Hi Unity Users! This week’s digest is packed with ways to get involved with Unity, including exciting news about our new chatbot prototype, fall onboarding, and our upcoming 5-Year Anniversary Series!
ANNOUNCEMENTS
You can help shape the future Unity help desk by testing our new chatbot prototype, or share your work to be featured in our upcoming Unity 5-Year Anniversary Series. As part of the celebration, we’re launching a Unity Logo Contest, where you can submit your design for a chance to become our next official logo and be featured in the newsletter!
We’re also excited to introduce Sanctuary, a secure computing platform for research with sensitive data, being built to align with NIST 800-171 standards. Propose a pilot project and become a beta user to help us refine this important new resource.
Keep reading for details on how to get involved!
🗓️Fall Onboarding
New to Unity or need a refresher? Join our facilitators on Friday, September 12, 2025, at 1:00 PM for an introductory session covering SSH access, Slurm job submission, and Unity OnDemand tools like JupyterLab and RStudio. You can see details about the workshop on our Event page and click the Zoom link to register for the workshop in advance – all Unity users are welcome!
🎂Share your work with us! Be featured in the Unity 5-Year Anniversary Series
In celebration of Unity’s 5-year anniversary, we’re launching the Unity 5-Year Anniversary Series! This series will showcase your work as users, feature a logo design contest, and highlight the many ways Unity supports impactful research and discovery. More details are coming soon. In the meantime, we’d love to hear from you! If you’re interested in having your work featured as part of the series, please fill out the interest form here.
We’re excited to share the incredible work happening across the Unity community.
🎨 Unity Logo Contest: Submit a design and make your mark
We’re celebrating Unity’s 5-Year Anniversary with a brand-new logo – and it could be yours! Submit your original design for a chance to:
- Have your logo become the official Unity logo
- Be featured in the Unity Newsletter
- Showcase your work to the entire Unity community
Whether you’re a seasoned designer or just love to get creative, we’d love to see your vision for Unity’s new logo.
Deadline: Early September, exact date TBD!
Submission form: Stay tuned!
🤖Test out a Unity prototype bot
We’re exploring the potential for AI-enhanced user facilitation to improve the Unity user experience and support our help team more efficiently. An analysis of aggregated responses from this study will help project leaders understand what’s working, and how we can improve the AI-enhanced search functionality or limitations prior to deployment.
We’re seeking current Unity users to participate in this study involving a prototype chatbot developed by the UMass Amherst Center for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence.
Participation includes:
- A short pre- and post-survey
- A 30-minute guided task session where you will work with the prototype bot to accomplish a series of tasks on Unity under observation by study personnel
- A brief interview to discuss your experience The task session and interview will be conducted in-person at UMass Amherst or online via Zoom.
If you’re interested, fill out the study interest form here.
🚨Call for Pilot Projects: Try Out Sanctuary, a New Secure Computing Platform
We are excited to introduce Sanctuary, a new secure computing platform designed for research involving sensitive data and being developed to align with NIST 800-171 standards. Sanctuary will complement the existing Unity platform by providing a secure environment for projects that require elevated security practices.
We’re seeking pilot projects and beta users to help test the platform’s early implementation. During this beta phase, only non-sensitive and non-controlled data may be used, but we are especially seeking researchers whose work typically involves sensitive data and who would benefit from Sanctuary’s enhanced security features in the future. Participants will receive early access, hands-on support, and the opportunity to influence features and policies.
Interested? Fill out this brief interest form to learn more or propose a pilot project.