Social Space for Geospatial Information

IST-Africa 2011 Conference Proceedings
Paul Cunningham and Miriam Cunningham (Eds)
IIMC International Information Management Corporation, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-905824-24-3

Social Space for Geospatial Information
Karel CHARVAT1, Premysl VOHNOUT1, Stepan KAFKA2, Jachym CEPICKY2,
Tomáš MILDORF3, Karel JANECKA3, Tomas CHVATAL1
1
Ceske Centrum pro vedu a Spolecnost, Radlicka 28, Praha, 150 00, Czech Republic
Tel: +420 281 973501, Fax: +420 281 973501, Email: ccss@ccss.cz
2
Help service-remote sensing, Vnouckova 614, Benesov, 256 01, Czech Republic
Tel: +420 317 724620, Fax: + 420 317 724620, Email:bnhelp@bnhelp.cz
3
Faculty of Applied Sciences, University of West Bohemia in Pilsen,
Univerzitni 22, Plzen, 306 14, Czech Republic
Tel: +420 377 632691, Fax: + 420 377 632602, Email: kjanecka@kma.zcu.cz
Abstract: This paper introduces ideas to build a social space for sharing spatial data
and spatial information. It includes also the experience with sharing of spatial data
and spatial information. The objective of 4th way to SDI is not to build a single node
or access point for accessing or collecting spatial information but to build a network
of nodes, where every node could be an access point for spatial information. The
objective of 4th way to SDI should not be understood as an alternative of public
initiatives including INSPIRE, GEOSS, GMESS or UNSDI but to give a chance to
anybody to profit from formed Global SDI using standards coming from this
initiatives and using interoperability rules defined mainly by Open Geospatial
Consortium and W3C. The objective of 4th way to SDI is not to replace such useful
initiatives as OpenStreetMap, but to make results of the initiatives more accessible
for everybody. The objective of 4th way to SDI is not to remove such solution like
Google Maps or Microsoft Live Maps, but give some alternative, where on one side
people could share information in different environment including for example
Google. The objective of 4th way to SDI is to support utilisation of Open Sources.
Proprietary solutions are not excluded from the network. A key aspect is
interoperability. Objective of 4th way to SDI is also to give a chance to share and use
spatial information by people, who do not have necessary infrastructure.

Keywords: SDI, Social Networks, Communities, URM, GeoHosting

1. Introduction
There can be identified four basic blocks for SDI building: institutional support, political
support, accessibility and usability [6]. As depicted on the following figure, we see a gap in
the SDI building. This article should stress out the importance of user involvement in SDI
building representing the gap.
What are the methods to build Spatial Data Infrastructure (furthermore referred to as
SDI)? What is the future of SDI building in development countries? How developing
countries could profit from new technologies? How experiences from Europe could be
implemented in Africa? And what we can do together? These are the main questions, which
we would like to address and discuss.
The most frequent ways how to build SDI are:
1. Building SDI by public administration in Europe is public based SDI mainly
supported by the INSPIRE initiative (http://inspire.jrc.ec.europa.eu/). There are
defined certain rules for data sharing and their life cycle. They include metadata,

Copyright © 2011 The authors www.IST-Africa.org/Conference2011 Page 1 of 9

specifications for data sets and spatial data services; network services and
technologies; agreements on sharing, access and use; and coordination and
monitoring mechanisms, processes and procedures.

2. Commercial public portals – e.g. Google, Yahoo, Microsoft. They are used every
day by users who are looking for some information. This data can't be often used for
building of local or regional SDI due to licensing policy issues. The data provided
are very often missing information necessary for building up SDI, e.g. metadata
according to the international standard or metadata at alls.
3. The third alternatives are voluntary or online communities. As the example of
OpenStreetMap (http://www.openstreetmap.org/) shows, nowadays, citizens have an
interest in sharing their findings within a community. Therefore, the architecture
should foresee collaboration possibilities for people who are not employed by
environmental agencies. Data are eventually reported by the general public needs to
be checked and validated before it may be published. Specific data models and
formats might be a problem in this domain. The usage of these infrastructures are
sometimes difficult for a non specialist.

2. Objectives
Introduction chapter explained the three common approaches of SDI building. The concept
of our approach is called 4th way to SDI building. The idea is to take advantage of
standardisation efforts including INSPIRE and OGC (http://www.opengeospatial.org/) and
combine thess efforts with both commercial initiatives and mainly with support of
initiatives on voluntary basis. The goal is to bring all these possibilities closer to people in
a form, which is easily accessible and understandable. The future solution has to support
integration of spatial and non spatial information. A solution based mainly on Open Source
software integrates spatial and non-spatial information, uses standards for communication,
storage and interfaces and enables to communicate with various stakeholders through social
network sites and other means. The solution is based on Geoportal4everybody
(http://www.geoportal4everybody.eu/).


3. Background
One year ago, we used the terms 4th way to SDI and Geoportal4everybody for the first time.
But this process started many years ago with the ideas of Geohosting and Uniform
Resource Management (furthermore referred to as URM). The objective of Geohosting is to
offer services supporting the creation of a spatial data sharing system with possibility to
publish data for any user having access to Web. The system is based on open formats and is
open for interaction with other SDI platforms. It could be used in education, but also could
be a solution for researchers and small data providers including developing countries. The
main objective of the URM is an easy description, discovery and validation of relevant
information sources. The URM ensured that any user can easily discover, evaluate and use
relevant information. A free text search engine (e.g. Google) can’t be used due to the fact
that in many cases a user obtains thousands, if not millions, of irrelevant links. This
happens because the free text enginesdo not fully recognise the context of the searched
information. The context characterises any information, knowledge and observation.
Context strongly influences the way how the information will be used. A possibility for
solving the discovery problem within a context is to use metadata for standardised
description of any information, knowledge, data sources, sensors, etc. In combination with
standardised lists of terms (controlled vocabularies or thesaurus, standardised way of
geometric location, gazetteers and controlled list of categories), it will increase efficiency of
discovery of requested knowledge, information or data sources. Metadata are descriptive
information about an object or a resource whether it is physical or electronic. While
standardised metadata are relatively new, the underlying concepts behind metadata have
been used for as long as collections of information have been organized. Library card
catalogues represent a well-established type of metadata that has served as collection
management and resource discovery tools for decades. The URM concept allows to access
any information stored on one portal with other portals using the URM principles.

We would like to promote a shift from the pyramid paradigm, which is often mentioned
in the relation to building of Global SDI, to paradigm of spider net. Our concept is based on


a system of distributed data sources, where every provider can decide about accessibility of
his data against concept of cloud computing, where one organisation is managing all
information. The idea is not against outsourcing of data or services or using of external
services, but to have control about data from the side of data holders. For implementation of
this concept, we suggest the ideas of Geoportal4everybody. The principle of the URM
allows to build a "spidernet" SISE (Shared Information Space for the Environment)
infrastructure supporting interconnection of any two portals and effective exchange of
information.

4. Methodology
Geoportal4everybody combines both approaches. It offers possibility of publishing user
derived data on a community portal, but also to share information using metadata
catalogues with other portals. It also offers connection with public portal and reuse of
information on public portal. We also offer easy integration of such information sources
like OpenStreetMap. With the development of new desktop solutions, it is possible to
connect all infrastructures from desktop solutions. As an example Janitor system can be
mentioned. It integrates catalogue functionality into desktop system.
New functionality of Geoportal4everybody also includes aspects of social network site.
A social network site consists of a finite set or sets of actors and the relation or relations
defined on them. The presence of relational information is a critical and defining feature of
a social network.
The focus of the Geoportal4everybody project is on social network sites (e.g Facebook,
Twitter) as one of the main dissemination and communication tools.
The Geoportal4everybody is be an entry point for any news (new developments,
problematic topics, progress in the project, etc.). News are posted by involved actors and
automatically distributed to a number of selected communities – social network sites.
This approach allows involving other communities from one place without having to
enter each community. Users of various social network sites can read entries and comment
through their respective communities and don’t have to register elsewhere.
Geoportal4everybody is in principle also social network offering sharing of information
(spatial and non-spatial) among community. The principle of sharing of information among
portals also offer a support for exchange of information among communities.
Feedback from these social network sites is retrieved using RSS channel and answered
again from the central point.


Geoportal4everybody supports utilisation of information from other social network sites
including SlideShare or YouTube.
Other functionality is combining text with interactive maps.

5. Technology Description
The geoportal is composed of several components. These are further described in more
detail. It should give an overview of the technology used and basic characteristic of each
component.

5.1 SimpleCMS

SimpleCMS is a content management system (Furthermore referred to as CMS) focused on
usability and simplicity for end users. The main advantage in comparison with other CMS
systems is simple approach for solving complex tasks. SimpleCMS provides access to the
following features and/or provides access to the following options:
• Define content and system of menu for home page
• Publish on home page articles
• Publish external links in menu on home page
• Publish on home page predefined map composition from MapMan
• Order information on home page
• Remove information from home page
• Publish RSS channels on home page
See the example of Simple CMS at http://www.naturnet.org

5.2 Geohosting

The Geohosting system is able to work both with data stored directly on the internal server
and with information accessible via web services. Data are saved in geodatabase by default,
but the system is able to work also with data in individual files of different formats. Data
repositories are represented by the File Repository and the GeoDatabase. Individual SW
system components are:
• DataMan
• MapMan
DataMan is application for management of spatial data. It supports management of data in
databases or files. It supports export and import of this data and also publishing and
updating of related metadata. In database, it is possible to store both, vector and raster data,
including their attributes. Also for file oriented storage, it supports both, vector and raster


data. From raster formats, it currently supports IFF/GeoTIFF, JPEG,GIF, PNG, BMP,
ECW, from vector formats ESRI Shapefile, DGN, DWG, GML.
The basic functionalities of Dataman are:
• Transfer the spatial file into file repository
• Describe file by metadata (ISO19115}
• Definition of structure in database
• Transfer file from file system into database (currently only for shapefile)
• Describe record by metadata (19115)
The Map Project Manager (MapMan) is a software tool for users who want to publish
local data or to create new map projects and compositions from local data and external
services. It supports publication of spatial composition from locally stored data (fields or
database-stored in DataMan), with external WMS, WFS data services. It supports
visualization in web browser using clients including HSLayers, GoogleMaps, DHTML
client, Desktop viewer GoogleEarth, GIS Janitor or publish data as OGC WebMapService
(WMS), OGC WebFeatureService (WFS). All published data are also connected with
metadata stored in Micka. Mapman functions list
• General goals
• Support for creation and publication of map compositions from own and
external data
• Support for publication of map compositions in more coordinate systems
• Support for combination of different types of layers in different coordinate
systems
• Creation of project (map composition)
• Project settings
• Name, Abstract, Author, Keywords
• Extent (as coordinate or visual in map)
• Coordinate system
• Access permissions (for browsing and editing)
• Type of possible layers in project
• Vector layer
• Files
• SHP, GML, DGN, other formats supported by OGR library
• Databases
• PostGIS database
• MSSQL Geomedia database
• Services
• WFS (WebFeatureService)
• Raster layer
• Files
• TIF, JPG, GIF, PNG, otherformats supported by GDAL
library
• Services
• WMS (WebMapService)
• Methods of adding layers to the project
• From existing WMS or WFS servers
• From user data storage (files stored on server by users)
• From connected databases
• Find required layers (datasets) in embedded catalog client (CSW – Catalog
Service)
• Layer’s symbology is defined by SLD (Styled Layer Descriptor)
• Publication of project


• MapViewer (web application) – with relevant metadata
• WMS – with relevant metadata
• WFS – with relevant metadata
• Google Map
• Google Earth
• Using in external applications

5.3 HSLayers

HSLayers (Help Service + OpenLayers) combines capabilities of ExtJS and OpenLayers
and several helping scripts to establish truly Web GIS applications. Development started in
2007. In 2009, after 2 years of development, it was released under conditions of GNU
General Public License 3. HSLayers features are coming up from OpenLayers and therefore
their characteristics are as follows:
• Portrayal of various types of data:
• Raster: OGC WMS(-T), Image (PNG, JPEG, GIF), …
• Vector: OGC WFS(-T), GML, GeoRSS, KML, GPX, GeoJSON, …
• Data sources from commercial servers: Google Maps, Virtual Earth, Yahoo
Maps, …
• The user interface (use control) adheres to current conventions in web map portals.
• Information about queried objects in text bubbles.
HSLayers additional functions including dynamic adding of OGC (Open Geospatial
Consortium) services into map - clients for WMS and WFS, portrayal of independent data
sources on the client side, saving of map composition according to WMC (Web Map
Context) OGC specification on user computer for repeated future use or for sharing
between users and others.

5.4 Catalogue Client

Catalogue client allows search through connected metadata catalogues by catalogue service
OGC CSW. Data can be searched by text or by defined elements defined in standards (OGC
CSW 2.0.2, AP ISO, INSPIRE). Basic elements are dataset and services. Basic elements
can be extended by user demands but they will not be searchable on other catalogues. First
version of catalogue used cascading of multiple services. This version support adding
services independently on each other.
This application interacts with map viewer so it can be added map services into map by
one click. Another interaction is with metadata extractor. Documents or web pages stored
by extractor can be opened also by one click.

5.5 Metadata Editor MIcKA

MIcKA is a complex system for metadata management used for building Spatial Data
Infrastructure (SDI) and geoportal solutions. It contains tools for editing and management
of metadata for spatial information, web services and other sources (documents, web sites,
etc.). It includes online metadata search engine, portrayal of spatial information and
download of spatial data to local computer.
MIcKA is compatible with obligatory standards for European SDI building (INSPIRE)
and ISO standards. Therefore it is ready to be connected with other nodes of prepared
network of metadata catalogues (its compatibility with pilot European geoportal is
continuously tested). A test version of MIcKA is accessible at
http://www.bnhelp.cz/projects/metadata/branches/micka-2.0/index.php?l=eng


6. Developments
The described solution is continuously developed and single components are published as
open source step by step. But on the other side we offer also commercial support and
customisation for potential users. Solution is currently part of solution of Czech National
INSPIRE portal, but also a lot of European portals like OneGeology
(http://www.onegeology-europe.eu/), NaturNet Plus (http://www.naturnet.org/), Habitats
(http://www.habitats.cz/), EnviroGrids (http://www.envirogrids.cz/) and Plan4all are based
on this solution. For public usage there are portals Geoportal4everybody and UNSDI.CZ.
The main principles of the solution are:
• Independent components
• Composition according to user requirements
• Based on SOA
• Possibility to integrate with other resources
• Maximum openness
• Open Source
• Open Standards
• Extension to non-GIS community
• Open Search
• Administration of other (non-spatial) data sources

7. Recommendations
To support these activities it is necessary to be more focused on activities like awareness,
education, participation of different groups and preparedness of users. There are several
pilot projects dealing with education in various fields and using of social network sites for
getting feedback on SDI building. It was shown during the execution of these projects that
it is possible to build an SDI using the feedback and voluntary contribution of users. The
awareness and information support has to be provided on all levels with main focus on
regional and local level and also in direction to private sector and different social networks,
until now not accomplished by GEOSS (http://www.earthobservations.org/geoss.shtml),
GMES (http://www.gmes.info/), INSPIRE and other initiatives. It is very important that all
initiatives are focused not only on sharing data, but also services. Services should enable
appropriate use of collected data and information.

8. Business Benefits
The way to increase general participation of all group of stakeholders and users of vision of
Single Information Space for Environment, currently supported mainly by the ICT Ensure
project and in future by the HABITATS project. Taking into account previous facts,
INSPIRE could be a good legislative and standardisation frame for real future European
SDI and eventually in relation with GEOSS and UNSDI (www.ungiwg.org/unsdi.htm)
initiatives could help to build worldwide SDI. But there is a need to combine current
standardisation work with the following aspects:
• To support more bottom up approach in building SDI, where local and regional
organisations will not only adopt regulations but they will more actively participate on
forming of SDI.
• To support participation of public bodies but also private initiatives, communities and
social network sites on building of SDI.
• To support not only sharing of information, but also their analysis, modelling and easy
accessibility for different applications.


9. Conclusions
The way of the presented solution is to increase general participation of all groups of
stakeholders and users in SDI building. Current initiatives are usually based on top down
approach. A feedback on SDI building seems to be essential for meeting the requirements
of governmental bodies and users – drivers of the SDI. It was proven during the execution
of the previously mentioned projects that it is feasible to build up such communication
which will be performed in both directions (from users to SDI and vice versa). It is
necessary to combine current standardisation work and to support bottom up approach in
SDI building by involving public bodies and private initiatives, communities and social
network sites. Further work has to be done in this field, especially in the analysis of the
feedback from users and assessment of reliability of the user feedback.
The above mentioned technologies were developed within the frame of these projects:
Plan4all - the solution was achieved with financial co-funding by the European
Commission within the eContentplus with registration number 318007.
enviroGRIDS @ Black Sea Catchment - the solution was achieved with financial co-
funding by the European Commission within the Seventh Framework Programme with
registration number 226740 and name “Building Capacity for a Black Sea Catchment
Observation and Assessment System supporting Sustainable Development”
BRISEIDE - the solution was achieved with financial co-funding by the European
Commission within the Competitiveness and Innovation framework Programme with
registration number 250474 and name “BRIdging SErvices, Information and Data for
Europe”
HABITATS - the solution was achieved with financial co-funding by the European
Commission within the Competitiveness and Innovation framework Programme with
registration number 250455 and name “Social Validation of INSPIRE Annex III Data
Structures in EU HABITATS”
The technologies are further disseminated throughout the following projects:
NATURNETPLUS - the solution was achieved with financial co-funding by European
Commission within the Lifelong Learning Programme [CZ/09/LLP-LdV/TOI/134009]
SDI-EDU - the solution was achieved with financial co-funding by the European
Commission within the Lifelong Learning Programme [CZ/09/LLP-LdV/TOI/134010]
The technologies are fully operational in the following institutions:
CENIA - Czech Environmental Information Agency, Prague, Czech Republic
Red de difusión de la Investigación en Ciencias Sociales y Jurídicas (REDISCJ),
Canaria Islands, Spain
Zemgales plānošanas reģions, Latvia

References
[1] Karel CHARVAT, Stepan KAFKA, Marek SPLICHAL, Ota CERBA, Jelle HIELKEMA Uniform
Resource Management, IST Africa 2008, Windhoek, May 2008
[2] Karel CHARVAT, Petr HORAK, Martin VLK Jelle HIELKEMA Stepan Kafka, Jachym CEPICKY, Jan
JEZEK, Ota CERBA: GeoHosting – Publish Your Spatial Data Yourself, IST Africa 2009, Kampala May
2009
[3] Karel CHARVAT, Maris ALBERTS, Stepan KAFKA, Jachym CEPICKY, Irena KOSKOVA and Marek
SPLICHAL, Computer Assisted Educational Processes Based on Naturnet Learning Tools and Thier
Incorporation into Uniform Resource Management System, IAALD AFITA WCCA2008, Tokyo 2008
[4] European Parliament, 2007. DIRECTIVE 2007/2/EC OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF
THE COUNCIL of 14 March 2007 establishing an Infrastructure for Spatial Information in the European
Community (INSPIRE). http://eurlex.europa.eu/JOHtml.do?uri=OJ:L:2007:108:SOM:EN:HTML
[5] INSPIRE documents. [Online].Available: http://inspire.jrc.ec.europa.eu/index.cfm/pageid/6
[6] Dasgupta, A., 2010. Spatial data infrastructure: So close, yet so far? Geospatial World.


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