Re: Request for discussion: Is our Sprint more of a Mini-DebConf? What to have next?
Dear Steffen,
sorry for my late reply -- I have been busy last week with both work and
RL and also had to think a little about your suggestions.
[...]
>> FYI as a side note: I have reached out to informatics people here at
>> Sanger during the regular campus-wide Informatics Group Meetings by
>> giving a brief talk about Debian Med and the history of the sprints and
>> also trying to get an idea of who would support such an event in-house.
>> In the discussion afterwards indeed some upstream developers agreed that
>> this would be a good idea and would benefit the institute. However,
>> there was little initiative from any particular group to approach me
>> afterwards and find out how to make it work together; it was merely
>> suggested to contact the Genome Campus conference centre (which might be
>> on the more expensive side compared to our previous venues).
>> I can try to poke some people to bring the topic back to the table.
>
> Fantastic campus, fantastic people, just that carp-loaded bit of water does
> not really qualify.
I completely agree with your view, and also I agree that water from
above doesn't count either ;)
> Why don't you start a second theme and have it during the summer, one
> that could more easily then start migrating abroad. It could for
> instance be "attached to upstream" both in the sense of data
> providers and possibly a conference for those traveling from far?
TBH I am not really comfortable being the driver behind the 'second
theme' meetings you are proposing. If I understand your proposal
correctly, you are envisioning these to be mainly about potential
applications, and how these may benefit the local upstreams as well as
the rest of the biomedical and genomics research community. I agree that
this is a good idea and that having an event on campus can be a great
opportunity for networking and community engagement in this regard.
However, I would also like to state that I do not see myself as the best
person to come up with concrete topics, plans and things to address as
I, simply put, may not have the necessary visions for future research or
application development that you definitely have. I am also not very
involved in the data to be processed, nor would I consider the research
side of these applications to be something I would like to get more into.
> Also "automate big clinical chemical data" (ABCCD) comes to mind :o)
Maybe it does to you ;) But I have absolutely no exposure to clinical
research at all so I'm afraid I can't comment on how much of a 'hot
topic' that may be.
[...]
>> If the number of participants supports this, maybe some pre-allocated
>> time for custom break-out sessions, to allow for some in-depth mentoring
>> or bug squashing without missing group discussions or talks?
>> What do you think?
> Most of us seem to be professional bioinformaticians. If we want to do
> bug squashing we can basically do that any time via skype and github.
While this may be true in some (most?) instances, my experience was that
the previous Debian Med meetings have always helped me a lot to learn
certain things through direct interaction with people who have been
doing the task at hand for a long time. In that regard IMHO nothing
beats face-to-face meetings, and I felt this was confirmed when working
with one of the participants at the meeting in Copenhagen earlier this year.
What I originally meant, and would probably make me most happy would be
to see enough variety in these meetings to suit both groups: those who
attend these meetings for high-level discussions and moving the research
community forward using Debian as one tool among many, as well as those
who are more interested in getting their hands dirty with the
Debian-specific bits, as one would probably have in a more traditional
sprint.
As you might have guessed, I would consider myself well within the
latter group.
> I sense particular value in learning whom to actively contact for help when
> something is difficult to track down if this is not upstream. It would be
> very nice for all the infrastructure bits, though, especially for the CI
> additions that you in particular I have seen to contribute much for.
I'm not sure I understand what you mean here. I agree that close
upstream connections are good, but I don't get the exact situation you
may be thinking of.
> What if what you referred to as "bug squashing" we apply on data
> processing, i.e. workflows for best biological insights? Particularly
> for a large data site like yours it may be very nice to have
> something intertwining Debian with CWL for education, documentation
> and production.
As already said, I agree in principle but do not feel like someone who
is involved enough on the level of 'biological insights' to be of much
help here.
Please don't get me wrong -- I would be more than happy working to make
a Debian Med meeting possible here on Campus. I have discussed a
potential procedure with my colleagues here, and their take is that if
we can work out a more detailed list of requirements (amount of
participants, budget/external support, accommodation requirements,
_agenda_, ...) we could promote the idea with the Right People^tm,
trying another time to get support from Sanger and/or EBI in the form of
meeting rooms and accommodation. Surely that would need to be planned
well ahead of time, so this summer is most likely too soon.
Inviting and involving local developers would be only natural and surely
a condition for campus support. Having spoken to some of my colleagues,
they also think a more Debian-focused hands-on event would be well accepted.
If you think it would be helpful to discuss this a bit more I would also
always be up for a call.
Best
Sascha
--
The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute is operated by Genome Research
Limited, a charity registered in England with number 1021457 and a
company registered in England with number 2742969, whose registered
office is 215 Euston Road, London, NW1 2BE.
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