1. GEOSS Architecture Describes how components fit together for providing data and information that will be better …than the individual components or systems of which it is composed. Links together strategies and systems to facilitate Earth observations in a comprehensive, coordinated, and sustained manner. GEOSS will be a distributed system of systems, building step-by-step on current cooperation efforts among existing observing and processing systems within their mandates, while encouraging and accommodating new components.

2. Core Architecture GEOSS Component, Service registry Standards, Special Arrangements Registries references GEO Web Portal and other Clients searches Offerors contribute to register GEOSS Clearinghouse Catalogues Services User accesses list of catalogues accesses searches invokes reference

3. GEOSS Architecture for the Air Quality Community (March 2008) GEOSS Comp. Registry Community AQ Portal extracts Service Offeror registers GEOSS Clearinghouse Catalog list Searches, harvests bind, invoke references publish provides Standards; SIF Registry Adopted from Percivall, Feb 2008 by R. Husar, March 2008Percivall, Feb 2008 Community AQ Catalog Catalog User Services find, select Community Of Practice links to GEOSSCommunity Service Offerors, Users

4. GEOSS Architecture for the Air Quality Community (March 2008) GEOSS Comp. Registry Community AQ Portal extracts Service Offeror registers GEOSS Clearinghouse Catalog list Searches, harvests invokes references publishes provides Standards; SIF Registry Adopted from Percivall, Feb 2008 by R. Husar, March 2008Percivall, Feb 2008 Community AQ Catalog Catalog User Service Workflow composes Data Analyst visualizes Reports to Decision Maker Policy Analyst Informs Services find Community Of Practice links to GEOSSCommunity Service Offerors, Users

5. GEOSS Architecture for the Air Quality Community (March 2008) GEOSS Comp. Registry Community AQ Portal extracts Service Offeror registers GEOSS Clearinghouse Catalog list Searches, harvests invokes references publishes provides Standards; SIF Registry Adopted from Percivall, Feb 2008 by R. Husar, March 2008Percivall, Feb 2008 Community AQ Catalog Catalog User Service Workflow composes Data Analyst visualizes Reports to Decision Maker Policy Analyst Informs Services find Community Of Practice links to GEOSSCommunity Service Offerors, Users

6. Architecture – Future Developments Future development should begin with defining scenarios for decision support needs of GEOSS Societal Benefit Areas. The core architecture should then be refined based upon these needs as defined by the GEO Committees (in particular the UIC), Communities of Practice and other relevant GEO Tasks. Architecture definition should continue, including: development of scenarios using an enterprise modeling approach; further definition of workflow for observation processing and decision support; and, extend the architecture to include observation nodes to support such use cases as inter-calibration. Operational requirements should be identified including decisions on resources allocation, commitments, persistency and governance that recognize and supplement the voluntary contribution nature of GEO.