately organised into structures with clearly delineated roles and responsibilities and which minimise the current barriers experienced by many researchers.
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