Building communities and awareness at the NGS

Gillian SinclairNGS Liaison Officer

Outline

• What is the NGS?• Current outreach mechanisms• Communities• User survey• Conclusions

What is the NGS?

25 member institutes 33 heterogeneous resources15,000 processing cores

Available to any researcher at a UK HEI or research institution

More new member sites coming soon!

Growing!

is bringing researchers together

We have now supported in excess of 1000 researchers

Our users come from all research areas and funding sources

Current outreach mechanisms

Roadshows*Campus champions*Innovation forum* Website*TrainingConferencesLiterature, posters etcMailing lists, blog, Facebook

Roadshows

• Standard event – 3 hours including lunch• Tailored to the institutions requirements in terms of

length and content• Can incorporate training• Presentations by real live NGS users on research

topics relevant to the institution• Presentations from the training team on how to get

started and how to run jobs• Roaming RA service can be made available• Lunch!

Roadshow attendance

• Over 120 people have attended

Attendee role

IT Services Rep

Lecturer

PhD student

Researcher

Other

Research area

Business & management

Engineering

Life Sciences

Health sciences

Languages

Social sciences

Humanities

Physical sciences

Computer science

Other

Roadshow outcomes

• 87% attendees think the event length is just right

• 90% presentations right length and high quality

• 93% of attendees are either likely to apply for a NGS account or are considering

• 98% will tell their colleagues about the NGS

Campus Champions• All current NGS member sites have been asked for a nominee.• Signed off by a VC etc to ensure that the position is recognised higher up• Campus Champion will be

– a member of staff who has responsibility for research computing outreach– become an expert contact for local users and potential users of NGS and

related campus resources. – act as a conduit for communications between the NGS and member

institution. • To address

– Lack of engagement with local service provision/management– Lack of connection to user communities that are not at NGS member sites– Lack of knowledge of full range of services available– Under utilization of partner and affiliate resources through the NGS

interfaces

Benefits

• Improved engagement between the institution and NGS

• Training and documentation on the processes for user registration and management.

• Specific Champions section into NGS surgery meetings.• Material for publicizing NGS and related local activities,

including research success stories etc.• Organisation of a launch event / Roadshow to kick off

the program locally.

Innovation Forum

• Second annual event held Oct 2009 Magic Circle Headquarters, London

• 131 attendees• Mix of researchers,

PhD students, academics, IT staff, research support staff

Research area

Business and management

Engineering

Life Sciences

Health Sciences

Languages

Humanities

Social Sciences

Physical Sciences

Computer Science

Other

Innovation Forum• Used to gather feedback on range of topics including

website, NGS future, cloud computing and what communities want from us.

• Break out sessions based on most common research areas and main NGS services– data handling, user support, site integration, software– Bioinformatics, molecular modelling, social sciences

• Break out sessions chaired by a mix of NGS staff, users and other e-science reps

• Breakout groups reported back and outcomes are being looked at

Website

• Launched 18th of November • Feedback gathering at the IF’09• The first port of call for many people, has to be

good• Has specific sections to direct people to what they

need to know e.g. how to get started, applications • More interactive and dynamic• Poll on the home page shows that 75% of visitors like

the new website

Website

• Since the 18th of November• 2136 unique visitors viewing an average of 4

pages a visit• Top 3 countries – UK, US and Spain• Most popular pages (apart from the home

page)– Certificate overview– GSI-SSHTerm application– Your account

Communities

• Launched last week• Designed to help NGS users find other NGS users in similar research areas etc.• The aim is to foster interaction between NGS users, enable collaboration and to encourage a sense of community between Users of the NGS services.• Community members can search the NGS user database using

key words such as software names, research topics etc. All user application cases are searchable.

• It is also possible to browse lists of users by research areas • http://www.ngs.ac.uk/Communities

User survey

• Carried out once a year• Entered into a draw to win one of 3 Amazon

vouchers• Advertised on widely• http://tiny.cc/NGSsurvey• Aims to find out how people use our services,

what benefits it has for them and how much they know about what we offer.

Frequency of NGS usage

Why use the NGS?

NGS service usage

NGS outreach awareness

To sum up

• Range of methods to foster community – online and offline methods

• Exploitation of methods to maximise publicity and communication with existing and potential users

• Variety of ways to gather feedback and for users to feedback to us directly

• Our users are pleased with the service we are offering

Gillian SinclairGillian.sinclair@manchester.ac.uk

Website – www.ngs.ac.ukFortnightly news bulletin – www.jiscmail.ac.uk/NGS-newsBlog – http://www.nationalgridservice.blogspot.com/