Rescue andDigitization of Meteorological and

Hydrological Data Project

Funded by the Caribbean Development Bank

Implemented by the Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology

Draft ReportDatabase Management Consultant

• Consultant – Mr. Paul Whitfield (Canada)• Protocols and Policies for data sharing and

dissemination• Summarized interviews with…• … five member countries – Trinidad and Tobago,

Barbados, St. Lucia, Antigua and Barbuda, Jamaica

• …CIMH• …Data Design Team

Main Issues

• Sovereignty and data ownership• Value of data• Others related to station numbering and

database mirroring

Database Procedures

• More rigorous checking of additions to the database needs to be implemented e.g. all “insert data” actions must confirm an existing station number

• Data transfer must be done institution to institution rather than person to person

• A change management mechanism is needed to capture corrections made in home country databases, so that CIMH are holding a backup copy and not a divergent copy.

Policy for Exchange of Data

Individual Meteorological Services need to know who is using their data and how. Need to establish ownership and user expectations.• A Memorandum of Understanding between CIMH and each

data contributor should be developed so that scope and parameters of the ‘sharing’ of data is clear to both parties

• CIMH must be able to inform Individual Meteorological Services of requests for data.

• Create a user agreement that clearly indicates to the requestor the limits and requirements that accompany the receipt of the data – including ownership

Policy for Metadata

Metadata are generally unavailable and not specifically locatable• a common computer system for documenting

inspections, equipment, methods would be a valuable addition to QMS implementations and also to the documentation of climate observations.

• Documentation of station location and changes should be created and maintained

Cost Recovery

None of the Meteorological Services can recover costs of providing data into their operating budgets. If they do recover costs it goes to government ‘general revenues’• The recovery of the costs of providing data would

have to align with the needs and wishes of individual Meteorological Services

• Profits from such a service would have to be reinvested at CIMH, either in making the database sustainable, improving calibration services, or offsetting contributions

Plan for Sustainability

(i)Data provided outside country’s jurisdiction – sovereignty issue (ii) There is a general support of specific cost recovery should it offset costs or be invested in sustaining the database and data rescue• Develop a MOU or other instrument that would address

the Sovereignty Issues involved in the shift of responsibility of data provision from an individual Meteorological Service to CIMH.

• CIMH must ensure that they can deliver regional products from their portal and not just data for individual countries.

Models of Web Access

Limit the number of export data types to one or two of the most commonly used. Develop common functionality available through the web portal for users and NMSs.• Export selected raw data only in either *.CSV

or *.TXT formats• Develop common functionality for web

portal products that meets needs of NMSs and user community

Backup and MirroringNMSs rely on local copies and human involvement in backups. Offsite backups if they exist are ad-hoc. NMSs are aware of mirroring, but it seems to be viewed as a costly alternative.• Where countries have invested in CLIDATA, their investment

should not be abandoned. An investment in mirroring the Oracle database at CIMH coupled with a transfer mechanism to ingest CLIDATA DBMS into the new system is warranted

• Where countries are reliant on CLICOM, CLIMSOFT, or locally created software, a copy of the new DBMS which has sufficient functionality to support office operations should be provided to NMS to provide a basis for mirroring and exchange.