Community Services

Linda Miller, Jeff Weber, Doug Dirks

Strategic Focus Areas

The Community Services group's activities support Unidata's strategic goals in the following ways:

Enable widespread, efficient access to geoscience data
We work with government and industry data providers to secure access to data for Unidata community members. We monitor and collaborate with data sources to stay apprised of impending changes and to advocate for the needs of our user community.
Develop and provide open-source tools for effective use of geoscience data
We promote Unidata tools and software for multi-disciplinary use, with an eye toward finding additional research and educational communities that can benefit from our work.
Provide cyberinfrastructure leadership in data discovery, access, and use
We engage with community members and groups to determine which data, tools, and services will be most useful both to the Unidata community and the broader geoscience community. By fostering collaboration, we help leverage the important work being done by the UPC and others for the benefit of all.
Build, support, and advocate for the diverse geoscience community
We provide user workshops, tutorials, and community workshops to help build supportive relationships between community members. We participate in UCAR/NCAR and NSF projects for underrepresnted populations and minority communities (SOARS, AIHEC, outreach to HBCUs). We provide services and tools to facilitate education and research in diverse communities. We work to broaden the Unidata community by participating in student and professional conferences.

Posts to the News@Unidata blog appear regularly, but not on a specific schedule. Some highlights:

Blog readership has been relatively steady. Reader comments to blog articles remain fairly light.

Assisted Users Committee members in planning and execution of the 2012 Unidata Users Workshop held July 9-13, 2012 in Boulder.
Participated with Michael James in weekly AWIPS II meetings with NCEP Headquarters and NCEP Centers technical staff discussing progress and technical issues.
Coordinated with NWS Headquarters on AWIPS II official releases and progress.
Collaborated with Chairs of governing committees on planning and implementing the Joint Policy and Users Committee meetings.
Arranged and participated in a meeting with Steven Goodman, GOES-R Program Scientist and Chief Scientist. This resulted from a discussion during the Unidata summer workshop with Greg Mandt, Program Manager of GOES-R.
Becky Cosgrove and her staff, NCEP, has coordinated wth Tom Yoksas to make changes to the CONDUIT data stream since the survey was conducted.
Participated as members of the triennial summer workshop planning committee in organizating and arranging for the "Navigation Earth System Science Data" workshop held 8-13 July 2012.
Participating on UCAR's Weather Exhibit Committee (has led to development of IDV 'kiosk' skin for touch screen monitors)
Participating in the AMS Committee to Improve Climate Change Communications (CICCC)
Perform acts of Wizardry at UCAR's Super Science Saturday
Worked with NOAA/GSD to bring the 2D HRRR model output into the IDD, and continue to seek solutions for delivering the 3D model output with NOAA and NCEP.
Working with UCAR/COMET on a derecho case study using the IDV.

We have continued to update the Facebook and Twitter feeds.
We are investigating establishing a Google+ presence. Maintaining a G+ presence may not be worth the effort.
We are actively planning a YouTube channel for short videos/screencasts. We will coordinate with UPC staff to create short videos to demonstrate key functionality of Unidata software.

We plan to continue the following activities:

NAWIPS migration to AWIPS II, including the overall AWIPS II project
Ongoing development of news articles for publication through News@Unidata
Continue to support and contribute to governing committees
Now that we are settled in our office space, we plan to begin the seminar series once again
Outreach
Engagement with professional societies
Triennial workshop planning and coordination

We plan to organize or take part in the following:

Assist with the Unidata's 5-year proposal to NSF
Booth at AMS 2013 annual meeting
Table at AMS 2013 student conference
Booth at the National Weather Association (NWA) meeting in Madison, Wisconsin in October 2012

Statistics from the Community pages on the Unidata web site. Comparisons are made with statistics from the previous six-month period.

Most recent six months

Prepared September 2012