Do you know someone in the Unidata community who has been actively involved and helpful to you and other Unidata members? Perhaps this is someone who volunteers to assist others, contributes software, or makes suggestions that are generally useful for the community.

The Unidata Users Committee invites you to submit nominations for the Russell L. DeSouza Award for Outstanding Community Service by 23 March 2018. This Community Service Award honors individuals whose energy, expertise, and active involvement enable the Unidata Program to better serve the geosciences. Honorees personify Unidata's ideal of a community that shares ideas, data, and software through computing and networking technologies.

The National Science Foundation has recently funded a project to conceptualize a Geospatial Software Institute (GSI) as a long-term hub of excellence in software infrastructure that can serve diverse research and education communities. To achieve the goal and associated aims, the project will design a community organization called the Geospatial Innovation Consortium for High-Performance Software and Discovery to mobilize and serve pertinent communities and stakeholders in a sustainable way. In connection with this initiative, broad community input is being sought to help design the GSI. An online survey is available and responses are requested no later than January 25, 2018.

If you'll be attending the 98th annual American Meteorology Society meeting, 7-11 January 2018 in Austin, be sure stop by Unidata's booth in the exhibit hall (Booth 520). Software developers and other staff from the Unidata Program Center will be on hand to chat any time the exhibit hall is open. If you're especially interested in seeing a live demonstration of a particular Unidata software package, check the following schedule and time your visit accordingly.

In addition, Unidata staff are presenting talks and posters throughout the conference. If you haven't already, check out the Unidata Staff Conference Schedule.

Happy New Year from all of use at the Unidata Program Center! In case you missed it — here's a recap of news from the Unidata Program Center for the month of December, 2017.

Members of the Unidata Program Center staff will be attending the 98th annual American Meteorology Society meeting, 7-11 January 2018 at the Austin Convention Center in Austin, Texas. Unidata will be in Booth 520 in the exhibit hall; feel free to stop by to talk with us. The booth will feature live, hands-on demonstrations of Unidata software and services, including a look at the current state of the AWIPS, IDV, MetPy, and THREDDS Data Server packages. Come and talk with the developers about what's coming up and what you'd like to see.

Read on for a schedule that lists selected sessions at which Unidata staff (and summer interns) will be presenting or attending. See the AMS meeting Conference Program for additional information on the sessions.