8 MANAGEMENT REPORT

8 MANAGEMENT REPORT

8.1 Organizational Structure

The current organizational structure of the Alexandria Project is shown in Figure 5. This structure is serving the Project well and is very similar to the structure that we proposed initially. We have periodically reviewed this structure, and have found no better alternatives. In particular, the research and development team structure has proved to be both stable and flexible.

Figure 5 Alexandria organizational Structure

In terms of the different components of this structure:

1.  major changes during the past year to the structure are the combining of two research and development teams into one team; the creation of two new subteams within one of the teams; the creation of a new team, which is now relatively inactive; and the virtual disbanding of a team.
   1.  The Interface Team and the User Evaluation Team have been combined into Interface and User Evaluation Team. In terms of personnel on these teams, Dr. Wang has moved to the Image Processing Team, while Dr. Dan Montello (Geography) and Dr. Judith Green (Education) have joined the team. This is a more rational utilization of the Project resources.
   2.  Two subteams have been created within the Library Team: the Alexandria Atlas Team and the Metadata and Cataloging Team. These latter subteams are focused on specialized but important issues for the Project.
   3.  An Educational Team came into existence to support interactions between ADL personnel, local teachers and administrators, and personnel from the Graduate School of Education at UCSB. The goal of the meetings was to provide the services of ADL to local and state schools. These interactions led to the writing of a major proposal to NSF for funds to support ADL activities in schools (the SUNDial Project, see section 11.7). The Team became relatively inactive when NSF declined to fund the proposal. Should funding for such activities become available to ADL in the future, this team will clearly be reactivated.
   4.  The Legal and Economic Issues Team, which consisted of only one faculty member and no graduate student support, has essentially been inactive. While we believe this to be an extremely important area, the Project does not have the resources to adequately support significant research in this area.

1.  The Executive Committee and the Team Leaders Committee are each meeting in alternate weeks and function well.
2.  The Advisory Panel has so far only met once, and its advice proved to be of great value. Since that meeting we have added new members to the Panel and are planning to hold a meeting in March or April of 1996.
3.  We are currently organizing the Design Review Panel (DRP), which will initially consist of a set of major users (such as the USGS) who will have test versions of the system. A full DRP will be organize when the Testbed is made publicly available after July 1st 1996.

8.2 Interactions and Levels of Activity

The organizational structure, in particular, has supported, and perhaps even encouraged, a pleasingly high level of activity and interaction between the many members of the project. The research and development teams, including the Testbed Team, each hold a separate weekly meeting. Joint meetings between teams are also held with some frequency, although not on a regular basis. The Team leaders meet every two weeks to exchange information on technical matters and to discuss technical directions for the project. The Executive Committee meets in alternate weeks and discusses managerial and strategic issues relating to the project.

The teams have overlapping memberships so encouraging a high level of interaction. Furthermore, there is a meeting of the project team with a frequency of once per month or more. A major goal of this meeting is to stimulate interactions.

Various seminars have been organized in the Computer Science Department around DL themes, and there is typically at least one such seminar each quarter. These seminars have proven useful for keeping faculty and students abreast of current issues and of introducing new graduate students to the Project and the ideas of DL's.

The Project holds full day retreats every six months for all project members. The main purposes of such retreats include intensive information exchanges and to form plans for the next six months of development.

8.3 Personnel

Finally we now describe briefly the various personnel actions occurring during the past year, and the performance of the personnel.

8.3.1 Professional Staff

The professional staff of the Project have performed very well over the past year. While the hiring of outstanding engineers on a relatively short-term project is difficult, we have been lucky in our hiring.

The decision to build a Development Team (now called the Testbed Team) using full-time, professional staff has turned out to be a very good decision. It is clear that, in a university environment, faculty researchers and students need major systems support in developing large testbed systems. A rewarding aspect of this facet of our organization is that the faculty and students on the one hand and the professional staff on the other have formed a highly creative, interactive relationship.

Inevitably we have had changes amongst the professional staff on the Project. At the time of the last Site Visit, we released our two senior engineers for reasons of inadequate performance. Christoph Fischer, our database engineer and Project Coordinator, returned to Austria at the end of 1995 to take up a job offer he could not refuse. He will be missed on the Project, and we are currently interviewing replacement engineers. The current Testbed Team, which consists of Dr. Jim Frew (the team leader), Dr. Qi Zheng, Jason Simpson, and Alex Wells, is functioning extremely well.

Margit Seeber, who worked as one of our database entry/cataloging personnel in the Library side of the operation, will also be returning to Europe in March 1996. We have already hired, as a replacement for Margit, Randy Kemp, who has a masters degree in library science from the University of Michigan.

Sandy Stevens stepped down from doing a good job as our Administrative Assistant in February 1996, and has been replaced by Patty Towne.

Finally, we are pleased that Bruce Gritton of Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute is now associated with the Project as an investigator.

8.3.2 Faculty Investigators

The only changes to faculty participation in the Project have been the relatively recent additions of Dr. Dan Montello (Geography, UCSB) and Dr. Judith Green (Education, UCSB) as investigators. Both are involved with evaluation of the system from the user's perspective.

Dr. Barbara Buttenfield, who has directed the SUNY Buffalo component of the Project, moved to the University of Colorado in early 1996. Written agreements are in place documenting Colorado's commitment to meet the Alexandria match that was originally negotiated with Buffalo. The University of Colorado has also granted Dr. Buttenfield a first semester of leave with full pay to insure that the project momentum is not hampered by the move.

The grouping of faculty and students into partially overlapping Research and Development Teams that each meet on a weekly basis appears to be a stable and productive way of managing the interactions.

Initial concerns of the funding agencies about the large number of faculty associated with the project, and the associated management problems, have fortunately turned out to groundless. The numerous interactions that large numbers have proved to be very beneficial for the project.

8.3.3 Graduate Students Associated with the Project

The graduate students associated with the project have been relatively stable in composition. We are currently supporting the research of 11 students on the project.

Significant discussion and interaction with these students has occurred concerning the partition of their time between the development aspects of the Project and the research aspects, particularly in relation to their dissertation research requirements. The current arrangements with respect to this partition appear to be working out reasonably well.