r.s. weigel department of computational and data sciences
DESCRIPTION
The Virtual Radiation Belt Observatory (ViRBO) and tools for radiation belt science http://virbo.org/. R.S. Weigel Department of Computational and Data Sciences George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia. Contributors. Software * Eric Kihn (NOAA/NGDC, ViRBO Web and API) - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
The Virtual Radiation Belt Observatory (ViRBO) and tools
for radiation belt sciencehttp://virbo.org/
R.S. WeigelDepartment of Computational and
Data SciencesGeorge Mason University, Fairfax,
Virginia
ContributorsSoftware * Eric Kihn (NOAA/NGDC, ViRBO Web and API) * Mikhail Zhizhin (RFO, ViRBO Web and API) * Dmitry Mishin (RFO, ViRBO Web and API) * Dmitry Kokovin (RFO, ViRBO Web and API) * Jeremy Faden (Cottage Systems, Autoplot) Data * Dan Baker (CU/LASP, Data and metadata) * Sebastian Boudier (Onera, Data calibration) * Janet Green (NOAA/SEC, Data and metadata) * Shri Kanekal (CU/LASP, Data and metadata) * Reiner Friedel (LANL, Data and calibration) * Paul O'Brien (Aerospace, Data and metadata)
The Heliophysics Data Environment
Outline• What is a VxO?• Goal of VO effort• Where to start• Relevance of VO effort to
Scientist• Steps to create VO environment• Needed services• ViRBO
What is a VxO
• Virtual Observatory where x represents a domain such as thermosphere/ionosphere or radiation belt
• For a given community, a VxO provides– A comprehensive list of available data– Community-specific services on data– Connections to other VxOs with relevant
services
Goal of VO effort• “VOs should make ‘standard’ scientific research
much more efficient.” [Roberts et al., 2005]
• Rate of science output must keep up with rate of potential science output given amount of available data
• The framework which is used must allow for this
• Requires improvements in:search interfacesanalysis visualizationaccess communication
• … all parts of the chain from instrument or model output to end user must continuously improve.
History• In (funded) development for about 3 years• A fundamental change in the data
approach• Virtual Observatories for Radiation Belt,
Thermosphere/Ionosphere, Magnetosphere, Solar, and Heliosphere.
• Newer services include an event list manager, waves, and an energetic particles.
Where to start
• Look at http://vspo.gsfc.nasa.gov/• Key function: High-level pointers to
known data sets.• If you know of a data set that you
can’t find a reference to there, let them know.
• For more detailed information and services, VSPO will return pointers to relevant Virtual Observatory.
Relevance to Scientist
• Many of us have become data managers and solve similar problems do not depend on science specialty.
• We build ad-hoc solutions• If you have a problem, ask if it is cross-
domain. – If it is, there is probably another person or VO
working on a similar problem. There is usually potential for leveraging effort.
• Example: Event list• Example: Web browser visualization
– Identify and develop cross-cutting services. They eventually become “core” services.
Steps to create VO environment
1. Describe the data in a standard format (SPASE; http://spase-group.org/). Primary VxO activity in past 3 years. If you know of a data product that does not have associated metadata, tell a VO.
2. Create services3. Connect services
Steps to create VO environment
1. Describe the data in a standard format (SPASE; http://spase-group.org/). Primary VxO activity in past 3 years. If you know of a data product that does not have associated metadata, tell a VO.
2. Create services3. Connect services
Key Concept
•Everything should be viewed as a service
Example Services
• CCMC – Community Coordinated Modeling Center
• VMR – Will add services to CCMC data
• SSCWeb – Orbit calculations• ViRBO - L* calculations (using
SSCWeb data)
Needed Services, Tools, and Roles
• Metadata– Creators– Standard– Query– Edit– Management
• Data– Creators– Ingestion service (with
versioning!)
• Data Base– API– General– Mass store and backup– Fast Cache (Content
delivery service)– Filter service
• Visualization– Pre-computed– Static and on demand– Interactive and
dynamic
ViRBO [http://virbo.org/]
• Breaking the VO paradigm in many ways (not just connecting services and creating metadata)
• Improved high-level tools and services are fine, but first– Increase data accessibility– Increase amount of available data
• We have:– Created many climatological data sets– Simplified access to many existing data sets.– Creating a time series server– See virbo.org for more …
Data [http://virbo.org/]
Future and existing services
– L and L* data base– L-sort plots– Fly-through AP-8/AE-8 and AP-9/AE-9– Hosting SVN for AP-9/AE-9
development– Hosting meeting notes and documents– Work with RBSP to develop or connect
services– Many more …
ViRBO Current Projects
•VxOware•Autoplot•Time Series Server
VxOwareNotes: http://vxoware.org
Implementation: http://virbo.org/meta
A tool for metadata management
VxOware
• For all aspects of managing XML-based scientific metadata
• User accounts with different privileges• Edit/submit metadata via browser and with
command line tools• Queries of many types• Federations• Comment, Link, and Tag metadata• Revision history• Transforms on query output
Autoplot[http://autoplot.org]
• A browser for data on the web