[open-science] Organising an open data event at SWAT4LS Workshop (London, December 2011)

Wed May 4 10:11:00 UTC 2011

Dear All

Some more info from Andrea, who is organising the conference. I sent him
brief details of our proposals. His ideas (full email further down):

I'm thinking about planning two days before the workshop. We already have
some tutorial proposed, but I think it would be good to have as well a more
informal "hackathon-like" space.
Just as an example:
we could have:
Wednesday: hackathons
Thursday: Tutorial + evening/discussion/panel on open data in science
Friday: Workshop, where some results from the hackathon can be presented in
the poster/demo session.
Last year the hackathon experience was capped to 20pp and it was
interesting, but a bit disorganized. It ended up being a big tutorial.
The problem with setting a topic too tightly is that participants may come
from different backgrounds and it's hard to find a common focus.
I can probably gather a few people interested in pathways information,
though.
Another option would be to have a more loose setting where we have some open
data/semantic web "clinics".
Yet another idea could be to have a tutorial on the use of CKAN technologies
for Life Sciences.

Would anyone be willing to join a Skype discussion about this if we can find
a time when Andrea is free? Peter, maybe you would be a good person to
discuss how to run a hackathon for people with diverse interests?

Jenny

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Andrea Splendiani <andrea.splendiani at bbsrc.ac.uk>
Date: Mon, May 2, 2011 at 9:02 PM
Subject: Re: Open Data in Science at SWAT4LS
To: Jenny Molloy <jenny.molloy at okfn.org>

Dear Jenny,

let me explain better my situation.
I'm going to organize a workshop on Semantic Web applications for the Life
Sciences in London this year (late november, beginning of december).
The workshop is at its 4th edition and so far it has been pretty successful.
Up to last year, it consisted of a one day workshop with a traditional
academic style: presentations of peer-reviewed papers, keynotes, panel,
poster/demo session, and a special issue associated in an international
journal.
In the past edition in Berlin, we have added to the 1 day workshop 2 days of
tutorials and hackathon-like events (see the link to the 2010 edition from
the swat4ls.org website).
The workshop itself has been on sound basis so far (we had 50 submissions
for a 1 day workshop last year), it will likely run on Friday and follow a
traditional pattern.
I'm thinking about planning two days before the workshop. We already have
some tutorial proposed, but I think it would be good to have as well a more
informal "hackathon-like" space.
Just as an example:
we could have:
Wednesday: hackathons
Thursday: Tutorial + evening/discussion/panel on open data in science
Friday: Workshop, where some results from the hackathon can be presented in
the poster/demo session.
Last year the hackathon experience was capped to 20pp and it was
interesting, but a bit disorganized. It ended up being a big tutorial.
The problem with setting a topic too tightly is that participants may come
from different backgrounds and it's hard to find a common focus.
I can probably gather a few people interested in pathways information,
though.
Another option would be to have a more loose setting where we have some open
data/semantic web "clinics".
Yet another idea could be to have a tutorial on the use of CKAN technologies
for Life Sciences.

How do these ideas sound ? Perhaps we can catch-up on Skype and discuss it a
bit.

>From a practical point of view, we charge participants, though not for
profit. Last year hackathon registration was just 20EUR to cover basic
costs. Should we find sponsors, we can make the event open.
At the moment the practical details of the organization are a bit confused,
as we have a major player from US which was interested in co-organizing, but
it's clear anymore. I'm holding for the time being both ULU and Welcome
Trust Collection sites. Hackathon would be more likely in the former (or
perhaps even in some university in London).

ciao,
Andrea

 Il giorno 02/mag/2011, alle ore 00.14, Jenny Molloy ha scritto:
- Hide quoted text -

Dear Andrea

Thank you for contacting the OKF regarding running an open data event in
conjunction with the SWAT4LS conference in December. Your email was
forwarded to the Open Data in Science working group and there are several
members who are keen to organise something.

In terms of the type of event, you mentioned either a workshop or an evening
event in your email. We would be keen to organise both, with an open data
hack day followed by a presentation of the work from the day and some
speakers, if that sounds good to you.

Some of the topics that came up on the list were:
Open Research Mapping of malaria research to form a figurative and literal
map of open research/data including timelines, geolocation, citation links,
etc.
Building an open data toolkit such as guides, publicity materials to raise
people’s awareness of the importance of open data.

The idea is for this to be a practical workshop, where people will learn
about the issues surrounding open data while creating something useful for
the scientific community. In addition, people who want help with specific
open data questions will be working alongside those who are likely to be
able to answer them.

We'd be very keen to hear your views!

Best wishes

Jenny Molloy

OKF Open Data in Science Working Group Coordinator
Email: jenny.molloy at okfn.org
Skype: jcmcoppice12

 Andrea Splendiani
Senior Bioinformatics Scientist
Centre for Mathematical and Computational Biology
+44(0)1582 763133 ext 2004
andrea.splendiani at bbsrc.ac.uk

On Fri, Apr 29, 2011 at 12:56 AM, Peter Murray-Rust <pm286 at cam.ac.uk> wrote:

> It will certainly work, if we prepare the ground. Ben has explored the
> malaria open papers and I think this is a very good starting point for
> several different reasons...
> * it's feasible, there's a critical mass of information available. The term
> "malaria" is much more precise than some other medical terms so
> preision/recall is good
> * it's a global challenge and inclusive. We could do some really valuable
> OSM stuff
> * everyone has heard of it
> * there's a chance that it could link up to other funded efforts (e.g. Mat
> Todd's Open Drug initiative)
>
> To prepare we need to get a critical group of us physically together and
> prepare some working material. Ben's stuff is a really good start and should
> act to bring people in for later hackfests. For the main event we already
> need an infrastructure that people can add to - hackfests are not always
> good at creating a viable infrastructure. We need something with the feel of
> OSM mapping parties where the vision has been implemented in part and
> volunteers can easily add to it.
>
>
> --
> Peter Murray-Rust
> Reader in Molecular Informatics
> Unilever Centre, Dep. Of Chemistry
> University of Cambridge
> CB2 1EW, UK
> +44-1223-763069
>
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