Cycle 4 Funding: Array API and astrowidgets (Craig)

[jdswinbank]

Issue to track progress of Cycle 4 funding request which was approved in #393 .

• Project Description
• Awarded Amount: $11,250 (US)
• Period of Performance: 2024-05-01 through 2025-04-30
• Finance Committee Contact: @jdswinbank
• COTR: @pllim

[AnaGabela]

Hey Matt

Let's get you started on getting a new contract with NumFocus because I think that's gonna take them a little while. Here are the instructions:

Go to https://numfocus.org/rocket
Click on Independent Contractor Registration
Form fields
Project: Astropy
Grant: NASA
Full Name
Email address
Street Address
Street Address
City
State
Postal Code
Country
Start Date: 2024-05-01 through 2024-04-30
Description: Array API and astrowidgets
Project Contact name: Astropy Finance Committee
Project Contact email: finance@astropy.org
Payment method: ACH, Wire Transfer, PayPal
Bank Information
Comments about payment
Upload W9 or W8
Please let me know that you have submitted the form so we can keep track of it.

[mwcraig]

Hi @AnaGabela -- I just filled out the contractor form.

[pllim]

Just so we're clear what I should be tracking, Awarded Amount: $11,250 (US) means Astropy is only funding "ccdproc and astropy.nddata work" section of https://github.com/astropy/astropy-project/blob/main/finance/proposal-calls/cycle4/mwcraig-cycle4-ccdproc-astrowidgets.md ?

[AnaGabela]

Yes I only see the Awarded Amount: $11,250 (US)

[pllim]

Ah, I see #393 (comment) now but unclear from the comment what exactly is being funded for a year. @jdswinbank , can you please clarify? Thanks!

[jdswinbank]

... Astropy is only funding "ccdproc and astropy.nddata work" section ...

First reaction: this is correct.

However, to add slightly more nuance: we chose $11,250 because we were unable to fund the full proposal and this matched the first part. However, the voting wasn't specific to that: it made no distinction as to which part of the proposal the community “prefers”. I think it would be appropriate for @mwcraig to choose which parts of the proposal he works on within the limited budget available.

[pllim]

I think it would be appropriate for mwcraig to choose

Should this be decided upfront so we can set the expectations early on?

[mwcraig]

Should this be decided upfront so we can set the expectations early on?

Probably -- the work I've started doing was on ccdproc since the funded amount matched that part of the proposal, and because it was pretty out of date infrastructure-wise.

We should talk about whether it makes sense to do a mix of things from both projects, though.

[pllim]

Okay. Is that talk between Matt and Finance Committee? Do I have to be involved too as COTR? My "job description" says I have to make sure the progress meets expectation so I don't want to end up bugging Matt about things that are not actually relevant here. Thanks!

[mwcraig]

From the PR with the proposal:

Rather than have the Finance Committee select from the various options you presented, we suggest that you discuss this and agree a course of action with the COTR when assigned.

I'm fine if we just want to declare that the course of action is to do the ccdproc/nddata stuff, but if you think it would be better to do a mix of tasks that would work for me too.

[pllim]

Since I am also personally involved in Astrowidgets, I cannot give an unbiased opinion on what work should be done. But if I say "both," I am worried that each will not have enough progress given the reduced funding. What combo would give us the best return of investment here? Any ideas?

[mwcraig]

I'd lean towards the ccdproc/nddata work since there is other work being in astropy to adopt the array API.