From urs.hugentobler at bv.tu-muenchen.de Thu Aug 2 11:52:45 2012 From: urs.hugentobler at bv.tu-muenchen.de (Urs Hugentobler) Date: Thu, 02 Aug 2012 20:52:45 +0200 Subject: [IGSMAIL-6635] IGS Workshop 2012 and #40 Governing Board Meeting Summary Message-ID: <501ACC7D.2060702@bv.tum.de> Dear Colleagues, last week we had our IGS Workshop in Olsztyn, Poland, which was a great success. The workshop format developed by the Scientific Organizing Committee lead by Shailen Desai, JPL, was excellent as it left plenty of room for interaction and discussions, and the scientific program found the appropriate balance between the different topics that form the foci of the IGS today. The workshop took place in the very nice facilities of the University of Warmia and Mazury and in a lovely region of Poland. The workshop was accompanied by a wide social program, including an ice breaker party, conference dinner, city tour, sailing regatta, visit in castle, planetarium, and observatory, all week with excellent weather. I really want to thank Andrzej Krankowski for inviting us to his university and for hosting our workshop. As the Chair of the IGS I want to express my thanks to Shailen Desai and his team for an excellent scientific organization of the workshop and the very appropriate workshop format and program they put together. And I want to thank Andrzej Kankowski and his team from the Local Organizing Committee for the preparation and local organization of the workshop, for facilitating our bus travel to and from Olsztyn, and for continuous support during the workshop. You all can be very proud of this excellent achievement! Short Workshop Summary ---------------------- The IGS Workshop 2012 took place at the University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn, Poland, from 23-27 July. The mornings were devoted to plenary sessions with invited presentations focusing on well selected topics covering the wide scope of the IGS. Lunch time followed by poster sessions allowed much time for discussion and interaction between the participants while the splinter sessions in the second half of the afternoon allowed the working groups to meet, discuss their 'hot' topics and formulate their recommendations. After the welcome by the deputy rector Prof. Figiel and the Mayor of Olsztyn, Dr. Grzymowicz, a review from an insider's view of the development of the IGS from its start of operations 20 years ago until today was given by Gerhard Beutler, Tim Springer provoked with the question whether the IGS is sleeping. During the conference we were able to confirm that the IGS is not sleeping at all but is full of life also 18 years after its formation and attacking the challenges posed by the rapidly changing GNSS landscape. The first scientific session showed the progress of the IGS Multi-GNSS Experiment (M-GEX), one of the key projects of the IGS. It was inspiring to see the status of the growing network and the number of presentations and posters focusing on analysis results incorporating the new data types. But it was also evident, that much work is still ahead (see GB Meeting Summary below). Mark Caissy and Georg Weber presented the status of the IGS real-time activities, the performance of the real-time products and the technical challenges of the IGS key project that will lead to the launch of the IGS Real-Time Service later this year (see below) as a service supporting precise point positioning at global scales for scientific and hazard detection applications. Despite the excellent quality of the IGS products different authors presented bothersome results related to not yet fully understood issues: Paul Rebischung showed 'interesting' differences in station time series generated by different Analysis Centers; Jim Ray and Jake Griffiths demonstrated noticeable rotational instabilities in the IGS orbits; Chuck Meertens and Andria Bilich forced us to reflect what GNSS antennas really measure. Nacho Romero reminded us that we need to take care of our network which forms the basis for all of our work. Further important topics covered were orbit modeling issues, the IGS time scale with improved long term stability, aspects of the next IGS reprocessing campaign, generation of ionosphere and troposphere products, and application of IGS products for weather forecast, generation of the next ITRF, tectonic motion and disaster monitoring, and many more. It is impressive always again to see the high quality of the IGS products, the efforts undertaken for improving them, and the wide field of their applications. The relevance of the IGS for the geodetic and wider community was underlined by representatives from IAG (Chris Rizos), GGOS (Markus Rothacher), FIG (Larry Hothem) and ICG (David Turner). Jointly with the IGS Workshop the meeting of the WG-A "Compatibility and Interoperability" of the International Committee on GNSS (ICG) took place which was an opportunity for intense interaction and exchange between IGS and system providers. The workshop terminated with the presentation of the recommendations by the Working Groups that define actions for the further development of the IGS. The recommendations will soon be available at the IGS web site. The workshop program can be found under http://www.uwm.edu.pl/kaig/igs_workshop_2012/, and the presentations and posters as well as the recommendations will soon become available at the IGS web pages http://igs.org. Governing Board Meeting Summary ------------------------------- The IGS Governing Board Meeting took place on Sunday July 22 with a wrap-up meeting after the workshop on Friday July 27. Main issues discussed are the following: * Strategic Planning The update of the IGS Strategic Plan is in preparation and the concept was presented by Juan Ceva (CB, by phone). The plan shall include a matrix relating objectives with initiatives. This should allow for a better monitoring and reporting of the progress achieved. The Strategic Plan period will be reduced from five years to four years in order to better synchronize with the terms of the GB chair. The plan shall be reviewed every two years. Next steps are the issue of a questionnaire to stakeholders. The feedback together with the workshop recommendations as well as a SWOT analysis shall form the input for the new Strategic Plan that shall be ready by the end of the year. Lot of work is still waiting, many thanks to the CB for the preparations already done. * Site Guidelines The Infrastructure Committee invested much effort in a thorough revision of the IGS Site Guidelines. The guidelines were available for public review and comments were received. Few comments related to real-time data transfer issues remain to be implemented in the next few weeks. The GB provisionally approved the Site Guidelines that will be published as soon as the remaining edits are implemented. * Network Coordinator The GB is glad to assign Robert Khachikyan, CB staff member, full time as Network Coordinator. With this one of the very important functions in the IGS is again filled. * M-GEX The Multi-GNSS Experiment is one of the key projects of the IGS. The GB approved the extension of the project until end of 2013 with the goal of a transition to a Pilot Project. The experiment is open, everybody who wants to contribute is invited to join. More information about goals and plans of M-GEX will be issued by a separate IGS Mail shortly. Robert Weber stepped down as Chair of the GNSS WG which coordinates M-GEX. The GB thanks Robert for his engagement over many years in the WG and GB and in particular for bringing M-GEX to live. The GB is very glad that Oliver Montenbruck from DLR/GSOC, Germany, is ready to take over this role and unanimously approved him as the new GNSS WG Chair and member of the GB. * IGS Real-Time Service The upcoming IGS Real-Time Service is our second key project. Initial Operational Capability of the Service will be available later this year, providing real-time GPS orbit and clock corrections. For details see http://www.gpsworld.com/gnss-system/augmentation-assistance/innovation-coming-soon-13044andftp://igs.org/pub/resource/pubs/IGS_why_in_RT.pdf. There are still several tasks to be finalized before going public with the service. The GB nevertheless approved the launch of the Service with target date November 2012 and with a monitoring of the progress of the preparations through regular EC telecons. * RINEX The IGS/RTCM RINEX WG presented a transition plan from RINEX 2.11 to RINEX 3.0x over the next few years. While tracking data from GNSS capable equipment shall be solely available in RINEX 3 after a target date to be specified, tracking data from legacy receivers will continue to be available in RINEX 2 for the foreseeable future. The IGS GB affirms the transition to RINEX 3 and the further elaboration of the transition plan. Detailed information will be issued to the user community by the RINEX WG. * Next Workshop After our successful workshop in Olsztyn we are already looking forward to our next workshop taking place in ... curious? Wait for more information. With this short summary I want to thank all participants, the presenters, session and working group chairs, and the support by the IGS CB. I hope that you all got again home safely without major problems. With best regards Urs Hugentobler Chair, IGS Governing Board -------------- next part --------------