Earthdata Forum

Greetings,

This is a suggestion for a minor change to your website. There are times when science data users need to contact someone on the mission, someone who actually makes the data. There's no point in asking PODAAC, because questions like "Why is there no validated Sentinel 6 data before pass 84?" isn't something you'd probably know. It's a mission decision, not a PODAAC choice or mistake.

Would it be possible for PODAAC to associate a name and email with each data set, so downloaders could easily get in contact with the people who originally created/posted the data? Just putting a validated email on a page like this (https://podaac.jpl.nasa.gov/dataset/JASON_CS_S6A_L2_ALT_LR_RED_OST_NTC_F08) would be fantastic.

Thanks for your consideration,
Jenni Bonin

Greetings @reythia,

Thanks for your suggestion regarding the addition of mission contacts to the website. Generally, the Earthdata Forum moderators are the front line between the public, data providers and producers, and will have information or resources for contacting the mission providers. Each DAAC website may differ slightly and distribute hundreds of products, but many of the data product user guides, detailed documentation, and even project metadata contain contact information for the Principal Investigator and/or Technical Contacts.
https://cmr.earthdata.nasa.gov/search/concepts/C2619443998-POCLOUD.html

We often receive questions regarding data processing and algorithms, so our team will be happy to discuss your suggestion. Please consider bookmarking or subscribing to this question, found under the User Control Panel, to receive notification when we provide a follow up on this thread.

Best Regards,
Reneé

Hi Jenni,

This is good feedback, thanks. Jinbo has us working on a list of POCs who can respond authoritatively to queries like yours (although, I think PO.DAAC would have the answer in that specific case). I don't know if this idea was on his mind in doing so. Many data providers don't want to have contact information exposed on our website; so PODAAC staff respond or forward queries as needed.

Anyway, I'll discuss the landing page idea with Jinbo and reach out to you if we need add'l input

Thanks again
Jack

Many thanks, Jack (and Jinbo)!