1. Data Access Tool
Biodiversity Information Service for Powys & Brecon Beacons National Park
Steve Goddard th Oct 2013
Thanks for inviting me
Introduce myself – name and job
Introduce BIS – LRC for central Wales – one of 4 LRCs in Wales
Here to talk to you about something we have been developing for the last 9 months

2. What is it? For the next 10 minutes…
The DAT is a web-based tool allowing the public, partners, recorders and wildlife trusts ‘live’ access to our data.
For the next 10 minutes…
Background
Functions
Challenges
Implications
Future development
What I am going to discuss:
Background (why built and objectives)
What it does (screen shots and possible demo)
Challenges (both ones overcome and on-going – technological and political)
Implications (disruptive technology, working practises, interaction with partners, data exchange)
Future (future development – commercial enquiries, verification)
Steve Goddard - Biodiversity Information Service
11/01/2019

3. Background Main objectives: Secondary objectives Technologies
Improve ‘visibility’ of our data
Improve partner access / reduce delay
Secondary objectives
Bring Wales LRC data ‘together’
Give access to recorders
Allow verification of historical data
Technologies
Geoserver / PHP / MySQL – All open source
Steve Goddard - Biodiversity Information Service
11/01/2019

4. Abilities - Public What’s in my back yard…
Just talk around screen shots
Results for the 1km square the point falls within
Sensitive species removed
Steve Goddard - Biodiversity Information Service
11/01/2019

5. Abilities – Partner > Search
Spatial search…
Search by point, line, polygon, bounding box – or gridref, predefined polygon – and buffers
The tool looks at the search area and the categories selected and works out which layers to search in Goeserver.
Layers are queried and then the results parsed.
Steve Goddard - Biodiversity Information Service
11/01/2019

6. Abilities – Partner > Results
Summarised results…
Mention full results – click on each record and see full record and map individual records.
Steve Goddard - Biodiversity Information Service
11/01/2019

7. Abilities – Partner > Mapping
Mapping of results…
Can map to Google, Bing – road or satellite.
No time to show:
Clustering
Export – CSV / PDF / KML
Saved searches
Designated sites
Distribution maps
Steve Goddard - Biodiversity Information Service
11/01/2019

8. Abilities – Partner > Dist. Maps
Steve Goddard - Biodiversity Information Service
11/01/2019

9. Challenges Technological Data Local agreements on data access
Steep learning curve – WFS/WMS
Internet connection speed
Data
Differences in taxon dictionaries among LRCs
Locally important species
Local agreements on data access
Limiting a DAT user to specific area
Limiting access to taxon groups (recorders)
Steve Goddard - Biodiversity Information Service
11/01/2019

10. Implications Early days – but very positive response from partners
Potentially – quite ‘disruptive’ to current business model
Changes to workload as partners carry out their own searches
Changes in SLAs and funding streams – how do we charge for usage
Encourages data exchange
Encourages education and interest in wildlife
Steve Goddard - Biodiversity Information Service
11/01/2019

11. Future Development Roll out access to Wildlife Trusts
Roll out access to County Recorders
Additional features:
Verification of historical records
Commercial enquiries (wizard and online payments)
Mobile / tablet version
Interpretation of data
Steve Goddard - Biodiversity Information Service
11/01/2019