CUAHSI-HIS Options for Data Publication

There are several options within CUAHSI–HIS for publishing data that may be appropriate for different projects. We encourage you to contact our User Support Specialist Yoori Choi (ychoi@cuahsi.org) if you need additional information or advice on how to use CUAHSI–HIS to publish your data.

Option 1: CUAHSI Data Hosting

CUAHSI-HIS can host hydrologic data and metadata on CUAHSI servers.

Data is loaded into a HydroServer maintained by CUAHSI. HydroServer capability currently includes support for point observations and time series data using ODM and geospatial data through OGC web services. Support for additional data types may be added driven by need. Under this model, CUAHSI works with you to ingest your data, and CUAHSI maintains the data archive after that.

Option 2: Coupling your existing data management system to CUAHSI-HIS

For ongoing projects with an existing data management system it is possible to couple this to CUAHSI-HIS through an agreed upon interface.

An example of this type of model is the one adopted by the Critical Zone Observatory (CZO) projects. An ASCII format data publication specification has been agreed upon for CZOs to periodically publish some of their data. This data is then ingested into a CUAHSI ODM where it is archived and published using WaterML and WaterOneFlow services (his.cuahsi.org/wofws.html). The same interface could be used by others, or a similar interface worked out in collaboration with CUAHSI-HIS. Under this model, CUAHSI archives and publishes the data, but in a way that allows projects to periodically add to the data archive systematically.

Option 3: Using CUAHSI-HIS software and standards for data

You may wish to host data yourself using CUAHSI-HIS Software.

The HydroServer software stack developed by CUAHSI-HIS may be used for publishing time series of hydrologic observations on the Internet as well as spatial data using standards-based web feature, map, and coverage services. HydroServer software may be obtained from: his.cuahsi.org/hydroserver.html. HydroServer is open source with code development managed at hydroserver.codeplex.com/. HydroServer also includes software for data editing and quality control and can be the basis for a complete data management system. Under this model, data archiving and publication is handled by the individual project.

Option 4: Host data yourself using your own data management system and publish it in a way that is compatible with CUAHSI-HIS

If you have an established internal data management system, publication through CUAHSI-HIS can be achieved by adapting your system to support these interfaces.

Data is compatible with, and can be made discoverable through CUAHSI catalogs when it is published using the standards that CUAHSI has adopted. These include WaterML and WaterOneFlow web services for point and time series observations, and Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standards for geospatial data. This will require programming and database expertise on your team and/or would need to be done with collaboration with the HIS team.

In options (1) and (2) CUAHSI servers ultimately host and archive your project data. In options (3) and (4) the individual project maintains its own data archive. All options meet NSF's requirement of archiving project data. The CUAHSI–HIS project has been extensively developed and tested over its project lifetime, and anticipates being an accessible and long-term option to publish and maintain the data.

In addition to providing data publication, the CUAHSI–HIS system has freely available data access and discovery tools to facilitate dissemination and use of the data, which can add to the broader impact of your project and facilitates the data sharing that the NSF–EAR policy advocates. Data published in CUAHSI-HIS is freely available as water data services. Your data will be indexed as water data services at HIS Central in the national water metadata catalog, which gives your data a presence among similar data sets, and provides enhanced search and discovery.