Information in environmental data grids.

Area of Science:

• Environmental data science
• Information management
• Distributed computing

Background:

• Accessing heterogeneous environmental data across networks is challenging due to varied formats and storage.
• Existing ISO standards offer limited guidance on domain-specific information landscapes.
• The UK NERC DataGrid requires robust solutions for mediating data access.

Purpose of the Study:

• To present a novel information taxonomy for environmental data.
• To introduce two information components for data understanding and manipulation.
• To demonstrate the application of these components within a real-world data infrastructure.

Main Methods:

• Development of a domain-specific information taxonomy.
• Creation of two distinct information components: one for data understanding, one for data manipulation.
• Deployment of these components within the UK NERC DataGrid.

Main Results:

• The developed information taxonomy provides a structured approach to describing environmental data.
• The information components effectively aid in data understanding and manipulation tasks.
• Successful integration and deployment within the UK NERC DataGrid demonstrate practical utility.

Conclusions:

• The proposed information taxonomy and components offer a viable solution for homogeneous access to heterogeneous environmental data.
• These tools enhance the usability and accessibility of environmental data resources.
• The approach is applicable to other distributed environmental data systems.