[NeXus-committee] RDA workshop on cloud servers, April 3-4, 2017

[Osborn, Raymond]

Hi everyone,
As I mentioned in the last telco, there will be a workshop at the Alba Synchrotron, Spain, from April 3 to 4, 2017, to discuss the development of standards for cloud servers for neutron and x-ray scattering data. The URL is at https://indico.cells.es/indico/event/97. It is officially being convened by the RDA Photon and Neutron Sciences Interest Group as a satellite workshop to the next plenary meeting of the Research Data Alliance in Barcelona, on April 5-7 (https://www.rd-alliance.org/plenaries/rda-ninth-plenary-meeting-barcelona).  Brian Matthews, Frank Schluenzen and I are co-chairs, and Thomas Proffen and Andy Götz were involved in setting this up . 

I think it would be useful to have some representation from others in the NeXus committee. I believe that cloud servers would be most useful if they provided access to files in a well-documented standard format with rich metadata, and obviously NeXus meets that criterion, so your support would ensure that view is heard. There was also a push to have additional items added to the workshop goals, including one on “Controlled Vocabulary”, which I think is a reference to RDA standards for, e.g., referencing facilities and instruments, that NeXus may need to be aware of. Since this meeting will attempt to lay the basis for a remote data access standard, it is potentially of interest to all facilities and scattering scientists.

Please let me know if you are interested in attending. 

Happy New Year,
Ray
-- 
Ray Osborn, Senior Scientist
Materials Science Division
Argonne National Laboratory
Argonne, IL 60439, USA
Phone: +1 (630) 252-9011
Email: ROsborn at anl.gov