saarikko jarmo-nefis-helsinki-2005

METSÄNTUTKIMUSLAITOSSKOGSFORSKNINGINSTITUTFINNISH FOREST RESEARCH NSTITUTEwww.metla.fi

Network for a European Forest Information Service

NEFIS

Jarmo Saarikko, Metla, FI

Alex Fedorec, Greenwich University, UK

Risto Päivinen, Andreas Schuck & Tim Green, European Forest Institute, FI

Frontiers in Forest Information, The Impact of Changing Technologies, Oxford, Dec 07, 2005 (Fedorec)

Environmental Specimen Banking and Information Management, Helsinki, Dec 15, 2005 (Saarikko)

Environmental Specimen Banking and Information Management, Helsinki --- Metla, U. Greenwich, EFI / NEFIS - Jarmo Saarikko 2005-12-15

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Contents

What is NEFIS?About data and informationSpecific tasks for the projectSome results of NEFISScope and challengesUML modellingUse casesChanging technologyDemonstration package – resource discovery and visualizationSpecific issues of a pan-European FIS


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What is NEFIS?Network for a European Forest Information Service

Accompanying Measure in the EU 5th Framework Programme 2002-2005(Contract No. QLK5-CT-2002-30638)

General objectives were to build on and continue activities initiated in the ‘European Forest Information System (EFIS)’ project and to maximise the value of existing data and databases by:

coordinating ongoing efforts to create forest information systems and services

supporting development of harmonised standards and procedures for data provision by data providers at regional, country and international levels

increasing the usability of available data and databases by the European citizens.


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My ”message of the day”

Interoperabilityinformation exchange with other systemsopen access – excluding endangered sp.standardized methods of information exchange(XML, search engines)other systems

datasets of analysis results of the specimensForest Information SystemsBiodiversity Information SystemsResearch Information Systems and publicationsOther sample collections, etc.


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NEFIS PartnershipEuropean Commission, DG JRC, Institute for Environment and Sustainability – Land Management Unit International Union of Forest Research OrganisationsDresden University of Technology – Forest Biometrics and Computer Sciences Frauenhoffer Gesellschaft zur Förderung der angewandten Forschung e.V.Finnish Forest Research InstituteInventaire Forestier NationalDanish Forest and Landscape Research Institute –Dept. of ForestrySveriges Lantbruksuniversitet – Dept. of Forest Resource Management and Geomatics University of Greenwich – School of Computing and Mathematical SciencesRegione Dell’Umbria – Servizio Programmazione ForestaleAccademia Italiana di Scienze Forestali Centre Tecnologic Forestal de Catalunya – Forest Policy and Rural Development DeptHungarian State Forest Service (SFS)Federal Research Centre for Forestry and Forest Products, BFH


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About Data and InformationIs more data needed or have we reached information overload?

Is some important data/information missing or of too low accuracy?

Are current resources/information fully utilised and used efficiently?

Lack of data/information is not necessarily the problem buttheir use and application

Do we know where to find what information/data?Users incl. decision makers are often not aware of existing information or do not use it

How accessible is existing information really?In which way should information and data be made available?


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Specific Tasks of NEFIS project

1. Review the state of the art in the technical development of information services

2. Develop metadata standards and controlled vocabularies3. Suggest unified and operable methods for communication

between different Internet-based forest information service activities

4. Publish a follow-up version of the currently available EFIS prototype

5. Test the EFIS using regional, national and international data sets

6. Evaluate the service from the users’ and data providers’ perspectives

7. Develop strategies for development of the service


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NEFIS Work Packages& Specific Tasks

WP1. Project management

WP2. Develop metadata standards and controlled vocabularies

WP3: UML Description of an extended European Forest Information ServiceReview the state of the art in the technical development of I.S.Suggest unified and operable methods for communication between different Internet-based forest information service activitiesEstablishment of a NEFIS KnowledgeBase

WP4: Data preparation and data provision• Publish a follow-up version of the currently available EFIS prototype• Test the EFIS using regional, national and international data sets

WP5: Evaluate service from users’ and data providers’ perspectives

WP6: Links with Commission services and follow-up activities


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Some Results of NEFIS

Metadata schema (based on Dublin Core)

Suggestion for a Forest Markup Language (FML)

Controlled vocabularies 12 themes, 4 developed further

Prepared sample datasets and metadata available through the EFIS system

Technical review and UML description of an extended EFIS

Demonstration package: Resource Discovery and VisualizationToolkits

KnowledgeBase http://nkb.efi.fi/

Utilisation by the European Commission: EFICP, INFORS


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Scope and Challenges

Databases

XLS

Files

Docs

HTML

X

International/national Gov. agencies, NGOs

Land use planners, Mgrs, Sylviculturalists

Consultants, Modellers,Researchers, Education

Commercial, financial,Forest/timber industry

News media, Public sector


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Side NotesPublished result of one task becomes input dataset for another. “One person’s output is another person’s input”National Inventory → JQ report → Eurostat DB → FRA → MCPFE Report

(Similarly one person’s data is another's metadata)

Much information held in weakly structured documents. Lack metastructure to fully exploit explicit (codified)knowledge or extract tactic (unarticulated) knowledge.

Crucial issue: Why would someone want to use this system?

Resource user?Information provider?


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Technical Review UML Modelling

UML – The Unified Modelling Language (ISO/IEC 19501)

Objectives“Produce a consultative UML review of EFIS model and extend it to incorporate new information types, relationships and processes,

Build on outputs of other projects such as EFIS, GFIS and results from other work packages of the AM.

Develop understanding of O-O paradigm applicability to European forest information

Identify system and user requirements

Scope technical possibilities and infrastructure”


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Why UML? - UML in the Ontology Spectrum

Strong semantics

Minimal hierarchic knowledge to rich consistent and meaningful knowledgeIs subclassification of

Is disjoint subclass of with transitivity

property

Has narrower meaning than

Is subclass of

Taxonomy

Thesaurus

Conceptual Model

Local Domain Theory

RelationalModel

SchemaER

Extended ERXTM

RDF/S

UML – The Unified Modelling Language

Weak semantics

DAML+OIL, OWL

First Order LogicModal Logic

Daconta, M.C., et.al., 2003

OCL – The UML Object Constraint Language


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UML Modelling Cont’d

ApproachIdentify and partition key user groups and application domains

Elicit sample use cases and story lines from example applications, e.g.UN-ECE/FAO Global Forest Resource Assessment & TBFRA 2000

(Regional FRA)MCPFE Criteria & Indicators for Sustainable Forest MgtForest Products Production and Trade FlowsLand Use & Land Cover Change for UNFCCC

Commonalities factored to identify generic use cases, desired features, kernel classes, packages etc.


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Example Use Case 1


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NEFIS Generic Use CaseNEFIS System

Check guidelinesResource,

Document & Content

Management

«uses»

Get agregatedataset

locate andretrieve dataset

Transform dataset

«extends»

«extends»

Top Package::client

Top Package::Provider

Validate Dataset

«uses»

publish sourceinformation

«uses»

Subscriber workflow, task & role

management

«uses»

SubscriberRegististration Task & Role

Management

«uses»«extends»

Application Tool

Repository

Analyse, visualise ,transform aggregate

MetaData Registry and Repository

Mgt System

«uses»«uses»

«uses»

«uses»

Metadata Mgt

Top Package::NEFIS admin

«extends»

«extends»

Portal Management

Support Kernel

Browse ForestInformation

«extends» «uses»

Validation is done off -lineSystem simply provides contact and comms support


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Identification of Key Elements

Metadata management: Not just resource discovery -Normalisation and control of ontology database required to ensure semantic interoperability at all levels

Content management central to dynamic control and delivery

Task and role choreography and support, facilitate and enhance usability (success predicated on high quality publish & subscribe tools)

Maintenance of tool and standard component repository

Note technical review revealed each of these elements is enabled by web services and service-oriented-architecture


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Technical Review - Changing Technology

Within the short life of the NEFIS project we have seen the rapid growth of:

new pattern and model driven techniques for analysis and architecting complex or large scale information systemsopen-system standards, exploitation of metadata and middleware protocols to support resource location and interoperability in highly distributed heterogeneous systemscomponent-oriented and web-service tools and technologies to implement these systemsRAD tools for sophisticated GUI development

We are also seeing emerginggrid and autonomic infrastructures to optimise executionagile methods to manage the development process


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Central ServicesMetadata DB /

Domain Ontology

Central Resource & Document DB

Tool Repository &Forest Model

Archive

NEFIS Service-Oriented Deployment

Resource Browser

Visualisation,Analysis &

Reporting Toolkits

CLIENT

Resource Locator & Vortal Services

NEFIS SERVER PROVIDER SERVER

Harmonisation Tools

Publication Tools

Published Services

Raw Databases and Information

Provider Systems

« WWW »

Task & RoleManagement.

Acc

ess

& A

utho

risat

ion

Mgt

ContentManagement

MetadataManagement

UDDI API/Registry

*«internet»

*«internet»

*

«intranet»

Archiving and Hosting Services


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NEFIS Metadata Basedon DCMI Element Set.

Suggested FML provides an XML schema reflecting this

NEFIS extensions and modifications ( )


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Controlled Vocabularies: Themes and Terms

Facilitate cataloguing and accessing of NEFIS metadata records and underlying datasetsDeveloped from data sets provided by the NEFIS partnersBased on a generic standard and existing recognized vocabularies: CABI thesaurus, AgroVoc, NAL Keywordlists developed for 12 themes:

Forest inventory (incl. growth & yield) Forest firesForest products and trade flows Forest healthSilviculture (incl. forest nurseries) Rural developmentVegetation (or forest or land) types Forestry institutionsNon-wood goods and benefits Forest operationsMaps and geo-referenced data Field experiments

Lists further developed further for the themes in bold(e.g. to include definitions, equivalents in other languages etc)


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Data Preparation and Data Provision

Objectives

• to identify the datasets (sub-national, national & international) for input to the EFIS

• to prepare metadata records using the proposedmetadata schema

• to provide and prepare sample datasets availablethrough the EFIS system


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Demonstration Package

Consists of:

Resource Discovery (RD)in which the proposed NEFIS metadata schema is implemented

New Visualisation Toolkit (VTK) functionalities, support of spatial time series data;tools for dynamic aggregation of grid (raster) data;some new visualisation techniques

Data retrieval: Implementation of simple system for retrieval of data from data tables from distributed and remote sites, collation of the data,and processing into a format that can be used by the VTK


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Demonstrator Package

Search

Metadata

DataUtilise


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Example VTK Visualisations


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Evaluation

Undertaken using standardised questionnaires and expert statements

Addressed:• Metadata and metadata guidelines

• Operability and applicability for describing datasets• Keyword list and thesaurus

• Data rights and data rights management

• User needs and user expectations • Potential capabilities of a NEFIS (VTK)• Extent to which NEFIS can serve as a harmonised system for

periodical data reporting/delivery


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NEFIS KnowledgeBasehttp://nkb.efi.fi/

Structured repository for deposit, storage and access of information and metadata relevant to forest information systems, with emphasis on NEFIS recording:

outputs from NEFIS WPsother forest IS/services development initiatives (e.g. GFIS, EFIS) and other relevant projectsrelevant software resources and documentation


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Summary & Conclusionpan-European FISs have vast and expanding volumes of distributed information, are heterogeneous, highly changeable, have huge range of potential user types and applications.

The changing technology discussed in NEFIS potentiatesWrapping and support of legacy systemsInteroperability and transparency of information Provision of futureproofed scalable architectures

More importantly it enablesLocation and retrieval of (just) the right data and information Provision of the information in the right form for the task

Challenges areProvision of quality publish/subscribe toolsOntology not only for resource discovery but semantic interoperability


Thank You!

further information:www.www.efiefi..fifi//projectsprojects//nefisnefis

http://www.efi.fi/projects/nefis


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Specific Issues of Pan-European FIS

LanguageImpacts on U.I., reports… Terms: search & navigate facilities…

User needsRegional needs and interestsOwnership and rights managementLegal/convention reporting requirements

InformationAvailability and AccessHeterogeneousData harmonisationModel standardsValidation

TechnologyNon-standardised, highly distributed Diverse I.T. capability & infrastructure