Status Report: Community Services

April 2018 - September 2018

Doug Dirks, Jeff Weber, Joshua Young

Areas for Committee Feedback

We are requesting your feedback on the following topics:

Activities Since the Last Status Report

News@Unidata blog

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

• Summer 2018 Unidata Interns Wrap Up Their Projects
• NetCDF Licensing Remains Unchanged: Libraries are Open-Source and Freely-Available
• Python-Focused Software Training Workshop at Jackson State University
• Register Now for the 2018 Software Training Workshops
• 2018 Users Workshop Explores Evolving Geoscience Workflows
• What's New in IDV 5.5
• 2018 Community Equipment Awards
• Software release information
• Community job postings
• Community meetings and other announcements

Dependencies, challenges, problems, and risks include:

• Finding community members willing to contribute stories (or story ideas) for the blog is an ongoing challenge

Community Outreach and Services

The community services group continues to actively reach out to and engage with Unidata community members.

Progress has been made on the following:

• Drafting the next core funding proposal to the NSF.
• Planning for participation in upcoming professional society conferences (2018 AGU Fall Meeting and 2019 AMS Annual Meeting).
• Engagement with CUAHSI to support the NFIE and WRF-Hydro at the NWC.
• Assisting the EarthCube Science Support Office staff with back-office tasks.
• Continue to serve on the CUAHSI HIS standing committee.
• We continue to update Unidata’s social media channels (Facebook, Twitter, Google+).
• We continue to  publish short videos/screencasts on the Unidata YouTube channel.
• We continue to actively support the NCAR/SOARS program.
• Actively participate in Super Science Saturday.
• Engage and support the Undergraduate Leadership Workshop (ULW) at UCAR.
• Support the development and operation of the UCAR:NCAR Equity and InclusiON (UNEION) community of practice.

Dependencies, challenges, problems, and risks include:

• Facilitating community adoption of new technological services (cloud, etc)
• Engagement with Unidata social media streams among community members is not particularly high.

Ongoing Activities

We plan to continue the following activities:

• Event planning activities for the Users Workshop in June will continue (and increase)
• Work on the Unidata core funding proposal to NSF
• Engagement with EarthCube, ESIP, and science or cyber communities at large
• NAWIPS migration to AWIPS, including the overall AWIPS project
• Ongoing development of news articles for publication through News@Unidata
• Continue to support and contribute to governing committees
• Seminars
• Outreach
• Inclusion and equity
• Engagement with professional societies
• Support for cloud-related projects
• Further development of the Data Management Resource Center
• Support the pursuit of funding
• Site visits as the budget allows
• Engage other UCAR/NCAR divisions regarding Unidata software use i.e. CESM/IDV

New Activities

Over the next three months, we plan to organize or take part in the following:

• Expanded emphasis on cloud-related activities
• Support the Users Committee’s work towards  planning the next Triennial

Over the next twelve months, we plan to organize or take part in the following:

• Continue to engage the hydrologic community regarding WRF-Hydro/IDV interactions and the National Water Center’s efforts
• Seek additional opportunities to engage and listen to the community

Beyond a one-year timeframe, we plan to organize or take part in the following:

• Provide additional data management and cloud-related training

Relevant Metrics

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

All community pages

Most recent six months:

• 53,919  unique pageviews (56,470 in previous period)
• 10.1% of total unique pageviews 10.1% in previous period)

Top community pages

1. All blog pages
   43063  unique pageviews (42422 in previous period)
   71% of total community pageviews (79% in previous period)
2. www.unidata.ucar.edu/events
   11625  unique pageviews (3888 in previous period)
   19% of total community pageviews (7% in previous period)
3. www.unidata.ucar.edu/community
   2800  unique pageviews (4678 in previous period)
   5% of total community pageviews (9% in previous period)
4. www.unidata.ucar.edu/about
   2397  unique pageviews (2393 in previous period)
   4% of total community pageviews (4% in previous period)
   
   

Social media statistics, March 15, 2018

1. # of Twitter followers: 904 (up from 824)
2. # of Facebook followers: 754 (up from 717)

Strategic Focus Areas

We support the following goals described in Unidata Strategic Plan:

1. Enable widespread, efficient access to geoscience data
   We monitor and collaborate with data sources to stay apprised of impending changes and to advocate for the needs of our user community. We provide user workshops, tutorials, and community workshops to help build supportive relationships between community members.
   
2. 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.
   
3. Provide cyberinfrastructure leadership in data discovery, access, and use
   We work with government and industry data providers to secure access to data for Unidata community members.
   
4. Build, support, and advocate for the diverse geoscience community
   We coordinate with our governing committees to find ways to expand Unidata's community participation. We use our web site, electronic newsletters, and social media to keep community members informed about enhanced data services, software tools, and cyberinfrastructure.
   
   We participate in UCAR/NCAR and NSF projects for underrepresented 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.

Prepared August 2018