| This workshop is designed to provide ecologists,
biologists, and data managers hands-on experience with some of the new
ecoinformatics tools being created under the Knowledge
Network for Biocomplexity Project. Participants will learn how to
use Morpho, Ecological Metadata Language (EML), and Metacat and apply
these to managing ecological data at field and research stations across
the country. Additionally participants will be asked to provide feedback
on the software tools to guide further development.
Venue
National Center
for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS), UCSB, Santa Barbara,
CA.
September 28-30, 2004
Audience
Ecologists, Biologists, Data Managers
Workshop Objectives
Provide hands-on training and evaluation of data
management technologies produced by the KNB project
Participant Objectives
By the end of the course, the participants will:
- Demonstrate knowledge about Morpho, EML, and
Metacat
- Demonstrate ability to use Morpho, EML, and Metacat
in archiving and discovering data.
- Provide feedback and evaluation of Morpho, EML,
and Metacat.
Format
A three day workshop consisting of presentations
and hands-on demonstration for each ecoinformatic tool: Morpho, EML,
and Metacat, including time for focus group discussions on the design,
use, prospective implementation, and evaluation of each tool. (See Attached
Agenda)
Preparation
Each participant should come to the workshop with
at least three data sets in hand, either on a disk or accessible from
the network, and with sufficient knowledge of those data to fully document
them. This knowledge should include the number and content of the data
tables, a detailed description of each variable (attribute) in each
data table, and basic descriptive information about why, when, where,
and how the data were collected. During the workshop these data sets
will be used in both the Morpho and Metacat hands-on sessions. When
you leave the workshop, participants will have fully documented these
data using EML and stored them in the KNB Metacat using Morpho.
In addition, participants should read and understand
the following materials before arriving at the workshop:
Prerequisites
A basic knowledge of data management practices is
useful for the workshop but not required. The Metacat activity may involve
some basic script writing in Perl, so a basic understanding of Perl
would be useful as well, but is not required.
How to participate
Interested people should fill out the registration
form below completely. We will select between 20-30 participants
depending on available funds. Participants that are selected will be
reimbursed for airfare to the workshop and lodging and per diem costs
during the workshop.
Sponsors
This training workshop is sponsored by:
Knowledge Network for Biocomplexity
Science Environment for Ecological
Knowledge |
nceas.ucsb.edu