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CONTENTSIGOS Strategic Implementation:Project and Partnership
CEOS Analysis Group Activity
CNES Activities in Relation with User Organizations
News from the Working Group on Information Systems and Services---This page
The CEOS Information Locator System CILS
News from the International Ocean Colour Coordinating Group
Information on the Preparation of the 11th Plenary
News from the Working Group on Information Systems and Services
Helen M. Wood Director, Office of Satellite Data Processing and Distribution, NOAA/NESDIS Jean Schiro-Zavela International and Interagency Affairs, NOAA/NESDIS
The CEOS Working Group on Information Systems and Services (WGISS)
held its fourth meeting in May 14-16, 1997 at the Canada Centre for Remote
Sensing in Ottawa. It was immediately preceded by the first meeting of
the WGISS Strategy Task Team on May 12-13. The three WGISS Subgroups-Access,
Data, and Networks-met in Toulouse, France (hosted by CNES) in April 1997,
along with a number of WGISS Task Teams.
- WGISS welcomed Takashi Moriyama of NASDA as Vice Chair, and thanked
Hiroshi Kikuchi of NASDA for his years of leadership with WGISS and for
championing the importance of a heightened consideration of networking
issues within WGISS and its predecessor groups. Mr. Moriyama will complete
Mr. Kikuchi's term as WGISS Vice Chair and then succeed Helen Wood of NOAA
as WGISS Chair, following the CEOS Plenary in November 1997. WGISS endorsed
the nomination of Peter Churchill of the European Commission as Vice Chair
for two years, starting in November 1997, and to then succeed Mr. Moriyama
as Chair of WGISS.
Building on discussions begun at the WGISS Strategy Task Team meeting, WGISS prepared a proposal regarding the Integrated Global Observing Strategy (IGOS) initiative. WGISS offers to support the IGOS pilot projects through tools, techniques, and recommended practices for:
- data identification, Equating data needed for the projects;
- data delivery, using and establishing advanced network capabilities; and
- data preparation, including formatting and geometric transformation, to support interuse of data.
For each of the six IGOS projects, a WGISS point of con-tact has been identified and examples offered for how WGISS can contribute to the project.
Gerard Szejwach, WGISS Vice Chair for user interaction, reported on the CEOS/IGBP High Resolution Satellite Data Project. The objective of the task is to facilitate access to a limited number of high resolution satellite data scenes to meet the needs of the global change community represented by International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme scientists. The data will be used for global and transect studies. In January 1998, the Project will make specific data requests to provider agencies. As requested by the 1996 CEOS Plenary, WGISS adopted the project.
Also at the request of the 1996 CEOS Plenary, WGISS began consideration of efforts in the area of Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Terry Fisher described CCRS' proposal to increase interoperability of GIS and Earth observation (EO) data within existing WGISS tasks and proposed to conduct a demonstration project to use a single data interface protocol to access full-resolution GIS and EO data from a Canadian network interface.
Strategy Task Team
The Strategy Task Team agreed to focus on evaluating the consequences of the technical work done by the subgroups/task teams and developing strategic recommendations to direct WGISS toward accomplishing its longterm goals. The STT encouraged Subgroups and Task Teams to engage in proactive encouragement of adoption of their results by data users and providers. Increased outreach to the user community is urged, by involving users in prototype and demonstration projects, The IGOS projects are seen as a significant opportunity for outreach to the user community. Before the second Strategy Task Team meeting, to be held in conjunction with WGISS-5 in October 1997, members of the STT will draft a paper describing the types and characteristics of target users and uses of WGISS' work, as well as the needs and constraints of data providers. User needs and the developing IGOS pilot projects will be major topics of discussion at the second STT meeting.
Data Subgroup
In conjunction with its April meeting, the Data Subgroup (DS) held initial meetings of two new tasks: Data Interoperability and Archiving. The Data Interoperability Task Team's objective is to explore issues involved with accessing data in a range of formats over the Internet using World Wide Web technologies, A current prototyping activity is installation of NASA's "DAAC-in-a-Box" at a number of sites that have data in differing formats, At the Archiving task team's orientation meeting in April, participants agreed to develop a work plan and expressed common concerns about the recording of raw data in digital format and the long-term stability and exchange of data from mission archives based on robotic libraries. Excellent progress has been made on the 1-km AVHRR (land cover) and 1-km topographic (elevation) global land data sets. The DS continues working on format and auxiliary data guide-line documents, while the Global Mapping task team is preparing a tutorial on map projections and a review of existing and alternative schemes for global mapping. The Ocean Color task reported on two meetings of the International Ocean Color Coordination Group and an upcoming Ocean Data Symposium in October.
Access Subgroup
The World Wide Web Task Team hosted a well-attended workshop in February 1997, regarding the use of Web technology to provide access to Earth observation/geo-referenced data; the next workshop is planned for February 1998. The on-line version of the "Yellow Pages" Worldwide Directory of On-Line Services for Earth Observation Data Users is available. The International Directory network now has four coordinating nodes (including UNEP) and over 5000 data set descriptions. WGTSS agreed that the Catalog Interoperability Protocol (CIP) should be presented to the CEOS Plenary as a formal standard for achieving interoperability among disparate data catalog systems, Meanwhile, CINTEX continues to test existing catalogs protocols for actual global interoperability. The Browse task team is developing recommendation regarding browse formats; these and other recommendations regarding various aspects of interoperable catalog systems will be summarized in an on-line Guidelines document.
to be continued on Page7
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