What is the OGSA-DAI project?

April 30, 2008 at 12:33 pm · Filed under collaboration, digital humanities, e-science, humanities computing

The aim of the OGSA-DAI project is to develop middleware to assist with access and integration of data from separate sources via the grid. The project was conceived by the UK Database Task Force and is working closely with the Open Grid Forum DAIS-WG. OGSA-DAI is funded as one of three OMII-UK sites which together aim to provide software and support to enable a sustained future for the UK e-Science community and its international collaborators. The project works closely with the Globus, ADMIRE, OMII-Europe, NextGRID, SIMDAT and BEinGRID teams to ensure the OGSA-DAI software works in a variety of grid environments (link to project).

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Visual Arts Data Service

April 28, 2008 at 10:45 am · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing

Students and academics looking for visual arts images now have online access to a stunning collection of over 100,000 images with the launch of www.vads.ac.uk. The website has been developed by VADS (the Visual Arts Data Service) which re-branded and re-launched itself earlier this month and contains collections as diverse as the National Inventory of Continental European Paintings, the Woolmark Company Archive, and the Central Saint Martins Museum and Study Collection.

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Old Bailey opens its unseen files

April 27, 2008 at 11:45 am · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing

The long arm of the law now stretches across time: from tomorrow, the transcripts of every trial heard at the Old Bailey from 1674 to 1913 can be read online, free of charge. The records of more than 210,000 criminal trials held from shortly after the Great Fire of London until just before the Great War, and the biographical details of around 3,000 men and women executed at Tyburn, are to be posted on the Old Bailey Proceedings website (oldbaileyonline.org).

Also see the citation for this work on ICTGuides. (link)

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Colleges, universities and the digital challenge

April 23, 2008 at 3:05 pm · Filed under web2.0

(From the Guardian Education Supplement)

Academic libraries are changing faster than at any time in their history. Information technology, online databases, and catalogues and digitised archives have put the library back at the heart of teaching, learning and academic research on campus.

This supplement starts with the expectations of young learners. The Google Generation Report, commissioned jointly by the British Library and the Joint Information Systems Committee (Jisc) - an independent, publicly-funded body supporting use of ICT in colleges and universities - found young people lacking in critical and analytical skills (link)

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Well, I’ll be googled

April 21, 2008 at 1:52 pm · Filed under gadfly, mobile

(This is from a Journalist friend on mine writing in the Melbourne Sun)

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,23562498-5000117,00.html

James Norman
April 19, 2008 12:00am

THERE comes a time when it is worth taking a step back
and reflecting on the depths of stupidity to which we
as a race are sinking.

I had such a moment of cynical epiphany recently when
I heard news from London that they have had to start
installing “texting-proof ” furniture in public
thoroughfares.

Read the rest of this entry »

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New on ICTGuides

April 18, 2008 at 3:46 pm · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing

ICT Guides is a service offered by the Centre for eResearch at King’s
College in London (CeRch). It seeks to promote the use of ICTs in
research and learning through cataloging digital arts and humanities
projects along with the tools and methods they employed.

A number of new projects have been added to ICT Guides:

Highlight:

Henry III Fine Rolls Project

” The Henry III Fine Rolls Project is a three year Resource Enhancement
project, commencing in April 2005 and funded by the Arts and Humanities
Research Council (AHRC). It aims to publish the Fine Rolls of Henry III
from 1216 down to 1248 in English calendar format, in both print and
electronic form. There is a fine roll for each of Henry III’s fifty-six
regnal years. Recording offers of money to the king for a multiplicity
of concessions and favours, they are of the first importance for the
study of political, governmental, legal, social, and economic history.
The Fine Rolls of Henry III from 1216 down to 1248 are being published
in both print and electronic form, including access to digital
facsimiles of the rolls.The print version will be published by Boydell &
Brewer. The electronic version appears on the project website and
provides free access to all those interested in this resource. A second
three year project also funded by the AHRC will complete publication
down to the end of the reign in 1272. . ”
See: http://ahds.ac.uk/ictguides/projects/project.jsp?projectId=926

**
Suggestions for new projects most welcome.

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Digital Darwin

April 17, 2008 at 12:46 pm · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing

90,000 new pages of work connected with Darwin have gone online for the first time. Guardian science correspondent James Randerson gives you a tour of the Darwin treasure trove (link)

Also see the ICT Guides entry for this project.

http://ahds.ac.uk/ictguides/projects/project.jsp?projectId=875

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What is the Southern Cross Resource Finder?

April 14, 2008 at 4:03 pm · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing

The Southern Cross Resource Finder (SCRF) is a web-based resource that enables users to discover collections from libraries, archives and museums which hold resources useful for the study of Australia and/or New Zealand. It has been produced by and is maintained by the Menzies Centre for Australian Studies, King’s College London and was produced by the Centre for Computing in the Humanities (link)

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Trans-Atlantic Digitisation Project

April 11, 2008 at 1:24 pm · Filed under digital humanities, humanities computing

A collaborative project between the Centre for Computing in the Humanities at King’s and New York University, is among the first to receive a new Transatlantic Digitization Collaboration Grant awarded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Joint Information Systems Committee (link).

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WWW2008

April 11, 2008 at 11:10 am · Filed under conferences

The World Wide Web Conference is a global event bringing together key researchers, innovators, decision-makers, technologists, businesses, and standards bodies working to shape the Web. Since its inception in 1994, the WWW conference has become the annual venue for international discussions and debate on the future evolution of the Web (link)

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Soap Box Project

April 11, 2008 at 10:43 am · Filed under deliberation, political communication, politics

This project led by Dr Sally Young at the University of Melbourne will be of interest to those who wish to understand the history of political advertising in Australia.

Politicians and members of the public would once stand atop a soapbox in order to shout their message across to an audience. Now they use a wide range of media including TV ads, social networking websites and all manner of radio and television appearances. This website will harness a range of materials ─ including photographs, texts of speeches, transcripts of debates and political ads ─ to allow visitors to see (and assess) how Australian political actors communicate.

Election campaigns are usually focused on the short-term – the hectic 3 to 6 weeks of the formal election campaign. This website instead allows you to see elections as a continuum; to look back over time to see what the parties and their leaders have said (and promised) in the past. The website includes material dating back over a hundred years so that visitors can recall recent campaigns or compare current events with historical ones (link).

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The Desmond Tutu Digital Archive

April 9, 2008 at 11:14 am · Filed under digital humanities, e-science, eresearch, history

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JISC Conference 2008: Enabling innovation

April 9, 2008 at 11:03 am · Filed under digital humanities, e-science, events, humanities computing, internet

Start date: 15 April 2008 09:00

End date: 15 April 2008 16:00

Venue: International Convention Centre, Birmingham

Follow the conference online

If you’re not attending the conference, you can follow what’s happening on the day (15 April) with:

• Live video-streaming⁵ of the opening and closing keynote speeches
• Conference social networking site⁶ so you can network online
• Micro-blogging of the parallel sessions (Twitter) conference tag: jiscconference08
• Live image sharing of the conference day (Flickr)
• Podcasts of interviews and recordings of parallel sessions

Plus, after the conference there will be:

• Screencasts of parallel session presentations (PowerPoint and audio – Slideshare)
• Videos of some of the more popular parallel sessions

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Vacancy: Centre for eResearch at King’s College London

April 8, 2008 at 4:51 pm · Filed under eresearch

King’s College London is undertaking the development of a pervasive
e-environment supporting the creation, use, sharing and preservation of
information and knowledge across the College, to enhance research, teaching
and administration. As part of this programme, King’s has established the
Centre for e-Research (CeRch). The Centre will play a leading role in
producing the overall architecture for this environment, with a view to
implementing a coherent, service-based ICT infrastructure that encompasses
the programme delivery areas.
A key component of this infrastructure will be support for the curation and
management of a diversity of large and complex digital materials arising
from the research process, using data grids and digital repositories among
other technologies. The Centre is seeking to appoint a full-time Software
Developer, who will work within a small technical team, designing and
developing enhancements to the iRODS data grid middleware, which was
developed at the San Diego Supercomputer Center as the successor to the
widely used Storage Resource Broker (SRB) . The work will be carried out as
part of the JISC-funded ASPiS project, on which the Centre is working in
collaboration with the Science and Technology Facilities Council . The aim
of the project is: (i) to enhance the access management functionality
provided by iRODS by integrating iRODS with Shibboleth ; (ii) to specify,
implement and integrate software for capturing provenance metadata in iRODS
data grids.

The ideal candidate will be a graduate with a relevant degree or equivalent
(either computing science or with significant IT component). You must be
thorough and methodical, able to work independently to tight deadlines, and
have experience of planning and working in teams.

Demonstrably good programming and problem-solving skills and the ability to
produce properly documented maintainable code are essential, as is a
knowledge the following technologies: C or C++ (iRODS is written in C); grid
middleware (especially data grids); distributed systems; access management
(especially Shibboleth); scripting languages (e.g. Python, Unix shell
script); open source development tools (e.g. Eclipse).

For further details and an application pack please visit

http://www.kcl.ac.uk/depsta/pertra/vacancy/external/pers_detail.php?jobindex
=6642

The postduration will be initially until 31st May 2009.

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Is writing this blog killing me?

April 7, 2008 at 2:22 pm · Filed under blogs, web2.0

The New York Times reports that two men were so obsessed with internet activity, their health was fatally damaged (Link)

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