Robert Ping
Robert Ping is Program Manager of the Research Data Alliance - United States (RDA-US) and manager of Education, Outreach, and Training for the Research Technologies division of University Information Technology Services and the Pervasive Technology Institute at Indiana University, US.
He was project manager for Professor Beth Plale from 2008 - 2013 where he helped launch initiatives like the HathiTrust Research Center (HTRC), the Data to Insight Center, DataNet: Sustainable Environment through Actionable Data, and the Research Data Alliance. He co-organized the Research Data Alliance Planning Meeting in Washington D.C./Arlington Virginia in 2012, the National Science Foundation-sponsored Coming Together Around Data: a PI Meeting for DataNet and INTEROP (Data2012), the inaugural HTRC Uncamp in 2012, The 27th PRAGMA Workshop - Facilitating Data Sharing: Big Data and Networking in 2014, and the National Science Foundation-sponsored Software Infrastructure for Sustained Innovation (SI2: SSE & SSI) PI Workshop in 2014.
He was also project manager for TeraGrid, an e-Science grid computing infrastructure combining resources at eleven partner sites. The project started in 2001 and operated from 2004 through 2011. He was involved with organizing and traveling to trade-shows around the US to promote the work sponsored by the National Science Foundation and encouraging K-12 students to enter the Science Engineering Technology Math workforce pipeline. He was also involved with the follow-on project : Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery Environment (XSEDE). ACCESS is the newest follow-on project, Advanced Cyberinfrastructure Coordination Ecosystem: Services & Support, established and funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) to help researchers and educators utilize the nation’s advanced computing systems and services.
In 2013 he transitioned to Research Technologies where he organizes training (the Supercomputing for Everyone Series) for ten or more workshops per year to help Indiana University faculty, staff, and students use high performance compute, storage, software, and visualization tools. He organizes webinars, conferences, workshops, and advisory board meetings to build community and sustain funding for the University and its initiatives. He manages news items, web presence, YouTube channels, and email communications via Sales Force for both Research Technologies and the Pervasive Technology Institute. He co-coordinates the Indiana University booth at The International Conference for High Performance Computing, Networking, Storage, and Analysis annual conference.
In 2023 he was invited to join the Research Data Alliance - United States as Program Manager. As Program Manager he will oversee the multiple projects within RDA-US including the TIGRUS Facilitation Program, outreach, communications, day-to-day activities, and funding initiatives. He will make sure initial ideas are disseminated, external and internal working group communications happen in a timely fashion, and outputs are disseminated to stakeholders and the community. As program facilitator he will engage with partners, manage facilitation and in-kind support, and manage finalization support of working groups.