A Review of its Uses at the University of Michigan Data Collaboration in the Wild Erik C. Hofer [email protected] Collaboratory for Research on Electronic.

A Review of its Uses at the University of Michigan

Data Collaboration in the Wild

Erik C. [email protected]

Collaboratory for Research on Electronic WorkSchool of InformationUniversity of Michigan


Collaboratory for Research on Electronic WorkSchool of Information, University of Michigan

Overview

•The challenge ahead

•Confronting the Tsunami

•Some specimens from the Wild

•Some lessons



The challenge

•Why this talk? Why now?

•Many reasons

•An exploding market

•An exploding demand

•We have to sort this all out for our users



The tsunami

•A convenient metaphor

•Web conferencing and data collaboration products are a giant wall of water, headed straight for us, that will cause great destruction if we are not prepared

•We have to understand how this wave is going to hit us



Some tsunami background

•A series of massive waves

•Energy is constant

•function of height and speed

•grow rapidly in size as they approach shore

•Caused (typically) by earthquakes or other seismic activity

•Can cause massive destruction



Our tsunami•There are seismic changes underway in

how research and education are conducted

•Forces have been building for a long time, but we are about to see major motion as those forces release

•To prepare for this tsunami, we must understand the source of the wave, more so than the wave itself



Seismic changes• There is wide belief that the education and

research community is poised to embrace new applications enabled by advanced IT infrastructure

• The cyberinfrastructure perspective has some concrete thoughts on how this should work for higher ed.

• Atkins et al., 2003

• K-12 is not far behind

• Fortunately, there have been some tremors that we can look to to understand what lies ahead



Some examples

•Remote instrumentation

• UARC/SPARC and NEESgrid

•Data discussion

• GLR CFAR and NEES ES-TF

•Distance education

• GIS Global Graduate Seminar and Anthrax Virtual Briefings



A note about the examples

•Standing on the shoulders of giants

•A huge number of people have been involved in each of these projects and I know I will not give due credit to each, but I’ll try



UARC / SPARC

•NSF-funded Upper Atmospheric Research Collaboratory and Space Physics and Aeronomy Research Collaboratory projects

•Remote instrumentation of facilities for upper atmospheric science

•Provided simultaneous viewing of multiple instruments, archival data and model visualizations in a collaboratory environment



UARC 5.0



UARC 6.0



SPARC



NEESgrid•Collaboratory component of the NSF-

funded George E. Brown, Jr. Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation

•Provides access to major earthquake engineering infrastructure at 15 research facilities in the US

•Enables remote participation and integration of numerical and physical simulation



NEESgrid Interface



GLR CFAR

•NIH-funded Great Lakes Regional Center for AIDS Research

•A virtual center connecting researchers at

•Connected through various collaboration technology



Virtual Lab meeting



Virtual Lab Seminar



•Regular virtual lab meeting for equipment sites in NEES

•Typically 15-20 sites

•Content ranging from roundtable discussions to presentations

NEES ES-TF



NEES ES-TF



Global Graduate Seminar

•Graduate-level course taught between several universities

•University of Michigan, American University, Howard University, University of Witwatersrand, University of Fort Hare, University of Pretoria

•Professor spends time in each place

•Each student is a participant in a web conferencing session



Global Graduate Seminar



Rapid Response Collaboratory

•A public-health related project organized in October, 2001 as a response to concerns about anthrax

•Core group of 10 people affiliated with GLR CFAR organized virtual briefings

•Used Placeware and commercial conference call provider

•Over 1200 participants in 8 states



Some lessons

•Not all uses of data collaboration are the same

•No silver bullet in technology choice

•Effort required depends largely on what activities need to be supported

•There are many ways to do this!



Some themes• Remote instrumentation

• Data is the focus

• Low technological barriers to entry

• Data discussion

• Conversation is the focus

• Specialized hardware may be necessary

• Distance education

• Need to be extremely fault tolerant



Conclusion•The tsunami is heading for us

•We have to understand the seismic changes in work that are sending the water our way

•Task and infrastructure requirements can yield very different collaborative environments for different users

•There is no single integrated solution right now, but we can piece things together



Acknowledgments

• National Science Foundation

• SPARC - ATM-9873025

• UARC - IRI-9216848

• NEESgrid - CMS-0117853

• National Institutes of Health

• GLR CFAR - 5 P30 CA79458



Ack: GGS• W.K. Kellog Foundation

• CSIR

• University of Michigan

• School of Information

• Center for Afroamerican and African Studies

• Alliance for Community Technology

• International Possibilities Unlimited

• Microsoft Research

• Cisco Systems

• Orbicom

• National Science Foundation



People (not all)Gary OlsonTom FinholtStephanie TeasleyDerrick CogburnDan AtkinsTim KilleenFarnham JahanianAtul PrakashBob ClauerTerry WeymouthBill Spencer

Peter KnoopSteve Wolinsky

Jason YerkieVlad WielbutJoseph Hardin

Charles SeveranceDan HornJeremy

BirnholtzDheeraj Motwani

Sung-Joo BaeDan Horn

Tim SchackerSarah Rybicki

Deborah Robinson

James JacksonMichael

TraugouttMichael Kennedy

Michael CohenRik PanginibanRobert GuerraAmb. Anthony

HillNestor Zaluzec

A Review of its Uses at the University of Michigan Data Collaboration in the Wild Erik C. Hofer [email protected] Collaboratory for Research on Electronic.

Documents

research facilities

aids research

research community

wild erik

massive destruction

physical simulation

virtual center

data collaboration products