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OceanShare: Interactive Access to Distributed In Situ Data

in a Collaborative Tool Environment

D.W. DenboC.R. Windsor

NOAA/Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory

Presented by:Chris Moore

http://www.epic.noaa.gov/collabhttp://www.pmel.noaa.gov/~nns/talks/dot

16th IIPS/AMS, 9 – 14 January, 2000, Long Beach, CA

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What is OceanShare? OceanShare

» A collaborative tool for integrated browsing of oceanographic and meteorological data from multiple geographically distributed archives.

Combines» Uniform Java access to distributed data archives» Interactive Java graphics» Java RMI/CORBA networking middleware» NCSA Habanero product for fully collaborative

environment» Platform independence (Mac, PC, Unix) Creating» Networked access to distributed data sets in a

collaborative tool environment for oceanographers or meteorologists

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Lack of uniformity between data sites is a barrier to data exploration and data integration activities» Need uniform, centralized access to

distributed data archives!

Inter-institutional collaborations are awkward between observational scientists.» Distance is a barrier to collaboration!

Why OceanShare?

Traditional techniques for remote collaborations involving environmental data are inflexible and static.» Faxing, e-mailing, or posting on the Web

provides limited interactions between scientists!

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Web technologies combined with Java present new opportunities for collaboration.» On-the-fly creation of interactive graphics in

a dynamic environment, with white boarding and audio chat, promotes unlimited, spontaneous data exploration and discussion leading to fruitful scientific collaboration!

OceanShare

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Scientists use networks not airplanes for collaboration

Objectives Interactive and collaborative environment for data exploration» Uniform access to multiple geographically distributed data archives

» Interactive Java graphics» Integration of data from local and remote data archives

» Interactive annotation of data– Highlight individual plots– add text, arrows, lines, etc

» User interaction with the data– Dynamic query of data values and metadata– Graphics zoom capability with automatic rescaling of axes

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Approach

Leverage heavily from successful developments:

Habanero: distributed interpersonal communications framework supporting multi-user, collaborative work environments.

NOAAServer2: centralized and unified view of geographically distributed, networked NOAA environmental data and information servers.

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NCSA Habanero

Developers toolkit Transforms Java applications into multiple-user

collaborative environments Collaborative features:

» Whiteboard, Text Editor, WWW Shared Session, Audio Chat

Platform independent (PC, Mac, Unix) Freely available from NCSA: http://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/SDG/Software/Habanero/

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NOAAServer2

Connects 5 NOAA data servers in Seattle, Silver Spring, Boulder» Atmospheric and oceanographic profiles, time series, gridded

data

Object oriented data model Off-the-shelf software for network data access Interactive, zooming Java Graphics Platform independent (Mac, PC, Unix)

http://www.joss.ucar.edu/NOAAServer/

OceanShare Architecture

OceanShareclient

CO

RB

AIIOP

Habanero Environment

Habanero communications

Local data files

netCDF

CORBAServer IIOP

Localprotocols

Remote Climatology

CORBAServer IIOP

Localprotocols

Remote Sea Level

CORBAServer IIOP

Localprotocols

Remote Profile Data

Example showing one OceanShare client (i.e., a scientist) and remote data archives

Data AccessData can be loaded from:

Swing User InterfaceClient Code

SGT DataModel netCDF

CORBA

OceanShare

PostgresSQLDataBase

RemoteData

LocalData

Local data files(presently only local netCDF files can be loaded)

CORBAData

ModelServer Code

netCDFJDBC

RemoteDataServer

CORBA Remote Data Server(Remote Data Server is responsible for making the data available using the Data Model)The data access module is separate from display, allowing us to easily extend OceanShare to new data formats.

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Habanero Communications

Habanero Environment

Jordans’Client

Jillians’Client

Jonathans’Client 1

1. Jonathan selects aprofile

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2. OceanShare sendsEvent to Habanero

3 333. Habanero informsall clients of event

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Scientific Graphics Toolkit Facilitates easy development of Java graphics applications Graphics characteristics:

» Interactive, publication quality graphics, with zoom capability

» Flexible, object oriented» Tailored for scientific, environmental data displays Scientific Graphics Toolkit Features:» Axes are user settable or automatically scaled» Sophisticated time axis labeling» Object oriented, labels are moveable, customizable

objects» Platform independent (Mac, PC, Unix) Freely available:» http://www.epic.noaa.gov/NOAAServer/sgt

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OceanShare Demo

Scenario: Two researchers looking at recent CTD measurements taken near 155W 0N.

OceanShare Demo

Whiteboard

OceanShare Demo

Local Data Selection

5 CTD profiles displayed in OceanShare

OceanShare Demo

Highlight one profile

Selection of remote dataset on the network

OceanShare Demo

Add new plot of TAO buoy temperatures

OceanShare Demo

Add data from June 13th

OceanShare Demo

Zoom to 25 meters

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OceanShare summary OceanShare is a collaborative “Portal” to

distributed data » Uniform, networked access to multiple

geographically distributed data archives» Interactive Java graphics» Collaborative environment» Platform independent (Mac, PC, Unix)

Scientists use networks not airplanes for collaboration » Networked access to distributed data sets in a

collaborative tool environment for oceanographers or meteorologists

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Proposed collaborative Data Portals:

Climate Data Portal» Uniform access to distributed NOAA El Nino Observing System

data and NODC archives of observed data

Hazardous Materials Response Data Portal» Uniform access to distributed hazardous materials data and

information to support hazardous spill response efforts Collaborative Problem Solving Environment for

Fisheries Oceanography Combined Investigations (FOCI)» Fisheries biologists and physical oceanographers (Seattle,

Fairbanks)» Secure document repository

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NODCPMEL

JOSS

UHSLC

ODU

KOREA(KORDI)CHINA

(NMDIS)

TAIWAN(NCOR)

AUSTRALIA(AODC)

CO-OPS

UA

AOMLFSU

NCSUNCDC

Potential Data Portal Partners: