From KAREN wiki

eResearch@Lincoln: new ways to do science... now and in the future

On Tuesday, September 22, 2009 60 presenters and participants met to explore tools and ideas at Plant and Food's Lincoln campus outside Christchurch. Representatives from KAREN members included: Plant and Food Research, AgResearch, GNS Science, Lincoln University, the University of Canterbury, NIWA

Plant & Food Research and REANNZ showcased tools and projects on KAREN and what the future holds for those using the network. There were first-hand examples of what leading scientists are doing with KAREN and how it is making a difference to their work. The programme featured presentations on:

• Environmental modelling | John McMaster, Plant & Food Research
• Biosecurity - Remote microscopy | John Kean, AgResearch
• Genomics - Collaboration commons | Alan McCulloch, AgResearch
• Meteorology - Supercomputing | Michael Uddstrom, NIWA
• Video conferencing tools | Nathan Gardiner, AVCC
• BlueFern supercomputing | Tony Dale, BlueFern

Services outcomes

Current & Potential Services over KAREN

• Number of presentations around projects using Cloud Computing, including Amazon resources for data processing & storage.
• John Kean (P&F) discussed application of high definition video conferencing over KAREN for remotely diagnosing bio hazards such as insects and spiders at ports. Scopia D/T may be good application in this space.
• Number of presenters mentioned using SAKAI from BestGrid for paperless project management and collaboration over KAREN
• Allan McCulloch (Ag) mentioned the need to stream real-time data over KAREN (Investigating Condor)
• Again, simple file transfer methods over KAREN were requested. We mentioned REANNZ Tsunami Servers will be available soon. Education about file transfer is needed as people still expect to send large data sets via email!?

General theme of Q&A session General theme of discussions in Q&A session centred around the fact we now have 2 fundamental resources - scientists and the network, but we don't have the "glue" to do eResearch. Need funding? / training? / dedicated resources? to provide people with specialist IT and research skills - i.e. programmer interface/algorithmic development to allow traditional researchers to take advantage of KAREN enabled technologies - GRID, HPC, etc.

Video Conferencing Bridge

• AgResearch - are currently using VC internally only. Also evaluating Desktop clients. Very interested in Scopia Desktop. Perception that AgResearch may find value in the KAREN Bridge in near future.

• GNS - perception that the KAREN bridge will become compelling soon but probably not when we initially launch the bridge.

Services Working Group

• Announced Services Working Group to conference. Spoke to Lincoln, AgR and P&F individually. All very supportive of the idea. Collaborative services very interesting to smaller unis like Lincoln.
• Felt either a general all hands working group or a small number of working groups based on challenges in specific research areas would be appropriate. Recommended asking DVCs of Research and Science Strategy Managers for nominations to represent organisations at the WG.

Communications outcomes

REANNZ assisted Plant & Food with the organisation of the event. As part of this, REANNZ managed the RSVPs and through this role was able to grow the number of KAREN users contacts in our database (with the ultimate goal of increasing our reach).

An online survey (using survey tool SurveyMonkey) was used to gather feedback on the event, to help us track success and improve future events. When the survey closed on 5 October we had collected 20 responses. A summary of the responses follows:

How often the participants attend KAREN events
3 Regular attendee at KAREN events
7 Occasional attendee at KAREN events
10 This is my first KAREN event

Overall quality of the seminar
6 High
9
4 Medium
1
0 Low

Overall relevance of the seminar
3 High
6
10 Medium
1
0 Low

What aspects of the seminar the audience found most useful
Themes:
- Explanation of video conferencing tools and service
- Short and snappy case studies of KAREN use vand technical explanations
- Social interaction with other researchers/scientists and discussion time
- Common need for IT/programming resources for eResearch

What can we improve on
Themes:
- Less technical language in presentations
- Need more detailed sessions now on 'how' to use KAREN, rather than 'what' KAREN is

Suggestions for future events
Themes:
- High performance computing workshop
- Discipline/field specific workshop
- How to use KAREN (step by step) with examples
- Identity and access management
- Design of KAREN and technical issue resolution