1. George Percivall OGC Chief Architect 25 July 2010
Use of Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) Standards in the Geosciences Tutorial at IGARSS 2010
George Percivall
OGC Chief Architect
25 July 2010
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

2. Use of OGC Standards in the Geosciences
This tutorial will provide an overview of standards from the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) and their use in the geosciences.
The OGC is a non-profit, international, voluntary consensus standards organization.  
Geosciences have been a main driver for OGC standards.  
Concepts from geodesy,  remote sensing, metrology, and science informatics were used to define the standards.  
The standards have been applied both before and after adoption to the fields of hydrology, geology, meteorology, oceanography, land cover, and many other scientific domains of the geosciences.  
Geoscience applications will be presented showing use of OGC standards for data and information discovery, access, processing, fusion and decision-support.
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

3. IGARSS 2010 Tutorial Use of OGC Standards in the Geosciences
1. Why open standards matter (08:30 am) e1. KML exercise 2. Standards for geoscience information e2. CSML feature exercise 3. OGC Web Service standards Break (10:15 to 10:30 am) 4. Sensor Web Enablement standards e3/4. OWS operation exercise 5. Geoweb – a global community e5. OWS client exercise 6. Applying this on your system (adjourn 12:30 pm)
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

4. Instructor: George Percivall
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
BS Engineering Physics
MS Electrical Engineering - Control Systems
Hughes Aircraft
GOES and GMS Weather Satellite System Engineer
Commercial Systems Engineering
NASA EOSDIS Core System Chief Engineer:
Evaluation Prototypes and Terra/Landsat Release
NASA representative to OGC, FGDC and ISO TC 211
Joined OGC in 2004
Chief Architect
Executive Director, Interoperability Program
IEEE Senior Member - member since 1983
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

5. Exercises developed by Arnulf Christl
Geography and Informatics at Phillipps University of Marburg, and Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelm University of Bonn, Germany
ExSE Experimental Server development of OGC WMT standard
Founder and owner of CCGIS Consulting Center for GIS, Bonn
Joined OGC as Principal Member in 2006
Design, Implementation of the Geoportal of Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany
Co-Founder of the non-profit Open Source Geospatial Foundation (OSGeo)
Elected president of OSGeo (2008)
Founder and owner of the WhereGroup, Bonn (
Design and Implementation of the Pollutant Release and Tranfer Registry of Germany (
Joined the OGC Architecture Board in 2008
Founder of the brand Metaspatial (2010) focusing on Metadata in the Geospatial Realm
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

6. George Percivall OGC Chief Architect 25 July 2010
Section 1. Why Open Standards Matter OGC and Geosciences Tutorial at IGARSS 2010
George Percivall
OGC Chief Architect
25 July 2010
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

7. Interoperability allows a Common Reality
“What we are doing is facilitating a common picture of reality for different organizations which have different views of the reality, the disaster, the emergency, the catastrophe, that they all have to deal with collectively”
David Schell
Chairman
OGC
Copyright © 2009, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.,

8. OGC and Geosciences Tutorial 1. Why Open Standards Matter
What do we mean by open standards?
The value of open standards
The OGC organization and programs
OGC Standards
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

9. What is a standard?
A document, established by consensus and approved by a community using formal processes, that provides, for common and repeated use, rules, guidelines or characteristics for activities or their results, aimed at the achievement of the optimum degree of order in a given context.
EuroControl Aeronautical
SkyView2 application
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc. 9 9

10. What do we mean by “Open” Standard?
Freely and publicly available
Non discriminatory
No license fees
Vendor neutral
Data neutral
Agreed to by a formal consensus process
What do we mean by “open” and an “open system”? First, consider the term “open”. This adjective is used extensively in the IT industry – including the GIS industry. But very seldom do we see this term actually defined. At the OGC, we use the term Open in very much the same way as the Open Source organization does (
So, from the OGC perspective, we and our members firmly believe that all of the standards and specifications created by the OGC member consensus process must be:
Freely and publicly available: All of the OGC specifications must be available free of charge (no royalties) and unencumbered by patents and other intellectual property.
Non discriminatory: Available to any one, any organization, any time, any where with no restrictions.
No license fees: There are no charges any time for the use of OpenGIS specifications.
Vendor neutral: The OpenGIS specifications do not favor any vendor over another. They are vendor neutral in terms of their content and implementation concept.
Data neutral: OpenGIS Specifications are independent of any data storage model or format.
Agreed to by a formal, member based consensus process: All OpenGIS specifications are defined, documented, and approved by a formal, member driven consensus process. The OGC Technical Committee Polices and Procedures document all aspects of the formal consensus process.
Definitions from the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) Open System: A system with characteristics that comply with specified, publicly maintained, readily available standards and that therefore can be connected to other systems that comply with these same standards. A system is a combination of two or more interrelated services arranged in a functional package to perform an operational function or to satisfy a requirement. Within the OGC, many of the terms and concepts related to open systems and interoperability can be traced to the OSI-RM, or OSI Reference Model. Essentially, this is a model of network architecture and a suite of protocols (a protocol stack) to implement it, developed by ISO in 1978 as a framework for international standards in heterogeneous computer network architecture.
Copyright © 2009, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.,

11. Copyright © 2009, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.,
Why Open Standards?
Rapidly mobilize new capabilities – plug and play
Lower systems costs
Encourage market competition
Choose based on functionality desired
Avoid “lock in” to a proprietary architecture
Decisions to share information and services become policy decisions
Copyright © 2009, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.,

12. Interoperability and Standards are Key
OGC Vision
To achieve the full societal, economic and scientific benefits of integrating location resources into commercial and institutional processes worldwide
Source: CSIRO, South Esk River Catchment Hydrologic Sensor Web, Tasmania
Source: Fisheries and Oceans Canada
Mapster
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc. 12

13. OGC and Geosciences Tutorial 1. Why Open Standards Matter
What do we mean by open standards?
The value of open standards
The OGC organization and programs
OGC Standards
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

14. Some (non-interoperating) Web Mapping Systems
Web Browser
GIS
DATA X
TIGER Map Server
EnviroMapper
MapGuide™
Internet Map Server
GLOBE Visualization
ELVIS
Orthophoto Browser
NetGIS
Spatial Web Broker
PARC Map Viewer
STAR Next Surf
GeoMedia™ WebMap
CARIS Internet Server
MapObjects IMS
MapXtreme™
Mapquest Internet
TerraServer
Copyright © 2006 Open Geospatial Consortium

15. A Concrete Example TerraServer - http://terraserver.microsoft.com
MapQuest -
EPA -
Copyright © 2006 Open Geospatial Consortium

16. OGC Web Mapping GetMap Land GetMap Water GetMap Boundaries
Source A
Land
GetMap
Source B
GetMap
Water
Source C
Data about Digital Resources
Boundaries
Figure Source: Jeff de La Beaujardiere, NASA

17. Copyright © 2009, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.,
Return on Investment
Multiple studies confirm the value and advantage of open standards based solutions:
NASA Geospatial Interoperability: Return on Investment Study:
Value of Standards, Delphi Report:
Economic Benefits of Standardization, DIN German Institute for Standardization:
Copyright © 2009, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.,

18. Benefits - Participation in OGC Programs
Direct, legal, and broad dialog with industry on interoperability needs
Align industry on priority standards needs – User community organizations help to identify and prioritize requirements for new standards.
Improve choice and competition in the marketplace – Involvement in OGC helps create broad industry incentive to advance and implement OGC standards in their products. This increases the pool of standards-based products that can be plugged into a system or enterprise -- no single application meets the needs of all users
Small investments in the OGC process help to reduce technology life cycle risk and cost – minor investments by many OGC members often yields industry action and consensus on standards. When this happens, organizations reduce their reliance on custom solutions and associated maintenance costs
© 2007 Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

19. OGC and Geosciences Tutorial 1. Why Open Standards Matter
What do we mean by open standards?
The value of open standards
The OGC organization and programs
OGC Standards
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

20. Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.,
OGC Snapshot
An International Voluntary Consensus Standards Organization, founded in 1994.
400 members and growing
28 implementation standards
Hundreds of product implementations in the market
Broad user community implementation worldwide
OGC Membership Distribution
By Region
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.,

21. Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.,
OGC Snapshot
An International Voluntary Consensus Standards Organization, founded in 1994.
400 members and growing
28 implementation standards
Hundreds of product implementations in the market
Broad user community implementation worldwide
OGC Membership Distribution
By Type
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.,

22. Example Government Organizations
DOD Australia
Geoscience Australia
NSW Dept of Environment and Climate Change (Australia)
Eurocontrol
European Environment Agency
European Satellite Centre
European Space Agency
UK MOD
UK MET
METEO France
Korea Land & Housing
BRGM (France)
Ordnance Survey (UK)
State Land Agencies (Germany)
Natural Resources Canada
US DHS
US EPA
US FAA
US NASA
USGS
US NGA
US Census
US NOAA
JPEO
Oakridge National Lab
NC Dept of Environment & Natural Resources
Dept. Science & Technology (India)
EU Joint Research Centre
© 2010 Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc..

23. Example Member Organizations
© 2010 Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc..

24. OGC Alliance Partnerships A Critical Resource for Advancing Standards
Geospatial interoperability is our mission and our expertise. OGC has alliances with other major standards and professional organizations to assure that geospatial interoperability is consistently addressed across the broader IT community. There is a growing body of internet standards that employ OGC standards (such as OGC Geography Markup Language) to consistently define and address “location” across the internet and wireless.
… and others
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

25. OGC’s Approach for Advancing Interoperability
Interoperability Program (IP) - global, innovative, hands-on prototyping and testing program designed to accelerate interface development and validation, and bring interoperability to the market
Rapid Interface
Development
Specification Development Program – Consensus processes similar to other Industry consortia (World Wide Web Consortium, OMA, OMG, etc).
Standards
Setting
As a response, the OpenGIS concept and dream began due to:
1. The user’s need to integrate geographic information contained in heterogeneous data stores whose incompatible formats and data structures have prevented interoperability. This incompatibility has limited use of the technology in enterprise and Internet computing environments, and the time, cost, and expertise required for data conversion have slowed adoption of geoprocessing across all market segments.
2. The larger community’s need for improved access to public and private geodata sources, with preservation of the data’s semantics.
3. Agency and vendor needs to develop standardized approaches for specification of geoprocessing requirements for information system procurements.
4. The industry’s need to incorporate geodata and geoprocessing resources into national and enterprise information infrastructures, in order that these resources may be found and used as easily as any other network-resident data and processing resources.
5. Users’ need to preserve the value of their legacy geoprocessing systems and legacy geodata while incorporating new geoprocessing capabilities and geodata sources.
Marketing and Outreach Program – education and training, encourage take up of OGC specifications, business development, communications programs
Market
Adoption
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

26. Interoperability Program Development
Testbed
Pilot
OGC Network
Experiment
Specification Program
Technology Maturation
Specifications
Implementations
Demonstrations
Types of Interoperability Program Initiatives
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

27. OGC and Geosciences Tutorial 1. Why Open Standards Matter
What do we mean by open standards?
The value of open standards
The OGC organization and programs
OGC Standards
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

28. OGC Specifications http://www.opengeospatial.org/standards
Implementation Specifications - Standards
Basis for working software; detail the interface structure between software components
Abstract Specifications
Conceptual foundation / reference model for spec development
Best Practices
Describe use of specifications
Engineering Reports
Results from OGC Interoperability Program
Discussion Papers
Forum for public review of concepts

29. OGC Web Services Standards
Core OGC Standards:
Web Map Service (WMS)
Web Feature Service (WFS)
Web Coverage Service (WCS)
Catalogue (CSW)
Geography Markup Language (GML)
KML
Others…
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

30. Sensor Web Enablement (SWE)
© 2009 Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

31. Copyright © 2009, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.
Market Availability see
Free availability of standards stimulates market
Hundreds of Products Implementing OGC Standards
Compliance Test & Certification Program
Copyright © 2009, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

32. For Details on OGC Standards…
Freely available
OGC Reference Model (ORM)
Overview of OGC Standards Baseline
Resource for defining architectures for specific applications
George Percivall, gpercivall at opengeospatial.org
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

33. OGC and Geosciences Tutorial 1. Why Open Standards Matter
What do we mean by open standards?
The value of open standards
The OGC organization and programs
OGC Standards
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

34. Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.
Exercise 1: KML
Google contributed KML to become an open standard for geobrowsers
Exercises:
e1a. Effelsberg – offline
e1b. KML samples - online
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

35. OGC KML Encoding Standard
For geographic visualization, including annotation of maps and images.
Presentation of graphical data on the globe
Control of the user's navigation: where to go and where to look
XML encoding
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.

36. IGARSS 2010 Tutorial Use of OGC Standards in the Geosciences
1. Why open standards matter (08:30 am) e1. KML exercise 2. Standards for geoscience information e2. CSML feature exercise 3. OGC Web Service standards Break (10:15 to 10:30 am) 4. Sensor Web Enablement standards e3/4. OWS operation exercise 5. Geoweb – a global community e5. OWS client exercise 6. Applying this on your system (adjourn 12:30 pm)
Copyright © 2010, Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc.