Lectures 6 and 7 Spatial Data Infrastructures Partnerships in Action Longley et al. Chapter 19

Partnerships = SDIs, Spatial Data Infrastructures

What is a National Spatial Data Infrastructure? “The technology, policies, standards, and human resources necessary to acquire, process, store, distribute, and improve utilization of geospatial data.” Source: Presidential Executive Order #12906 (1994): “Co-ordinating Geographic Data Acquisition and Access: The National Spatial Data Infrastructure” W. Clinton.

Partnerships via NSDIs The problem: Too much data duplication = waste Not enough data duplication = respond to emergencies Ad hoc data sharing has many difficulties Data often tailored to one application Best data often collected in greatest detail at local level but not accessible to regional or national folk Indexes/metadata to available GI unknown until recently No general protocols for any of this until NSDI…

Ground Zero site a few days after 9/11; the New York City Emergency Operations Center had been located in the World Trade Center complex and was destroyed (Courtesy James Tourtellotte/MAI/Landove LLC)

The depth of flooding in New Orleans as a consequence of Hurricane Katrina on August 31, 2005 (Courtesy NOAA)

What does it mean in practice? US NSDI Defined standards (mandated on federal agencies and encouraged for others) Minimizing inconsistency Clearinghouse – metadata descriptions of existing data. Advertising what is available National geospatial data framework - a common “template” on which to assemble other data

The US NSDI is composed of Metadata Geo data Geo data Clearinghouse Standards Partnerships

The data provide a core... Geographic/Geospatial Data

Categories of Geographic Data Community-developed data sets single purpose potential re-use common content specification “Framework” data

Specialized Framework Categories of Geographic Data

Digital orthoimagery Elevation and bathymetry Boundaries Railroads Geodetic Federal State Local Private Utilities Spatial AnalysisBase for Other DataFinished Maps Roads Cadastral Hydrography Framework Data Spatial AnalysisBase for Other DataFinished Maps

Web Sites of the Week

Specialized Framework Metadata Describing your data...

Metadata: “nutritional” label for GIS data sets Internally - s aves 4 hrs research 10 times a year = (4 x 10 x $50) = $2,000 (time it takes to look up or contact someone for information about a dataset) External Questions - refer 30 inquires/year (1hr/inquiry) = (30 x 1 x $50)=$1,500 (time it takes to answer calls from people who want to use the data or find out more about it) Future reuse/enhancement - $5,000 to $25,000 Liability (lawyers, courts) - $$$$

The uses of metadata Provides documentation of existing internal geospatial data resources within an organization (inventory) Permits structured search and comparison of held spatial data by others (advertising) Provides end-users with adequate information to take the data and use it in an appropriate context (liability)

Don’t buy Never use again… Don’t follow Don’t use from Bedard et al., U. of Laval

Specialized Framework Metadata Making data discoverable... Clearinghouse (catalog)

Clearinghouse provides... n Discovery of spatial data n Distributed search worldwide n Uniform interface for spatial data searches n Advertising for your data holdings

Clearinghouse operates as... n Entry point to constellation of servers n Collection of distributed servers, using a common protocol (e.g., Z39.50) n A virtual “Google” for geographic data

WebClient Gateway Clearinghouse “Nodes” or Servers This is all “Clearinghouse” NOAA Oregon USGSNMD NGS

Specialized Framework Metadata Clearinghouse (catalog) Standards Consistent approaches...

Who builds standards? n ISO - Intl Standards Organization n FGDC Standards working group in partnership with... n FGDC Thematic subcommittees n Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) n Concerned organizations n Producers and users of geospatial data

Types of standards n Data content — Common classifications — Common collection criteria n Data management Metadata Spatial Data Transfer Standard (SDTS) Data transfer protocols (e.g., WMS)

Clearinghouse/Catalog & Standards Important differences: Data models, data structures (formats), query languages, (syntactic) meaning of terms in metadata, meaning of values in data (semantic)  E.g.:  Metadata: –Different metadata standards (ISO vs. FGDC) –Different terms:‘Seabed’ vs. ‘Seafloor’ ‘Coastline’ vs. ‘Shoreline’

Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) OGC Web Service: OGC specification Interface allowing requests for geographic “resources” across the Web using platform-independent calls Main OGC services: Catalogue Service for the Web (CSW) Web Map Service (WMS) Web Feature Service (WFS) Web Coverage Service (WCS)

Catalog Services for the Web (CSW) Example International Coastal Atlas Network (ICAN) Connect individual coastal atlases to an integrated global atlas … Global atlas Local atlases ican.science.oregonstate.edu ican.ucc.ie mida.ucc.iewww.coastalatlas.net

Catalog Services for the Web (CSW) Example ICAN CSW based on open source GeoNetwork Geonetwork-opensource.org … Atlas X ISO Metadata & MIDA terminology FGDC Metadata & OCA terminology X Standard & X terminology “Seabed” “Seafloor”

Next step for ICAN is WMS CSW X WMSWFS … CSW WMS Linking of terms in metadata helps ultimate link to data: ICAN:Coastline is similar to OCA:Shoreline

Web Mapping Service (WMS) Example DISMAR: Data Integration System for Marine Pollution and Water Quality. More current projects at GetMap Operation

International Coastal Atlas Network ican.science.oregonstate.edu

Partnerships GEOdata Framework Metadata Clearinghouse (catalog) Standards

Lots of people involved… Federal government (many agencies) State government Local government Private sector – contractors, value-adders, exploiters Not for profit organizations Citizenry Others… No one is in charge…

Data.gov

INSPIRE – INfrastructure for SPatial InfoRmation in Europe

The distribution of 3,325 ARGO drifters (buoys) in the world’s oceans at 0605 UTC on March 22, 2009—the data from these buoys are updated in almost real time from satellite observations. The ARGO project is a partnership of 44 countries. Viewing of the ARGO data is facilitated by a GIS viewer. Each drifter collects data on temperature and salinity to 2000 m depth, and their movements indicate the direction and strength of ocean currents—important information for predicting weather.

Web Sites of the Week GEOSS – Global Earth Observation System of Systems

A Global Spatial Data Infrastructure? Difficult enough to get national players to work together… Is GSDI a process, a general framework or a product? Who are the stakeholders? Who needs it? (military doing what they need themselves?)