Re: Current and Future Computing Commission Issues

[David Watkin <david.watkin@chemistry.oxford.ac.uk>]

Ton, David
	I was not pointing a finger at anyone in particular, but if I had to, it would 
certainly not include David B.  His vitality and enthusiasm in discussing cif 
issues is such as to almost make him viable as a one-man commission.  However, I 
suspect that if Ton looks over the correspondance for the last 3 years, he might 
find that some other members have been less than hyper-active

Best wishes
D

David Brown wrote:
> Dear Ton,
> 
> I suspect I am one of David W's political appointees to the Computing 
> Commission as my name was added by the Executive Committee.  I believe 
> the reason was to make sure that there was communication between the 
> Commission and COMCIFS which they thought was in need of strengthening.  
> I notice that MS97 at Florence is a Commission Microsymposium on 
> programing for CIF and XML.  In the last week or two there has been some 
> acitivity on the COMCIFS software developers discussion list stimulated 
> by James Hester which indicates that there are people interested in 
> advance programming for CIF.  It would make more sense if one of these 
> people were to represent the CIF aspects of computing rather than me.  
> Herbert Bernstein is another person with much experience in this area 
> and I believe there are others such as John Westbrook with a wealth of 
> experience in programming for mmCIF
> 
> I can understand Bill's concern to see more women active in the 
> Commissions, but computing is not one of the areas that seems to attract 
> women and I agree with David W that we need people who are active and 
> not just there to make the numbers look good.  That said, the 
> Commissions do traditionally make an effort to keep a broad geographical 
> representation and it is important to maintain that breadth.  Commission 
> members have to be able to function in English which immediately puts a 
> bias in favour of AngloSaxon countries.  We need to hear the voices of 
> other parts of the world even if it means passing over some excellent 
> mainstream programmers from the UK or US.
> 
> In short, I am willing to retire from the Commission, but the new 
> membership should include someone who has experience in advanced 
> programing for CIF and XML.
> 
> Best wishes
> 
> David
> 
> 
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