The Conference Coordinating Committee, as a Committee, hasn't been called on to do much during the past year, because the things that have needed to be done could be done by the Chair. In fact, it's not clear that a committee is really required. The activities of the Chair have been as follows:

1. Archive and refresh Conftool: This is an annual process, and it consists of:
   • Re-licensing the Conftool software from Harald Weinreich, and arrange payment from the ADHO treasurer
   • Renaming last year's database from the generic current-year "conference" to "conference08" and backing it up.
   • Installing the new software and using it to build this year's database structure (the db structure sometimes changes in minor ways from year to year)
   • Migrating data that should persist (e.g., user account information, information about areas of expertise, etc.) from the previious year's database to the current one
   • Updating Conftool header graphics and conference contact information to reflect the current year's local host
   • Removing program chair/program committee/conference host privileges from last year's personnel, and adding those permissions to the accounts for the current personnel. This needs to be done in September, before the submission deadline in the call for papers. Documentation on the data migration part of this process is on the DH wiki.
2. Consult with upcoming conference host, answering questions about planning the event as they arise. Theoretically, the Conference Committee Chair can visit the host site, to consult on-site, but that didn't seem necessary this year, as the Chair is already quite familiar with MITH and in regular correspondence and conversation with the hosts.
3. Issue an invitation for future conference hosting on Humanist; this year, the invitation was issued at the beginning of May. It would probably have been good to issue this invitation a couple of weeks earlier, in mid-April, since on the current schedule the proposals arrived just in time for the actual meeting of the ADHO steering committee.
4. Corresponding and consulting with potential conference hosts, and advising on the preparation of their proposals. This year there were two universities interested, which is about average (some years there has been only one proposal; rarely have there been three). One of the most useful things one can offer to potential hosts is a successful recent proposal; this year, I used the proposal and draft budget from the Kings College proposal--a good model.
5. Distribute completed proposals to the ADHO Steering Committee. The two proposals, from Stanford University and the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, are attached.

 

Resp: John Unsworth
Date: June 009
Status: Report for ADHO Steering Committee

-- Main.HaroldShort - 20 Jun 2009