[Go-essp-tech] Still confused on CMIP5 support procedures

Wed Nov 30 02:34:02 MST 2011

Hi Sylvia,

I will answer your specific points first then explain more about how CMIP5 support has evolved thus far and what more needs to be done.  Also for an overview of the system see http://esgf.org/wiki/CMIP5HelpDeskGuide

> * Who are on the CMIP5_helpdesk and/or esg_support mailing lists? (e.g. who sees the issues affecting the federation)?
2-3 representatives from each core CMIP5 Gateway (PCMDI, DKRZ, BADC) plus key ESG developers and Gateway contacts are currently registered with CMIP5-HelpDesk.  I add people as required and could add you to the system if you wish; just ask.  However, anyone can be CC'd on email being tracked by the system so when we are addressing a query that, for instance, is specific to Curator trackback we could just include you in the email thread.

> * How are support requests farmed out? Would whomever is monitoring CMIP5_help know to send metadata related questions my way?
Incoming queries that aren't picked up by ESG/CMIP5 specialists are assigned to appropriate people by 2 members of BADC who specialise in query triage.  They have documented rules as to who should receive which sort of query (see the CMIP5HelpDeskGuide) and are learning by doing.  If in doubt they pass it to me and I allocate it so the most appropriate person.

> * Can subgroups of support be created such that 3-4 people can be responsible for a topic?
Yes and we have started doing this.  Rules can be created to automatically assign certain query types to certain people.  So far the boundaries haven't been particularly clear.  E.g. a data download failure may be the result of authorisation failure that could span multiple sites or be because of missing data.

> * How do we know that requests have been answered?  Is there tracking at all?
All queries are recorded in the web application.  There are extensive search and report facilities.  It's not the prettiest or fasted app in the world but it does the job.  We currently have
> * I am not sure users are finding these support avenues.  The links to the two mailing lists are listed under "contact us", vice "help" or
> "support".   Sometimes that kind of subtle difference can be a big difference.   Case in point: the user I dealt with did not know where to go and > obviously Eric did not either.
This is the term the Gateway codebase uses and could be changed quite easily if it would make a difference.  We are dealing with about 30 queries a week at present so some people are finding us.  We have closed 325 queries since April.

One problem is that CMIP5-HelpDesk is not trying to deal with all ESG queries.  Notably NCAR's Gateway gets plenty of queries not related to CMIP5 therefore their Gateway has to point people to esg_support as well as CMIP5-HelpDesk.  Also PCMDI are yet to change their default "contact us" page to point to CMIP5-HelpDesk despite being asked to do so several times.  As a result I forward many queries from esg_support to CMIP5-HelpDesk.

Footprints is a system designed to track private email correspondence between 2 or more people.  Therefore it is well suited for some support tasks but not others.  I would say we are just about keeping up at the moment but the system is far from ideal.  Several of us are spending too much time answering repeated queries that would be better answered by a FAQ or similar.

We clearly need better public channels for supporting CMIP5 and in August I proposed a Q&A-style web application to address this but it was judged too open.  Similarly Wiki pages such as the CMIP5 Help Desk FAQ maintained by Mike Ganzburger [1]  haven't caught on as yet.  So far we haven't found the right balance between public and private, between dynamic and static and between user-centric and developer-centric information.

I have been discussing this with others recently and expect a new approach to emerge shortly.
Cheers,
Stephen.

[1] http://esgf.org/wiki/CMIP5HelpDeskFAQ

---
Stephen Pascoe  +44 (0)1235 445980
Centre of Environmental Data Archival
STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Harwell Oxford, Didcot OX11 0QX, UK

From: go-essp-tech-bounces at ucar.edu [mailto:go-essp-tech-bounces at ucar.edu] On Behalf Of Sylvia Murphy
Sent: 29 November 2011 19:48
To: go-essp-tech at ucar.edu; Metafor List
Subject: [Go-essp-tech] Still confused on CMIP5 support procedures

Hi Everyone,

Last week I was copied on an email that came from Eric Guilyardi of Metafor who received a query from a user about CMIP5 model metadata.    I ended up emailing the person directly to answer their question.   I was rightly reminded that such offline assistance does not help the community be aware of issues affecting the federation.   This made me realize how unclear I am on how CMIP5 support is currently working.  So I have some questions.

* Who are on the CMIP5_helpdesk and/or esg_support mailing lists? (e.g. who sees the issues affecting the federation)?
* How are support requests farmed out? Would whomever is monitoring CMIP5_help know to send metadata related questions my way?
* Can subgroups of support be created such that 3-4 people can be responsible for a topic?
* How do we know that requests have been answered?  Is there tracking at all?
* I am not sure users are finding these support avenues.  The links to the two mailing lists are listed under "contact us", vice "help" or "support".   Sometimes that kind of subtle difference can be a big difference.   Case in point: the user I dealt with did not know where to go and obviously Eric did not either.

Cheers,
Sylvia
***********************************
Sylvia Murphy
NESII/CIRES/NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory
325 Broadway, Boulder CO 80305
Email: sylvia.murphy at noaa.gov<mailto:sylvia.murphy at noaa.gov>
Phone: 303-497-7753
Fax: 303-497-7649

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