GLIMS Update: Miniworkshop and GLIMS Book

[Jeffrey Kargel]

Dear all,
In association with the IGS Symposium last week we held a GLIMS miniworkshop.  Unfortunately, there was no good time to hold it during the week, since every session was filled with talks of wide interest.  There was an optional fieldtrip, which was a sacrifice to me personally to schedule the miniworkshop then, but it's what we had to do.  We had a small but active group, and we had some good discussions.  It was a mixed group of long-time GLIMS people and newcomers, and so much of the discussion was oriented toward the newcomers.  Bruce Raup went over the GLIMS database and uses of GLIMS data and briefly summarized the structure of GLIMS and some recent regional center activity related to populating the database. He also summarized some of the methods used in glacier analysis, and I added to that by giving a summary and analysis examples of one promising classification technique, Fuzzy C Means, and there was a fair amount of discussion about that.  Bruce also led discussion of some online tools, including a new tool and an update on GLIMSView (noting that upgrades to GLIMSView have fallen behind upgrades to some platforms, so for instance, older versions of Windows can still be used).  
I also summarized recent progress on the GLIMS Book, going over progress chapter by chapter.  It is clear that chapter submissions and reviews and revisions have picked up in recent weeks; everybody is feeling the heat and recognizes the need to complete the book.  It was also evident, and thankfully this was recognized by the participants, that a little more time would help many authors get their chapter submissions in order.  This is not going to be extended indefinitely, but as we review recent submissions, the editors encourage those of you who have initiated chapters but have not finished them to use September to best advantage, if you think you can make a completed chapter submission.  This still gives us the autumn for the review and revision process.  If you have some bits and pieces of a chapter, and you see some hope for it, but your chapter leader has gone off to the unknown wilderness, then please talk to the editors or amongst one another and see if you can salvage your chapter, because we would like to have them.  The fact is, we have a good solid core of chapters either submitted or very nearly finished, so clearly we will have a great book. If you have not submitted a chapter yet we hope your chapter will be part of it; if it's a small chapter, a month is probably enough time to write it; if it's supposed to be a big chapter, and nothing has started yet, then we need to have a talk.  I have started a new round of individualized letters to chapter leaders, so we can assess where each chapter stands and then make the go/no-go decisions on each chapter remaining to be submitted. And for those of you who have submitted, thank you, and we'll be going over the review/revision status with you, too. 
--Jeff Kargel  		 	   		  
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