Difference between revisions of "Geo Explorer"

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A service for performing assessment and harmonization on occurrence points of species. The aim is to provide users with an interface and methods for assessing if occurrence points are repeated, anomalous or for performing processing and aggregation operations on such data.
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GeoExplorer is a web application that allows users to navigate, organize, search and discovery internal or external layers.
 
This document outlines the design rationale, key features, and high-level architecture, as well as the deployment context.
 
This document outlines the design rationale, key features, and high-level architecture, as well as the deployment context.
  
 
== Overview ==
 
== Overview ==
  
The goal of this service is to offer a single entry point, in a certain scope, for processing, assessing and harmonizing occurrence points belonging to species observations. Data can come from the Species Discovery Service or they could be uploaded from a user by means of a web interface.  
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The main objective of this application is to offer centralized environment for access to the entire spatial data in a certain scope. By external visual components, as [https://gcube.wiki.gcube-system.org/gcube/index.php/Gis_Viewer GisViewer] it's also possible to explore and analyze a personal set of selected resources.
  
 
The service is able to interface to other infrastructural services in order to expand the number of functionalities and applications to the data under analysis.
 
The service is able to interface to other infrastructural services in order to expand the number of functionalities and applications to the data under analysis.
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=== Philosophy ===
 
=== Philosophy ===
  
This represents an endpoint for users who want to process species observation in order to explore their coherence and to extract some hidden properties from collected data coming from difference sources. This is meant as a complement to other services for species and occurrence points analysis.
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GeoExplorer is based on [http://www.infovis-wiki.net/index.php/Visual_Information-Seeking_Mantra Visual Information-Seeking Mantra], which is an approach to summarize the best user-interations order to get some information from a visual application: Overview first, Zoom and filter, Details on demand.
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The application use a cloud network of geospatial resources called [http://geonetwork-opensource.org/ Geonetwork], these resources are tipically [http://geoserver.org Geoserver] Layers. It's still possible to get external layers by their [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_Map_Service WMS] representation.
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=== Architecture ===
 
=== Architecture ===
 
The subsystem comprises the following components:
 
The subsystem comprises the following components:
  
* '''Inputs Managers''': a set of internal processors which manage the variety of inputs that could come from users or from other services;
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* '''GeoExplorer Central Controller''': manage all the internal components and their interactions;
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* '''Layers Grid Manager''': a set of objects and widgets that allows layers discovering by a grid;
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* '''Layer Info Panel''': widget that show all layer info (details on demand);
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* '''External WMS Layer Importer''': a set of objects for import an external WMS layer;
  
* '''Occurrence Point Processors''': a set of internal objects which can invoke external systems in order to process data or extract hidden properties from them. These include Clustering, Anomaly Points Detection etc.;
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* '''Layer Preview Generator''': an utility for obtain a preview image of a layer;
  
* '''Occurrence Points Enrichment''': a connector to another d4Science service (the [https://gcube.wiki.gcube-system.org/gcube/index.php/Occurrence_Data_Enrichment_Service Occurrence Enrichment Service]) dealing with the enrichment of occurrence points associated information, which is able to add indications about the chemical and physical characteristics of the oceans and earth;  
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* '''Data Retrieving Logic ''': a set of object that manage data filter, paging and ordering, exploiting the Geonetwork OGC Catalog Service for the Web ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalog_Service_for_the_Web CSW]);
  
* '''Occurrence Points Operations''': a connector to another d4Science interface which is able to operate on tabular data, by performing visualization, aggregation and transformations.
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* '''GCube GeoExplorer ''': an external wrapper which interact with some GCube components (such ASL, Workspace Light Tree, and so on).
  
* '''Processing Orchestrator''': an internal process which manages the interaction and the usage of the other components. It accepts and dispatches requests coming from outside the service.
 
  
 
A diagram of the relationships between these components is reported in the following figure:
 
A diagram of the relationships between these components is reported in the following figure:

Revision as of 19:30, 18 May 2012


GeoExplorer is a web application that allows users to navigate, organize, search and discovery internal or external layers. This document outlines the design rationale, key features, and high-level architecture, as well as the deployment context.

Overview

The main objective of this application is to offer centralized environment for access to the entire spatial data in a certain scope. By external visual components, as GisViewer it's also possible to explore and analyze a personal set of selected resources.

The service is able to interface to other infrastructural services in order to expand the number of functionalities and applications to the data under analysis.

Design

Philosophy

GeoExplorer is based on Visual Information-Seeking Mantra, which is an approach to summarize the best user-interations order to get some information from a visual application: Overview first, Zoom and filter, Details on demand.

The application use a cloud network of geospatial resources called Geonetwork, these resources are tipically Geoserver Layers. It's still possible to get external layers by their WMS representation.


Architecture

The subsystem comprises the following components:

  • GeoExplorer Central Controller: manage all the internal components and their interactions;
  • Layers Grid Manager: a set of objects and widgets that allows layers discovering by a grid;
  • Layer Info Panel: widget that show all layer info (details on demand);
  • External WMS Layer Importer: a set of objects for import an external WMS layer;
  • Layer Preview Generator: an utility for obtain a preview image of a layer;
  • Data Retrieving Logic : a set of object that manage data filter, paging and ordering, exploiting the Geonetwork OGC Catalog Service for the Web (CSW);
  • GCube GeoExplorer : an external wrapper which interact with some GCube components (such ASL, Workspace Light Tree, and so on).


A diagram of the relationships between these components is reported in the following figure:

Occurrence Points Reconciliation Service, internal architecture

Deployment

All the components of the service must be deployed together in a single node. This subsystem can be replicated on multiple hosts and scopes, this does not guarantee a performance improvement because it is a management system for a single input dataset.

Small deployment

The deployment follows the following schema as it needs the presence of other complementary services.

Occurrence Points Reconciliation Service, deployment schema

Use Cases

Well suited Use Cases

The subsystem is particularly suited when experiment have to be performed on occurrence points referring to a certain species or family. The set of operations which can be applied, even lying on state-of-the-art and general purpose algorithms, have been studied and developed for managing such kind of information.