Meeting title: Mapping the Landscape of Global Collaborations in Building Data Infrastructures
Please give a short introduction describing the scope of the group and if any previous activities
The Internet now connects data, compute resources and software from globally distributed resources in real time. Where on planet Earth these resources are geographically located is irrelevant, but to enable online access to them, there is a rising need for programmatic access to both data, and to software to process data across institutional, domain and national boundaries. This requires the development of standardized machine-to-machine interfaces that can loosely couple data and software through agreed formats, interfaces, vocabularies and ontologies, preferably across multiple domains. The complexity of these online infrastructures require that they are built by much wider communities, through effective cooperation and governance, to enable new and innovative forms of interdisciplinary science from globally accessible data stores.
Community efforts are springing up everywhere, both within and across many scientific domains. These communities have similar goals and host parallel working groups that support the mission of advancing scientific research through data interoperability. There is great diversity in the maturity of these organizations and it is clear that there is much to be learned from and with each other to improve coordination and avoid duplication of effort.
Scholarly communication defined by Sloan includes ‘engaging the emerging community of stakeholders and practitioners tackling similar issues’. The time is ripe for identifying the key communities and partnerships within the major scientific domains that are developing infrastructures that enable sharing and processing of scientific data and ‘mapping the landscape’ of these activities to further improve collaborations and partnerships, particularly those ‘umbrella’ alliances that are enabling interdisciplinary data sharing.
Already mapping the landscape exercises are starting to be undertaken because the duplication is becoming increasingly obvious (if not embarrassingly so!). Of particular interest is a tool developed by Dawn Wright of ESRI that was used by EarthCube to map the location of, and types of communities within EarthCube (http://dusk.geo.orst.edu/ec-story)
This BoF is about establishing whether it is felt that there is a need to do a Mapping the Landscape exercise for the major data infrastructure building activities within and beyond RDA.
Please provide additional links to informative material related to the group i.e. Case statements, working documents etc
This is a link to the tool of choice: http://dusk.geo.orst.edu/ec-story/
Please list the meeting objectives
This BoF is about:
1. Establishing whether it is felt that there is a need to do a Mapping the Landscape exercise for the major data infrastructure building activities within and beyond RDA;
2. Seeking whether this should be undertaken as a formal RDA working group; and
3. Investigating which is the most appropriate methodology, tool, etc.,
Meeting agenda (Summary of meeting is attached as Notes)
1. Introductions
2. Presentation on the reason for and what the purpose of the BoF is (Attached presentation on Agenda and Introduction)
3. Use cases presented on similar mapping the landscape exercises:
i. Belmont Forum: Priorities for International Development of e-Infrastructure and Data Management in Global Change Research. Rowena Davis (Belmont Forum and e-(Infrastructure and Data Management Project - presentation attached)
ii. CODATA Task Group on Coordinating Data Standards amongst Scientific Unions. Marshall Ma (University of Idaho - presentation attached)
iii. RISCAPE: European Research infrastructures in the international landscape. Ari Asmi (University of Helsinki - presentation attached)
iv. ESIP: Cross community Activities. Erin Robinson (ESIP - presentation attached).
v. EarthCube: Map of the Landscape: Portraying Connections. Rowena Davis (EarthCube Liason Team - presentation attached).
vi. Arctic Data Committee: Mapping the Landscape of Arctic Activities. Peter Pulsifer (National Snow and Ice Data Center - presentation attached)
vii. AuScope: Key AuScope activites, Australia. Lesley Wyborn (National Computational Infrastructure, ANU - presentation attached)
viii. RDA TAB: Landscape Overview Group. Steve Diggs (RDA TAB - presentation attached)
4. Discussion (Attached presentation on A0 sheets)
5. Decision to be made on whether to progress to an RDA Working/Interest Group
Audience: Please specify who is your target audience and how they should prepare for the meeting
Anyone who is working on a collaboration group that is building data sharing infrastructures.
There should be no requirements for preparation to attend.
Group chair serving as contact person: Lesley Wyborn
