19990504: Comments on USF proposal (MSWord attachment)

>From: "Laing, Arlene" <address@hidden>
>Organization: University of South Florida
>Keywords: 199905041654.KAA23614 equipment proposal

Arlene,

>Could you kindly review the Unidata equipment proposal that I am preparing
>for USF, please?  You had indicated in our meeting at the AMS conference
>that you would be available for comments.

I have been looking over your proposal and have a few observations and
comments which I include below.  My comments are not exhaustive, so
we might want to iterate on items through follow-up emails.

o I think that your proposal is well written.  You seem to have
  covered the major areas that the proposal should, a feat that not
  all submitters accomplish.

o It is clear that the equipment currently in place is aging and probably
  underpowered.

o You mention that the proposed new equipment will provide:
  "online storage for months of selected weather data".  Presumably,
  this capability is provided by the 4 mm tape unit and 36 GB of
  online disk storage (true?).  Do you plan to share this with
  the rest of the Unidata community (doing cooperative things with
  the rest of the community is a big plus in these proposals)?  If so,
  how?

o 3. Impact on Teaching and Educational Programs

  You state:

  "We need to upgrade our department's computer system so that students
  can overlay observations and numerical model forecast fields onto
  satellite and radar imagery, interactively create cross-sections of a
  host of parameters, and visualize weather systems from a user-selected
  three-dimensional perspective, including color animation."

  Currently, Unidata does not offer 3D visualization packages.  Do you
  have some other package in mind?  If so, what is it.

  How many students will be affected by the equipment.

  It is a good idea to be more specific about how the equipment will
  affect specific classes: what are the classes; how the equipment
  will be used to further the pedagogy; how much use the machines
  will get.

  Will the equipment allow courses to be taught that currently can not?
  If so, what and how.


o 4. Contributions to Research

  This section seems reasonable.  Some examples of how the new equipment
  would help in the existing studies would be useful.

o You are asking for a lot of equipment (total price tag over $52K).
  After a 50% USF cost share, this is still a request for $26K.  I
  can tell you that the number of sites that have gotten this much
  money through the NSF Unidata equipment grant proces is _very_
  small.  While you might think that it is good to ask for more and
  be cut back, it is often the case that requests for too much
  money will be looked over in favor of smaller requests.

  What would happen to your budget if you changed the 10 Sparc Ultra 10s
  to 10 Pentium III PCs?  And/or 5 Pentium III PCs?  My thinking is
  that you would probably be a lot more likely to get $12 - 15 K.

o You peripherally mention that you will be aided in the maintenance
  of the equipment/lab by a computer technician and Dr. Steven Reader,
  but you don't say concretely that either of these people have
  Unix system administration experience/competence.  If Dr. Reader
  does have this experience, you would do well to reword your comment
  about him having "several years of experience running Unix systems".
  System administration is one of the big headaches for new sites.  Having
  in-house/on-campus expertise goes a long way towards convincing
  reviewers that the equipment will not fall into disuse due to
  the lack of someone that can keep it running and up to date (with
  things like OS upgrades, security patches, new compilers, etc.).

In general, if possible it is a good idea to also note how USF getting
this new equipment will, in some way, help out the other members of the
Unidata community.  This doesn't have to be exhaustive, but it shows
the desire to join in the greater community effort.

>Thanks,

In the future, it would be a lot easier for me to look at ASCII text
instead of being a Microsoft Word attachment since I work on a Unix
machine, not a PC or a Mac.  This is not a big deal, but it would make
things quicker on my end.

Again, we can iterate on items in your proposal if you like.

Talk to you soon...

Tom