Essential Scientific Computing for Environmental Scientists

University of Oxford

March 13-14, 2024

09:30 - 17:00 GMT

Instructors: Andrew Walker, Chris Wood

Helpers: Justin Leung, Hannah Sanderson, Biao Wang, Adrian Mag

General Information

The Carpentries project comprises the Software Carpentry, Data Carpentry, and Library Carpentry communities of Instructors, Trainers, Maintainers, helpers, and supporters who share a mission to teach foundational computational and data science skills to researchers.

Want to learn more and stay engaged with The Carpentries? Carpentries Clippings is The Carpentries' biweekly newsletter, where we share community news, community job postings, and more. Sign up to receive future editions and read our full archive: https://carpentries.org/newsletter/

Data Carpentry develops and teaches workshops on the fundamental data skills needed to conduct research. Its target audience is researchers who have little to no prior computational experience, and its lessons are domain specific, building on learners' existing knowledge to enable them to quickly apply skills learned to their own research. Participants will be encouraged to help one another and to apply what they have learned to their own research problems.

For more information on what we teach and why, please see our paper "Good Enough Practices for Scientific Computing".

Who: The course is aimed at graduate students and other researchers. You don't need to have any previous knowledge of the tools that will be presented at the workshop.

Where: Elementary lab, Department of Earth Sciences, 3 South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3AN. Get directions with OpenStreetMap or Google Maps.

When: March 13-14, 2024. Add to your Google Calendar.

Requirements: Participants must bring a laptop with a Mac, Linux, or Windows operating system (not a tablet, Chromebook, etc.) that they have administrative privileges on. They should have a few specific software packages installed (listed below).

Accessibility: We are committed to making this workshop accessible to everybody. For workshops at a physical location, the workshop organizers have checked that:

Materials will be provided in advance of the workshop and large-print handouts are available if needed by notifying the organizers in advance. If we can help making learning easier for you (e.g. sign-language interpreters, lactation facilities) please get in touch (using contact details below) and we will attempt to provide them.

Contact: Please email c.wood@epcc.ed.ac.uk for more information.

Roles: To learn more about the roles at the workshop (who will be doing what), refer to our Workshop FAQ.


Code of Conduct

Everyone who participates in Carpentries activities is required to conform to the Code of Conduct. This document also outlines how to report an incident if needed.


Collaborative Notes

We will use this collaborative document for chatting, taking notes, and sharing URLs and bits of code.


Surveys

Please be sure to complete these surveys before and after the workshop.

Pre-workshop Survey

Post-workshop Survey


Schedule

Day 1

Before starting Pre-workshop survey
09:30-11:00Introducing Good Software Development Practices with Python
11:00-11:30Break
11:30-13:00Introducing Good Software Development Practices with Python
13:00-13:45Lunch
13:45-15:30Data analysis with Python
15:30-16:00Break
16:00-17:00Data analysis with Python

Day 2

09:30-11:00 Data analysis with Python
11:00-11:30Break
11:30-13:00Data analysis with Python
13:00-13:45Lunch
13:45-15:30Intermediate Shell
15:30-16:00Break
16:00-17:00Intermediate Shell
End of course Post-workshop survey

Setup

To participate in a Data Carpentry workshop, you will need access to software as described below. In addition, you will need an up-to-date web browser.

We maintain a list of common issues that occur during installation as a reference for instructors that may be useful on the Configuration Problems and Solutions wiki page.

The setup instructions for the Data Carpentry Ecology workshops (with Python) can be found at the workshop overview site.