Community Presence - September 2007

MMI has over 10 abstracts and presentations in upcoming workshops, including a proposed metadata training at Ocean Sciences. // John Graybeal was invited to participate in an international metadata workshop in Oostend in January, and to talk at NASA's Earth Sciences Data Systems Working Group meeting in October. // Several European visitors to MBARI will be meeting with MMI to discuss possible collaborations. // MMI was surprised to see the sensor workshops press release reprinted in a print magazine. // John Graybeal witnessed a strong MMI presence in the UNOLS Data Management Best Practices committee, posted an MMI page on their plone site, and connected to additional related groups. // MMI continued to provide more Community News postings.

In addition to the abstracts to AGU mentioned last month, additional abstracts have gone to Ocean Sciences 2008 (including a proposed science metadata training), and an Ocean Biodiversity Informatics conference.

John Graybeal was invited to attend an international metadata workshop in Oostend in January (about which more information will be posted on the MMI site shortly). He was also invited to speak at NASA's Earth Sciences Data Systems Working Group meeting in October, where one day will focus on oceanographic metadata standards.

Christoph Waldman of ESONET (and University of Bremen) will be visiting MBARI in early October, and meeting with MMI staff. Chris Higgins of Edinburgh University Data Library and EDINA, who recently was funded on a metadata-related project that mentioned MMI, will be visiting MBARI later in October, expressly to meet with MMI about possible collaborations.

It was pleasing, in a disconcerting sort of way, to see the sensor interoperability workshop report press release reprinted word-for-word (and picture-for-picture) in a trade journal. Thanks go to Kim Fulton-Bennett of MBARI, for producing a press release so fine that it required no editorial changes.

John Graybeal is on the University-National Oceanographic Laboratory System Ad-Hoc Data Management Best Practices Committee (whew!), which started up this month. An admirable number of references to MMI were made (starting with the membership list), and John provided at least one augmented vocabulary for the committee's consideration. From those connections, the RVTEC (Research Vessel Technical Enhancement Committee) survey of metadata practices was promoted on the MMI site.

MMI is providing an increased number of community news postings in recent months, reflecting greater attention to this topic inside and outside the organization.

Posted December 5th, 2007 by graybeal
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