1. A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially
Referenced Application Data
Paul Box | Project Leader
Rob Atkinson | Principal Investigator
Laura Kostanski | Gazetteer Expert
4th Digital Earth Summit 2012 Wellington, NZ
CSIRO GOVERNMENT AND COMMERCIAL SERVICES THEME

2. Overview
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The YAP problem
Use of Geographic References
Getting the granularity right
Multiple representations
Using Linked Data to index SDI resources
Using Linked Data to connect SDI and Application data
Goals and game-changers
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 2

3. The ‘Yet Another Portal’ Problem - YAP
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 3

4. The ‘Yet Another Portal’ Problem
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 4

5. The Yet Another Mashup Problem
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 5

6. Queensland floods:
27 online map sites
• Media
• Government
• NGO
6 alert and community report sites
Social media
• 7 twitter feeds
• 2 face book pages
All relate to place
multi sources
multiple channels
cannot easily integrate
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 6

7. SDIs and YAP syndrome
Portals, portals everywhere ...
• Everybody seems to have one
• They all function differently
• Designed for humans
Focussed on specific communities
• Often contain implicit contracts, accessible only to those in the
know (eg. naming conventions)
• Interoperability between domains not considered.
Focussed on suppliers, NOT users
• Sometimes provide sophisticated tools for publishing data
• More often have a low entry level for suppliers
• Users have to wade through lists of results
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 7

8. Everything Happens Somewhere
Implicitly geospatial
(geo-codeable)
Explicitly geospatial
Gazetteers
UNSTATS
Name
GRP’08 $
IND03
NTB
8,080
IND05
NTT
4,769
BPS-ID
GER ‘08
Tpop’10
003
Nusa Tenggara Barat
111.08
1,318,840
005
Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI)
Name
Nusa Tenggara Timur
112.09
335,805
One real world feature - Multiple representations
identities, versions
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 8

9. The “granularity problem”
Problem: metadata about data sets doesn’t help you understand a
specific reference.
SDIs currently focus on metadata at a set level
Users often need data and metadata for an instance
How do we find the metadata held at the data set level?
But which data set?
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 9

10. Feature Instance Identifiers
This is the “tricky part”
Lets start with the practical implication…
Catchment
ExtractionRate
Storage
1123343
730
300
Catchment
Boundary
Area
Geometry
1123343
33535.4
151.3344,35.330…….
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 10

11. “Distributed” references
Catchment
ExtractionRate
Storage
1123343
730
300
How to ask for this entity
Internet
How to deliver this entity
Catchment Boundary Area
Geometry
1123343
151.3344,-35.330…….
33535.4

12. Which representation?
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 12

13. Linked Data Web
From “An Architecture for Referencing Hydrologic
Concepts in Distributed Systems”, Usländer &
Atkinson, (accepted).
http://water.gov.au/id/catchment/567
http://water.gov.au/id/catchment/567
representations
Basic properties
Identifier Architecture
provenance
URL: spatial data access
URL: spatial data access
URL: observation data archive access
URL: observation data archive access
Data Marts
Transactions
URL: live data access
URL: live data access
Services
Observation
Archive
(Data Warehouse)
WFS
WCS
Services
Spatial
databases
Sensor Web (image OGC 2006)
Spatial Data Infrastructure

14. DEMO
UNSDI Gazetteer for Social Protection in Indonesia | Paul Box | Page 14

15. UNSDI Gazetteer for Social Protection in Indonesia

16. UNSDI Gazetteer for Social Protection in Indonesia

17. Key gazetteer issues

19. Same as:

20. UNSDI Gazetteer for Social Protection in Indonesia

21. Linked data
Agency X
Education
Statistical
Information
API
Agency Y
Transport
API
Agency Z
Statistics
API
Linked
Data
Provide URI identifiers for use in apps
Spatial
Information
Gazetteer
framework
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 21
User
UN SDI
National SDI

22. Finding source data
1: resolve reference
User
Portal (live documentation)
Portal (live documentation)
Linked Data:
Linked Data:
representations usedBy
2: Use returned information
to access source data
Name search
function
WFS (Thematic)
WFS-G
Common
Gazetteer
Index
Gazetteer framework
Agency Z
Statistics
st
arve
H
System 11
System
SDI Data
Sources
CSIRO. UNSDI Gazetteer for Social Protection in Indonesia
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 22
System nn
System

23. Goals
achieve fundamental, systemic improvement in
information integration capability that enables more
effective and cost-efficient sustained service delivery
Discover Access, Extract Transform Load
Discover Access
Extract, Transform, Load
Use
Use
Understand
Time and effort
Understand
Gazetteer framework - enable place names used
in different systems to be registered and used to
reference and integrate other information
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 23

24. The “game changers”
Linked Data (using the Web better)
Governance: UN-OICT, INSPIRE etc
Cloud Computing
Locally relevant global data sets
Crowd-sourcing
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 24

25. The institutional infrastructure
UNGIWG
(40+ UN agencies)
UNSDI
(CoE)
Global Pulse
(Pulse Lab)
UN CITO
UN Stats
UN Secretary
General
Gazetteer
Gazetteer
Project
Project
UN GGIM
UNGEGN
Assist Sec. Gen.
InaSDI
(Indonesia)
14 GoI
Ministries
BIG
Agreement
Agreement
AusAID
Funding
agreement
OSP (RET)
(Australia)
UK Location
(DEFRA)
CGNA
(Australia)
UNEP
Eye on Earth
EU JRC
INSPIRE
(European SDI)
BoM
NE2I
(Australia)
A Future for SDIs – Using SDI Data to Understand and Link Spatially Referenced Application Data| Paul Box | Page 25
Australian Gazetteer
(SDI activities)

26. Thank you
Rob Atkinson | Principal Investigator
Paul Box |Project Leader
Laura Kostanski | Gazetteer Expert
Digital Productivity and Services Flagship
t +61 2 9325 3122
e paul.j.box@csiro.au
w www.csiro.au/gazetteer
GOVERNMENT AND COMMERCIAL SERVICES THEME