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Kickoff Meeting for the Interoperable Geographic Information for Biosphere Study (IGIBS) Project

Kickoff Meeting for the Interoperable Geographic Information for Biosphere Study (IGIBS) Project. Welsh Institute for Sustainable Education, 11 th April, 2011, Chris Higgins, Project Manager, chris.higgins@ed.ac.uk. Agenda. Align Business Objectives.

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Kickoff Meeting for the Interoperable Geographic Information for Biosphere Study (IGIBS) Project

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  1. Kickoff Meeting for the Interoperable Geographic Information for Biosphere Study (IGIBS) Project Welsh Institute for Sustainable Education, 11th April, 2011, Chris Higgins, Project Manager, chris.higgins@ed.ac.uk

  2. Agenda

  3. Align Business Objectives Institute of Geography and Earth Sciences Welsh Assembly Government EDINA Within limits of the JISC programme aims and the project proposal. Suggest we spend afternoon fleshing out project plan and maximising the size of the sweet spot in the middle

  4. Panel Comments on the IGIBS Proposal 1of2 • ... interoperability with the emerging national SDI through INSPIRE compliance. • Shibboleth authenticated OWS will be of particular benefit to the academic community • ...the bid fails to present the use case with sufficient clarity • ...could have been presented with much greater force.  • ... may well be valuable work and an important use case, but flaws in presentation and argumentation mean that it is impossible to give it wholehearted endorsement. • ... through the interoperability of its components, is worthwhile.  Secondly, by engaging with a specific biosphere initiative the project potentially extends the breadth and depth of the JISC geospatial user community. • Less is said directly about the benefits for HE... • The proposal is missing a forceful and clear, general, layman's description of the benefits and purpose of the tool.  • The central benefit appears to be the creation of an application that 'will allow users to upload data and automatically generate an instance of a WMS

  5. Panel Comments on the IGIBS Proposal 2of2 • ... should release 2 or more months to achieve the necessary staff recruitment, mitigating the associated risk. • ...no visual or verbal description of timings and, above all, dependencies.  The bid alludes to checkpoint meetings, without indicating, even roughly, key milestones, timings for progress checking. • ... bid does not really present a clear case for the reuse of the outputs in other scenarios... • ...a substantial contribution from the Welsh Assembly Government. • ...would perhaps have liked to see some more thought given to extension of tools from this project across a broader range of (potential) users. • Stakeholder engagement will be primarily through the RA employed at IGES (recruitment required). • 26% contribution to costs by the participants... • ... this team is highly qualified for the work proposed...

  6. IGIBS Deliverables (from proposal)

  7. Introduction to Biosffer Dyfi Biosphere

  8. Vision Statement “The Dyfi Biosphere will be recognised and respected internationally, nationally and locally for the diversity of its natural beauty, heritage and wildlife, and for its people’s efforts to make a positive contribution to a more sustainable world. It will be a self confident, healthy, caring and bilingual community, supported by a strong locally-based economy.”

  9. Constitution • Coordination Body - Dyfi Partnership • Sets strategy • Action plan (currently under compilation, comprised of relevant independent endorsed projects) • Secretariat • Initially CCW • Now WAG • The 4 LA’s next • Representatives (approx 30) from: • Local community • WAG • Thematic Groups (Mike Woods for Research?)

  10. Thematic Groupings • Education: schools mostly • Tourism • Welsh Language Culture: brings together language initiatives, stimulate activity related to Welsh cultural heritage • Community & Heritage: example of uploading material to http://beta.peoplescollectionwales.co.uk • Conservation, landscape, land use and rural livelihoods: low carbon based livelihoods, adaptation to environmental change • Farming • Research & Monitoring • Last meeting was in Autumn 2010 • Next meeting 18th May 2011 • Chaired by IGES

  11. Some example linked activities/ideas • “Passport” to the Biosphere • Dyfi Footprint Project • Tirwedd Dyfi. (Arts project, connections between Welsh language/culture and landscape) • New Pathways for Sustainable Rural Livelihoods • Dyfi Osprey Project • Wood-fuelled district heating for Dinas Mawddwy • Feasibility study into how local farmers could obtain a premium through using a Biosphere brand • Darganfod Dyfi / Explore Dyfi

  12. IGIBS in the EDINA/JISC context • essential background to this project from this perspective • what others need to know to understand why in IGIBS. • what we want/expect out the project

  13. JISC • Joint Information Systems Committee • JISC Infrastructure for Education and Research Programme • Geospatial Strand (Tagged JISCGeo) • Projects to increase the use of geospatial tools, infrastructure (data and services) and information for learners, teachers and researchers; to enhance tools and services and related practice as well as identifying future requirements • Projects must…address real world end user problems

  14. EDINA EDINA • JISC Designated, part of University of Edinburgh • A National Data Centre for Tertiary Education since 1995 to enhance the productivity of research, learning and teaching in UK higher and further education (mission statement) • Focus is on services but also undertake r&D • EDINA provides technical support in the operation of the UK Access Management Federation • Uses Shibboleth open source software (an implementation of OASIS Security Assertion Markup Language) • Approx 8 million users • 837 Member Organisations (IdPs and SPs)

  15. GECO • Geospatial Engagement & Community Outreach • http://geco.blogs.edina.ac.uk/ • Managed by EDINA (James Reid) • The overarching purpose of GECO is to foster a community(ies) of users of geospatial resources (data, services, support). Geospatial, taken in its broadest sense underpins a vast array of academic endeavour - geography represents a fundamental organising axis for information

  16. Spatial Data Infrastructure “SDI encompasses the policies, organisational remits, data, technologies, standard delivery mechanism and financial and human resources necessary to ensure that those working with spatial data, whether at the global or local scale, are not impeded in meeting their objectives (INSPIRE consultation paper, 2003)” • Infrastructure for Spatial Information in Europe (INSPIRE) Directive • UK Location Programme (Our National SDI) • UK Academic SDI • Some key EDINA/JISC components of the UK Academic SDI relevant to IGIBS: • GoGeo! http://www.gogeo.ac.uk/ • GeoDoc • ShareGeo

  17. Main IGIBS Aim – Improve UK SDI Interoperability • Real world SDI R&D requirements • Resources • Data Public sector Academic sector Virtuous Circle • Better educated graduates • Future customers/employees used to using high quality public sector reference data via Geospatial Web Services • R&D requirements get met

  18. What EDINA wants from the project • A successful story! In other words, some serious progress with aim expressed on the previous slide. • Specifically: • UK Public Authorities using Shibboleth and it made easier for them to share data with the academic sector • Those EDINA Academic SDI components getting used more, eg, 10-15 good quality metadata records • A “WMS factory” tool that demonstrably works and gets taken up by the wider GI community • A simple mapping application that progresses to being integral to the Dyfi Biosphere Reserve • Follow-on project(s). Only so much can be achieved in 7 months

  19. If I had to prioritise…

  20. What EDINA GETS from the project depends on …

  21. IGIBS in the Welsh Assembly Government context

  22. IGIBS in the University Aberystwyth/IGES context

  23. WP1: Project Management

  24. Project Orientation • jiscGEO wiki • “Official” JISC page • Programme Manager SLA • igibs tag and its use • Video on project documentation (the 7 steps) • How many of the deliverables can be presented during the project as part of the “community conversation”? • Turn project plan into Blog posts • Team use of Blog

  25. With your help today, consider how to re-write sections, re-package and post Core IGIBS team (CH, BC, MK) to meet as close to possible to weekly at IGES and blog regularly. All others welcome any time either physically or by Skype

  26. Which of these can be blog posts?

  27. Meetings • Weekly, or close to weekly, at IGES. CH will come and meet with BC to hold Skype call with MK. Others to participate in Skype calls or drop in as they wish, or as required, etc. • Monthly UKLP Data Publishing Working Group meetings • 18th May. Dyfi Biosphere Research and Monitoring Group meeting • 27-30 June, INSPIRE Conference, Edinburgh • Final project meeting, Sept/Oct

  28. WP2: Stakeholder Engagement

  29. IGIBS Deliverables (from proposal)

  30. From the proposal • Real world, localised, inter-disciplinary, end user problems are brought into focus by concentrating on research and education requirements which have emerged from the UNESCO Dyfi Biosphere reserve • …work with a range of endusers and potential end-users to make sure their requirements inform… • …primarily by the range of academic disciplines and public sector organisations represented on the Dyfi Biosphere reserve Scientific Advisory Group…

  31. Methodology • Include: • Site visits • Hosted meetings • Interviews • Use of social media tools • UoA will “test” needs tested in: • Forest Research Platform • Education via IGES digital resource centre

  32. User Groups • Students, researchers, etc, within IGES • Students, researchers, etc, within the rest of the University of Aberystwyth, ie, other disciplines • Other academic sector Wales, UK • Other non-academic sector users 1 2 3 4 • Groups 1-3 research and education related to Dyfi Biosphere • Group 4. Citizens, see thematic groupings

  33. Report articulating real world end user problems that drove project • Use cases not well articulated in project plan • Need to be fleshed out • Can document in the blog? • How to do it?

  34. Best Practice model for using UK academic SDI at the dept level • What is this? • A report primarily for other departments in other universities to use • Focussed on IGES • Needs scoped as will stray into wider Research Data Management issues

  35. Report articulating future requirements • Hopefully one or more blog posts that will emerge from the “community conversation” over the duration of the project?

  36. WP3: Application Development

  37. IGIBS Deliverables (from proposal)

  38. Working prototype of the “WMS factory” tool Implementation Questions • Mapservervs.Geoserver • Natural Environment Framework (NEF) • GIS Library to process user-uploaded data: • Gdal/Ogr • Geotools

  39. Choice of WMS • Minnesota WMS • Existing work done with UKLP • Tested for INSPIRE compliance (with EDINA extensions) • Very fast (given our requirements) • Easy to create dynamic WMS instances • Geoserver 2.1 RC4 (released 5th April) • Still a Release Candidate • There is a community plugin funded by OS which does not yet implement all the necessary extensions for full Technical Guidance v3 compliance.

  40. User-uploaded data • Vector and/or raster? • SHAPE, GML (>3.1.1), E00 • Geotiff, JPEG etc. • Metadata: • The input data alone are not sufficient for a production WMS Service. • Should the user provide extra metadata? To what extent? • source, scale, accuracy and intended audience of a particular data set.

  41. Data Quality • Questions to be answered: • What is the age of the data? • Where did it come from? • In what medium was it originally produced? • What is the areal coverage of the data? (probed) • What projection, coordinate system, and datum were used in maps? (probed) • In what format is the data kept? • How was the data checked? • Why was the data compiled? • What is the reliability of the provider?

  42. Current Plan • Continuous incremental improvements: • Design and implement a prototype that can be used within a month. • Use a “point of contact” to provide feedback after each development iteration Ensure that the project constantly satisfies user requirements. Ensure that the project constantly satisfies user requirements.

  43. Simple mapping application • Essential for demonstration purposes • Based on the Wales Ecosystem portal if possible (an OpenLayers client)

  44. WP4: Access Control

  45. Shibboleth • Internet2 consortium • Open source package for web Single Sign On across admin boundaries based on standards: • Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML)‏ • Organisations can exchange user information and make security assertions by obeying privacy policies • Devolved authentication – maintain and leverage existing user management • Enables finer grained authorisation through use of attributes • Small coordination centre, large federation of organisations (service and identity providers) • Many Shibboleth Access Management Federations: • https://www.aai.dfn.de/links/ • https://spaces.internet2.edu/display/SHIB/ShibbolethFederations

  46. UK Access Management Federation • Managed by JISC Collections (previously JANET) and EDINA • Federation Operator: JISC Collections • Technical and Operational Support: EDINA • 840 Member Organisations (IdPs and SPs) • Approximately 8 million users • Cost of running is not insignificant

  47. Key Roles within an Access Management Federation IdP IdP IdP IdP IdP IdP Federation Service Providers SP SP SP Identity Providers Organisations SP SP Coordinating Centre SP SP Users SP SP SP SP SP SP

  48. Example Shibboleth Login Procedures http://www.switch.ch/aai/demo/medium.html

  49. Why put effort into federated access control? • Authentication is the process of verifying that claims made concerning a subject, eg, identity, who is attempting to access a resource are true, ie, authentic • Frequently, SDI content and service providers need to know who is accessing their valuable, secure, protected, etc, data • The ability for a group of organisations with common objectives, ie, a federation, to securely exchange authentication information is a powerful SDI enabler • Article 19 of the INSPIRE Directive ”…Member States may limit public access…etc, etc”. • Even more so if removing some of the barriers to interoperability…

  50. Why put effort into federated access control round OWS? • Open geospatial interoperability standards underpin SDI • OGC Standards agnostic about security • Grand challenge: lack of a genuinely interoperable security solution a major barrier to all sectors • EU requested that ESDIN project focus on testing practical existing solutions • Prior work by same team (JISC funded SEE-GEO project) • Demonstrated Shibb Access Control around WMS • No changes to the OWS interface specification • No changes to the core mainstream Shibboleth

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