Me doing stuff: January 2018

Which recent Geoscience related journal article has most influenced your work?

For me it was Laniak et al. (2013) "Integrated Environmental Modeling: A Vision and Roadmap for the Future". With a BSc in Computer Science I had worked in the IT industry before I started in academia. When I read Laniak et al. (2013) my Geography Master’s I knew that that was exactly how I would want to apply my computational background. Laniak et al. presented a vison for the future of integrated environmental modelling. They called to science and technology to work on standards for data sharing, and envisioned web-based platforms for transdisciplinary community interactions. I knew that science is not only about observations and theory. But it was then when I deeply understood how the capabilities of modern computers support research, make it reproducible and, thus, can accelerate research. The potential of linking people and knowledge from different disciplines in order to jointly understand natural processes and to make decisions together overwhelmed me. This landmark paper has since influenced me throughout my PhD and beyond.

Reference:

Laniak, Gerard F, Gabriel Olchin, Jonathan Goodall, Alexey Voinov, Mary Hill, Pierre Glynn, Gene Whelan, et al. 2013. “Integrated Environmental Modeling: A Vision and Roadmap for the Future.” Environmental Modelling & Software 39 (0):3–23. https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.envsoft.2012.09.006

As a scientist / researcher you have to stay informed about the latest research findings in your field. Typically, this means that you should follow the publications of the most important journals in your research domain. I found that many researchers (including myself so far) only conduct proper literature reviews when they work on a specific problem, when writing articles and grant applications. Often they wouldn't find the time to go to all the journal websites and scroll through the article lists etc.

I recently discovered the Feedly RSS reader. RSS is long-known internet feed syndication protocol that is used to subscribe to updates on websites and blogs. I found that many, if not all journals, more or less provide RSS feeds for their latest articles, often with an abstract provided. Feedly is a website application that helps you to organise RSS feeds and read them online. There is also an Android and an iPhone app. With these you can then read and manage your feeds on the phone. Now I quickly scroll through the latest articles every day via my mobile phone. This way it is just like scrolling through Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, but for journals. And the very few articles that you find relevant or that are of interest for you, you can save them in your Feedly backlog in order to read them later when you are in your office and take reading time :-)

Update: Inoreader is another very similar application to read your RRS feeds, and there are also the respective smartphone apps available.

One advantage of Feedly is that you can export and import lists of your RSS feed sources with so called OPML files. OPML is available in many RSS reader web sites and applications, so you can both import and export OPML files of RSS subscriptions.

I prepared an OPML Export file for you, a standard list format for your feed URLs, so you don't have to aggregate all the RSS URLs again. Happy reading and feel confident that you are not missing out on latest papers in your field.

Link to my export.opml file: https://www.dropbox.com/s/li0yjvwyt8cezsc/export.opml?dl=0

It includes links and feeds to the following resources:

Information systems and information technology : nature.com subject feeds - rss url and webpage url
Google Cloud Big Data and Machine Learning Blog - Google Cloud Big Data and Machine Learning Blog - rss url
Research Participant Portal - Funding Opportunities - Recently published Calls - rss url - webpage url