sgci all-hands-9-16-16

A Science Gateways Community Institute

Nancy Wilkins-‐Diehr, San Diego Supercomputer CenterMaytal Dahan, Texas Advanced Computing CenterLinda Hayden, Elizabeth City State UniversityKatherine Lawrence, University of MichiganMarlon Pierce, Indiana UniversityMichael Zentner, Purdue University

science gateway /sī′ əәns gāt′ wā′/ n. 1. an online community space for science and engineering research and education.

2. a Web-based resource for accessing data, software, computing services, and equipment specific to the needs of a science or engineering discipline.

NSF Division of Advanced Cyberinfrastructure (ACI) invests in software through SI2 program

First two Software Institutes awardedAug 1, 2016.

Science Gateways Community Institute Awarded$3M/year, 5 yr + 5 optional renewal

A successful gateway institute will provide leadership to– 1) bring science gateway developers together with each other and with the developers and operators of existing and potential cyberinfrastructure elements that science gateways integrate and enable the use of• in order to promote the efficient, effective, and sustainable development of scientific web and mobile interfaces

– 2) educate developers and the next generation of investigators to effectively use the gateway software ecosystem to solve real research problems; and

– 3) educate the next generation of researchers to enable them to create the software cyberinfrastructure required to both advance fundamental understanding of science gateways and enable researchers to address the grand challenge problems of the future

People, organizations,& communities

Software

Data

Scientific Instruments Computational

Resources

Networking & Cybersecurity

HYPOTHESIZE

EXPERIMENTANALYZE

THEORIZE

OBSERVE

AcceleratingScientificDiscovery

Science gateways connect these

• Studies show that gateway developers typically– work in isolation– must bridge to variety of resources

– need building blocks in order to focus on higher-‐level functionality

– struggle to secure sustainable funding

But we’ve observed challengesIsolated development limits both research and cost effectiveness

Early adopters

Publicity

Wider adoption

Funding ends

Scientists disillusioned

New project

prototype

Specialized Resources PercentData collections 75%Data analysis tools, including visualization and mining 72%Computational tools 72%Tools for rapidly publishing and/or finding articles and data specific to my domain 69%

Educational tools 67%

Platforms for fostering group or community collaboration 63%

Simplified interfaces that eliminate the need to learn coding 62%

Citizen science and other public engagement resources 47%Workflows that automate or capture tasks or processes 42%

Scientific instruments, such as telescopes, microscopes, or sensors 39%

5000-respondent survey of NSF PIs and Academic CIO/CTOs88% indicate Web-based applications are important to their work

n=4,004, or 88% of 4,538 researcher/educators. Percentage indicates these resources are “somewhat” or “very” important to their work.

57% played some role in gateway creationand these gateways were used for a variety of purposes

n of application types=7,805, by 2,756 creators (out of 2,819); mean=2.8 application types per application creator

34% 36%

20%17%

31%26%

42%

16%

30%

18%

45% 44%

14% 15%

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

45%

50%

UsabilityConsultant

GraphicDesigner

CommunityLiaison/Evangelist

ProjectManager

ProfessionalSoftwareDeveloper

SecurityExpert

QualityAssuranceand Testing

Expert

Wished we had thisYes, we had this

Well-designed gateways require a variety of expertise

n=2,756 respondents or 98% of application creators

Interest in Institute services is high:A sampling of survey responses and associated areas

Proposed Service%

Interest IncubatorExtended Support

Software Framework

Workforce Development

Evaluation, impact analysis, website analytics 72%

Adapting technologies 67%

Web/visual/graphic design 67%

Choosing technologies 66%

Usability Services 66%

Developing open-‐source software 64%

Support for education 64%

Keeping your project running 62%

Legal perspectives 61%

Managing data 60%

Cybersecurity consultation 57%

Website construction 57%

n=2,153, or 76% of 2,819 application creators indicating that they would seek at least some help from a service provider

Community Engagement ties everything together

• Diverse expertise on demand

• Longer term support engagements

• Software and visibility for gateways

• Information exchange in a community environment

• Student opportunities and more stable career paths

SGCI designed to help build more robust, cost-effective, usable gateways for science

Incubator ServiceExpertise for the gateway lifecycle

Technology Planning• Choosing technologies• Cybersecurity• Software engineering• Interfaces to compute and data

• Business model development• Financial planning• Project management• Software licensing• Staff and sustainability planning

Business Planning

Experts You Could Not Otherwise AffordSecurity• Center for Trustworthy Scientific Cyberinfrastructure

Sustainability • Nancy Maron, creator of the ITHAKA S+R course on Sustaining Digital Resources

Evaluation & Impact Measurement• Ann Zimmerman ConsultingInternal Resource Development• Notre Dame’s campus gateway task force

Client Interaction Planning• Usability studies• Web/visual/graphic design• Impact measurement• Community engagement• Support for education

Common Experiences• Training sessions• Group interactionsContinuing Engagement• Customized structure, content, goals• Mentoring• Pay It Forward

A Framework for Decision Making

Network / Cohort Formation

An Ongoing Dispassionate Ear

Extended Developer Support

Focus• Front-‐end development • Gateways using all types of CI• Both sides give 2-‐month to 1-‐year commitment• Well-‐defined engagements with work plans• Technology agnostic Mission

• Bring new gateways into existence• Adapt existing gateways to new resources and technologies• Provide “burst” support to help gateways with smaller issues

Dedicated SGCI staff work directly with clients to build and enhance gateways

Benefits• Reinforce Incubator lessons• Develop deep understanding of community needs that feed into other Institute areas• Capture and document support efforts for scalability• Hands-‐on opportunities for student participants

Data

Instruments

Analysis Tools

Workflows Sensors

Computation

Collaboration

Education

Airavata

AGAVE

And more…Galaxy

HUBzero

Jupyter

Scientific Software CollaborativeLeveraging existing investments in gateway technologiesGive developers a single destination for gateway software, services and resources to easily build, maintain and manage science gateways.• Create more gateways to advance scientific discovery, by making them easier to build • Create more researchers using gateways by increasing awareness and number of gateways• Enable NSF projects to integrate into the software institute and promote their products

End-‐to-‐End Solutions• Serve a diverse set of scientific domains• Out-‐of-‐the-‐box gateway solution that can be customized• Based on Docker – executable images that are the skeleton for a secure and functioning gateway• Portable and reproducible• Community-‐contributed • API integration

• Variety of services• Information• Security• Execution• Data• Event• Accounting

• Hosting opportunity

“Use-‐what-‐you-‐need”

Gateway Discovery• Open registry• Promotes use of existing science gateways• Community-‐contributed• Admin approval• Automated cleanup

Software Integration & Community Contribution• Docking mechanisms for community-‐contributed software, including NSF SI2• Incorporate community standards

Engage Other Areas of Institute• Support projects leverage Framework components• Framework evolves as a result of gateway engagements• Community outreach

Software Marketplace for Science Gateways

Community Engagement and ExchangeKey to a successful instituteGathering place for scientific web developers across NSF directorates, federal agencies, and international boundaries

– Community members are eager to connect

Website Activities• Discussion forums• Gateway showcase with case studies• Symposium series• News: media coverage, related happenings, academic publications, job openings, events calendar• Curated blog with guest authors, • Professional development: synchronous and asynchronous training• Capture client/user feedback on web and through other areas

• Tutorials and workshops• Paper presentations• Invited keynotes and panels• Interactive elements: Open Space, poster session• Travel support for students and campus IT staff

Builds on 10 years of experience with GCE and IWSG series

Annual Conference

Campus Gateway Groups• Task force builds campus-‐based expertise• Channel for scaling institute services

Outreach to Complementary NSF Initiatives• NSF SI2 projects• Large NSF projects• Science and Technology Centers• Engineering Research Centers • MolSSI software institute collaboration

Providing Financial Support• Enabling students learning gateway skills

• Including internship experiences

Integrating Gateways into Course Content• Providing broader access to high-‐end resources

Workforce Development: Keep the best and the brightest in the sciences

Promoting Gateway-‐Related Career Paths

• Campus opportunities• Job boards

Partners

National Organization for the Professional Advancement of Black Chemists and

Chemical Engineers (NOBCChE)

Association of Computer/ Information Sciences and Engineering Departments at

Minority Institutions (ADMI)

Molecular Science Software Institute

Google Summer of Code (GSoC)

Establishing Center for Training and Education at ECSU• Vigorous schedule of on-‐site and virtual training• Development of training and course curricula about science gateways technologies

SGCI Institute Areas

4 Focal Areas • Student-‐related

conference programs

Several gating events for SGCI• 60-‐month project divided into design and execution phase

– High priority for NSF, lots of oversight– We are trying to make reporting as seamless as possible

• 18-‐month design phase– Monthly reports, calls with NSF– Major review at 21 months that determines whether we move

forward• Execution phase

– Quarterly reports, calls with NSF– 30-‐month comprehensive review– 42-‐month renewal review

• Determines whether we move forward uncompeted for an additional 5 years

Institute Organization

Principal Investigator/ Project Director

Nancy Wilkins-Diehr, UCSD

Incubator

Michael Zentner, Purdue

Staff Consultants

Extended Developer Support

Marlon Pierce, Indiana U.

Staff

Scientific Software

CollaborativeMaytal Dahan,

TACC

Staff

Community Engagement & Exchange

Katherine Lawrence, U. of Michigan

Campus Gateway Group Task Force

Sandra Gesing, Notre Dame

Workforce Development

Linda Hayden, ECSU

Staff

Steering Committee

Nancy MaronAnn Zimmerman

CTSCNotre Dame

More detailed accountability chart with all staff at https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1fVDEirJhJXWUFJJieMM-‐oQK7K-‐wPyVxJvnNFvmeDuJ0/

What’s unique about SGCI?• Services based on community needs

– Learning and adapting as we go• Core values

– Autonomous excellence (aka high-‐quality follow through)– Enthusiastic– Thirst for knowledge– Service orientation “when others succeed you succeed”

• Core focus– Connecting people and resources to accelerate discovery by empowering the

science gateway community• Core processes

– How we do things– Repeatable, high quality, follow through

• Entrepreneurial Operating System – Lightweight management structure– Based on the book Traction by Gino Wickman– Focus on 90-‐day “Rocks” to achieve longer term goals

• Staffing– Several areas hiring or

identifying staff• Incubator

– Training materials outlined• Extended Developer Support

– Workplans drafted– Request process operational– Begin reaching out to

customers• Scientific Software

Collaborative– Helping with IT implementation

• Trello, JIRA, CRM– Requirements analysis for

gateway listing• List of ~200 ready to go

• Community Engagement and Exchange– Plan first annual conference– Reach out to mailing list and

website contacts– Website development

• Active postings, guest blogs, calendar of gateway-‐related events

• Workforce Development– Professional development seminars

for NOBCChE and ADMI – SGCI conference student support– GSoC application

• Management– Project Execution Plan

• Due 10/31– Financial and reporting processes– Steering Committee engagement

What are our first priorities?90-day “Rocks”

Staff materials in progress• Google docs area being developed– Org chart/contact list, project processes, 90-‐day Rocks

• All existing staff subscribed to appropriate lists– sgci-‐[email protected]– sgci-‐[email protected]– sgci-‐[email protected]– sgci-‐[email protected]– sgci-‐[email protected]– sgci-‐[email protected]– sgci-‐[email protected]

Vision for success• Science gateways form a vibrant community– Inter-‐agency, international, collegial

• Creating gateways is easier– Created with more thoughtfulness, so they are more sustainable

• Gateway developers have stable career paths– More efficient environments on campuses

• Students are excited to stay in the sciences• All of this benefits research• You all are a key to this success

What’s next?• Interest is high! – We have lots of work to do to follow up

• Gateways 2016– Nov 2-‐3 in San Diego

• Area leads will begin organizing meetings and laying out plans

• Links sent in welcome email– NSF Solicitation– Accountability chart– http://www.sciencegateways.org/services– Project vision

Questions?