Based on this and interactions I have been having here, is a task list that I anticipate for the next two months. I have tried to put the ones that are time bound and needing my own inputs upfront. This is a bit long - just scan it for now - esp for what is relevant to you.
1. Book on El Nino, Climate Variability, etc. for the Tropics (Deepashika, Ruchira, Shafna, Z) March 31.
World Scientific came back and now say that if we submit by end March they shall try to publish under the Imperial College Press imprint - so we lost a couple of weeks - but we did do some useful stuff. I need a deadline .
So we may re-order priorities a bit. Shall work with Deepashika and Zeena on trying to organize our work.
I shall request a few more folks to join in as this is going to be tough to do. But ultimately, this is an all-hands first priority effort.
Next Step - Make a work plan with D and Z
2. Papers (PA, SS, Z)
We shall continue with the paper submissions.
We may reorder the papers to so that it does double duty.
Next steps -
- Dengue MV submission - SS
- LZ to check PA content on CC - give input
- LZ to decide on El Nino related papers - MV / MJO / Temp, etc. - Send draft
- SS and LZ to iterate on Dengue submission
- LZ - Look into a Climate Services paper
- LZ - Climate Communication
3. Knowledge Management
a. Metadata on Files / Books / Journal Articles (NS, DS, RZ, Z)
at the office should be easily accessible and searchable - need this for above as well.
b. Make access to our information resources more friendly (RZ, Z, DS,NS )
c. Make software / CD maps / posters resources accessible (JV)
d. Implement a Document portal (JV)
e. Metadata on Files / Books / Journal Articles in NYC (LZ)
f. Endnote software installation and databases for different topics (JV, LZ and all those working on Book, if not papers)
Next steps - many folks above know already.
4. Proposals - 3-4 proposals are in the pipeline (Z, et al. )
a - The PEER 2015 on climate and water - deadline is April 15 if we get preproposals approved by end of Feb - so I may to do this after April 1. But maybe Z can quarterback the work before that. Relevant papers including the WR in system H work could be worked on.
b - Last El Nino for NSF + etc (LZ)
c - USAID call for NGO's - Deepashika and LZ may mentor Newsview as time permits
Next steps - LZ write to NSF program manager with concept
5. Maldives FECT registration: (Z / RZ / AA are involved)
(Feb and April 2015)
We have been making episodic attempts to register FECT in the Maldives in about 6 visits starting in 2012. But its got caught with the turbulence there. We started the registration in Comoros much later and we have FECT-Afrique already registered.
Afaaf is going to try to give it a shot so lets see. She is also taking some of the poster books to Rasheed, Mizna / Hudha / Mustapha. She shall also try to find data in Maldives - She is in touch with Prof. Wickramagamage and could collaborate through him.
Next steps - monitor AA progress starting today.
6. Contributions to Univ of Colorado project on Current El Nino Impacts in SL and maybe MV (Z, PA) immediate and March 13/14)
This helps with the book project.
Mickey Glantz (http://www.ccb-boulder.org/) who is running a project on this has asked for our input - a workshop in bangkok on march 13/14 - someone has to go for that - shall be tough for me to go - given workload.
Next steps - LZ has to respond and send various requests from Mickey to Z
7. PEER project outputs
- Pinga Oya Book (Deepashika has provided 2nd draft to Newsview)
- Video of MV WSC workshop ( to be uploaded to html similar to what IUCN did
- Sri Lanka Environment Day
8. Operational Work (PA, AK, RL, JV)
- Weekly report,
- annual reports
- Social Media - for sL and MV
- Maybe Climate Services paper
- maybe newspaper articles
- SL El Nino
- MV El Nino
- SL 2015 Yala
- SL 2015/2016 Maha so far
we have posted the Yala 2015 report, we can write an article based on this. (SS you want to take a look?)
9. SEO and improving Tropical climate.org : (JV primarily with inputs from PA, ZY, AK)
According to Sanjaya, Climate.lk remains around 18 on google page rank for
searchers on Climate and Sri Lanka rising from 42 but has risen quite high on Bing. Its not the case for Bing here.
but Sri Lanka with monsoon, el nino, weather, etc
Newspaper Articles
climate sri lanka
but not
monsoon, not within the 1st 100 dont know where it could be
el nino, 31
weather,
disaster,
etc
Many of the pages that are above us are quite trivial. So if we do better housekeeping, we should come out a whole lot up.
We need to
- continue to get rid of broken links
- cross link from our blogs, twitter account, facebook, etc to our main site
- redo URL's with correct spellings, include key words separated by - or _
- put in some additional pages for each one of the topics that we target
- try to get backlinks from highly rated sites (we should just link up with some of the related orgs overseas
- get backlinks
- write newspaper articles (more folks needed here)
Doing all this is good in any case, so JV is working on this and SR is helping out. So in the case of all of you - it is quite vexing that only a couple of people there appreciate
Rule 1 in the Rules and Guidelines - and that also after I harass folks - usually I vent and ignore.
Maybe we need to write that better.
Later we shall have to work on MV links.
10. Data Management (AK, UR, PA, JV)
- prioritize data upload to data to support papers
and build data infrastructure as below
- prepare comprehensive inventory for mv
- for Maldives - put our daily met data online
- for SL - get SL prcp, Tmin and Tmax update
Next Steps -
LZ to review AK work - need to
11. Maldives Work (UR, SS, PA, PW)
- Dengue work
- Water Scarcity work
- Vulnerability Assessment
- Data and services work should continue
UR - please coordinate this work.
12. Communication Work (Deepashika, JV, Z, LZ)
- Get all the key documents in place
- Print posters and SL FECT flyers
- Communication Strategy
- Update SL Poster Book
-
Next Steps - Deepashika has a work plan - which eventually has to be circulated.
13. RAWI project reports (Z, PA)
- we have been ignoring this -
next step outline and send report.
14. Wavelets / Latex / Thesis / WSC book (RL)
RL has managed to pull together my thesis with high fidelity.
Next steps: There are 3 paper drafts that arose out of this thesis - I have to point Ruchira to this.
Need to put these together.
-------------------------------------
There is a lesson there
my thesis of 200+ pages with 100 figures ends up being a file of 3 Mb! Of course, my phd thesis was about data compression - so I needed to be conscious.
I doubt anyone writes a document so that it come to that file size now. It was also because I used computers which were about 1000 times less powerful than what you have. This is because of conscious attention to file size and use of intelligent word processing software not the commercial software that comes out of Microsoft.
My undergraduate thesis was written with a type writer - about a decade ago we got it put in electronic format and it should be in our library! But having written it on a type writer did not hurt its quality.
