Mini Workshop Report to GEO and Others
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| Workshops | Air Quality Data Network
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Hi Masami. sorry you could not make it the Solta workshop. The workshop was quite technical on data servers, catalogs and clients, but we could have benefited from additional GEO perspectives, like: Data sharing Infrastructure is just a first step.. GEOSS is about serving the users, users, users..
Thank you for asking how the workshop turned out. With clear and complete impartiality :), I would say the workshop turned out quite well, largely due to the meeting participants, especially to co-organizer Martin Schultz from FZ Juelich for the focused discussions on turning the network 'from virtual to real'.
Below is a mini-report to you at GEO and also to others interested in the AQ CoP activities activities. As you requested, part of this workshop summary will also be included in the AQ CoP description in the GEO 2012-15 Workplan as well as in the report to the November GEO Plenary.
Best regards, Rudy
Networking Air Quality Observations and Models: From Virtual to Real
This was the first in-person meeting of GEO AQ CoP members involved with data networking. The tree-day workshop was attended by 26 participants, 6 by telecon. The group included specialists in interoperability and standards, software engineers (and or supervisors). The managers and programmers represented major air quality data hubs in Europe and US. This mix of expertise made the group was well positioned to address the practical issues of building an AQ data network.
The face-to-face meeting and social interactions allowed the participants to learn about each other's data systems and general perspectives. This was a necessary step toward a shared understanding and for building trust for future inter-dependent data networking. As a consequence, during the open discussion-oriented sessions, the participants were willing and able to articulate the key impediments to networked AQ data systems at their respective organizations. With this, remedies for those impediments can be pursued.
At the end of the meeting the managers and programmers of the major data hubs made a remarkable set of commitments toward making the AQ Data Network happen by expanding the network from the current 7 WCS data servers-distributors to 10-12; adding more datasets to the shared data pool; broadening the metadata support and linking the AQ Community Catalog to other catalogs. But it was also recognized that the real work starts now! The follow-though.
The next steps for the GEO AQ CoP include informing and harmonizing these AQ CoP activities with the GEO 2012-15 workplan, interacting with steakholder agencies as well as with other integrating initiatives. As always, a key facet of the AQ CoP activities will be to support and complement (not to compete with) other integrating initiatives.
