IGSN Technical Documentation of the IGSN

2014-05-15 Telecon

15 May 2014 Thursday Telecon

Agenda items

  • Financial Update
  • Technical Update
  • Any upcoming or past events related to IGSN
  • General discussion

Notes from call

  • Present: Hans-Joachim W.-A., Jens K., Uli H., Lee A., Dirk F., Kerstin L., Leslie H. (notes), Irina B., Marshall M., Anders N., Cathy C.
  • Financial update
    • The bank account is now completely set up in Potsdam.
    • Invoices for the membership fee will be sent out soon, likely the beginning of June.
    • Because of the high currency exchange fees, there was also a “Dollar account” set up for those members in the U.S., to cut down on fees for exchanging the money.
    • When the invoices are sent, there will also be a reminder of the responsibilities of the members and what being a member entails.
    • It has not yet been determined if there will be a lower membership fee for Associate Members as opposed to Full Members (Full Members = 500 Euros). There are not Associate Members at this time. It would make sense if it were lower since they have less rights. We could also ask for donations from commercial participants.
    • Question: is there a target budget? Answer: To cover the General Assembly costs at AGU (usually less than $1000 per year), outreach, professionally designed brochures, make the website nicer with more information and better design. No salaries planned, though that could come up at a later point.
  • Technical update
    • LH: Now that we have multiple allocating agents, the next step is to take stock of who will be planning to become allocating agents soon.
    • Jens: Currently, it is a manual process. A namespace is requested, a ticket is created, there is an action taken, then the namespace is manually entered into the wiki. There is a namespace proposal in the wiki, we should outline the governance procedure to follow it, then from there develop the technical procedure.
    • To draft the procedures for discussion at the next call, the following group will meet: Anthony K. (volunteered by Cathy C.), Cathy C., Jens, Kerstin/Leslie.
    • Target to have the draft by the end of July.
    • Dirk: will there still be a technical workshop on the infrastructure? This would drive the timeline of allocating agents. KL: Yes, but there is no central funding for this now. Members would have to cover the costs. KL will try to find support for it.
  • Upcoming events for IGSN
    • There was a proposal to move the General Assembly at AGU to Sunday, to reduce the number of conflicts or the early morning meeting time. It will be the 10th anniversary of IGSN, there could be a reception to help with outreach and awareness. Several were in favor of the move to Sunday.
    • Lee A.: The Belmont Forum will be putting together a strategic plan and funding call. KL and Lee will make sure IGSN is included. Jens: I’m also in Belmont Forum, WP4. And CSIRO should have a little money for that.
    • KL: I’m going to a workshop for the taxonomic data working group, early november, Kenya. Will present IGSN.
    • Lee A. will outreach to National Data Repositories
  • General discussion
    • Jens: we are planning to compile an IGSN cookbook. Something more user-friendly than the wiki pages. (in sequence and more structured) Cathy Constable: I thought that might be a task for then group discussing allocating agents?
    • If anyone here knows of a good designer (for brochures, etc.), then let Kerstin know.
    • There are recorded webinars introducing the IGSN and this can be updated after the allocating procedure is updated.
    • IGSN/allocation can be cross-marketed with CODATA

Action items

  • Send email to members asking who will be allocating IGSNs soon.
  • KL look for support for technical workshop (Aug. or Sept.)
  • Send email asking if there are any problems with a Sunday General Assembly before AGU.
  • Working group for Allocation Procedures - set up working space, set up schedule (LH), write up by end of July
  • Items for feedback (LH): GoToMeeting vs. AdobeConnect, items for revamping the http://www.igsn.org site, anyone need any other information?
  • IGSN Cookbook
  • Next call will be after the end of July