Network for a European Forest Information Service

1

• Network for a European Forest Information Service
• NEFIS
• Alex Fedorec, Greenwich University, UK
• Jarmo Saarikko, METLA, FI
• Risto Päivinen, Andreas Schuck Tim Green,
  European Forest Institute, FI
• Frontiers in Forest Information
• The Impact of Changing Technologies
• Oxford Dec 2005

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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.

3
NEFIS Partnership

• European Commission, DG JRC, Institute for
  Environment and Sustainability Land Management
  Unit
• International Union of Forest Research
  Organisations
• Dresden University of Technology Forest
  Biometrics and Computer Sciences
• Frauenhoffer Gesellschaft zur Förderung der
  angewandten Forschung e.V.
• Finnish Forest Research Institute
• Inventaire Forestier National
• Danish Forest and Landscape Research Institute
  Dept. of Forestry
• Sveriges Lantbruksuniversitet Dept. of Forest
  Resource Management and Geomatics
• University of Greenwich School of Computing and
  Mathematical Sciences
• Regione DellUmbria Servizio Programmazione
  Forestale
• Accademia Italiana di Scienze Forestali
• Centre Tecnologic Forestal de Catalunya Forest
  Policy and Rural Development Dept
• Hungarian State Forest Service (SFS)
• Federal Research Centre for Forestry and Forest
  Products, BFH

4
About Data and Information

• Is 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
  problembut their 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

• Review the state of the art in the technical
  development of information services
• Develop metadata standards and controlled
  vocabularies
• Suggest unified and operable methods for
  communication between different Internet-based
  forest information service activities
• Publish a follow-up version of the currently
  available EFIS prototype
• Test the EFIS using regional, national and
  international data sets
• Evaluate the service from the users and data
  providers perspectives
• 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 Service
• Review 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 activities
• Establishment 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
  Visualization Toolkits
• KnowledgeBase http//nkb.efi.fi/
• Utilisation by the European Commission EFICP,
  INFORS

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Scope and Challenges of NEFIS
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Side Notes

• Published result of one task becomes input
  dataset for another. One persons output is
  another persons input
• National Inventory ? JQ report ? Eurostat DB ?
  FRA ? MCPFE Report
• (Similarly one persons 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
Daconta, M.C., et.al., 2003
Strong semantics
Modal Logic
OCL The UML Object Constraint Language
First Order Logic
DAMLOIL, OWL
UML The Unified Modelling Language
RDF/S
XTM
Extended ER
ER
Schema
RelationalModel

• Minimal hierarchic knowledge to rich consistent
  and meaningful knowledge

Weak semantics
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UML Modelling Contd

• Approach
• Identify 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 Mgt
• Forest Products Production and Trade Flows
• Land 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 Case
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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 systems
• open-system standards, exploitation of metadata
  and middleware protocols to support resource
  location and interoperability in highly
  distributed heterogeneous systems
• component-oriented and web-service tools and
  technologies to implement these systems
• RAD tools for sophisticated GUI development
• We are also seeing emerging
• grid and autonomic infrastructures to optimise
  execution
• agile methods to manage the development process

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NEFIS Service-Oriented Deployment
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NEFIS Metadata Based on DCMI Element Set.
NEFIS extensions and modifications (?)

• Suggested FML provides an XML schema reflecting
  this

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Controlled Vocabularies Themes and Terms

• Facilitate cataloguing and accessing of NEFIS
  metadata records and underlying datasets
• Developed from data sets provided by the NEFIS
  partners
• Based on a generic standard and existing
  recognized vocabularies CABI thesaurus, AgroVoc,
  NAL Keyword lists developed for 12 themes
• Forest inventory (incl. growth yield) Forest
  fires
• Forest products and trade flows Forest health
• Silviculture (incl. forest nurseries) Rural
  development
• Vegetation (or forest or land) types Forestry
  institutions
• Non-wood goods and benefits Forest operations
• Maps 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 proposed
  metadata schema
• to provide and prepare sample datasets available
  through 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
Utilise
Data
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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 WPs
• other forest IS/services development initiatives
  (e.g. GFIS, EFIS) and other relevant projects
• relevant software resources and documentation

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Summary Conclusion

• pan-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
  potentiates
• Wrapping and support of legacy systems
• Interoperability and transparency of information
• Provision of futureproofed scalable architectures
  
• More importantly it enables
• Location and retrieval of (just) the right data
  and information
• Provision of the information in the right form
  for the task
• Challenges are
• Provision of quality publish/subscribe tools
• Ontology not only for resource discovery but
  semantic interoperability

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Thank You!

• further informationwww.efi.fi/projects/nefis

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Specific Issues of Pan-European FIS

• Language
• Impacts on U.I., reports
• Terms search navigate facilities
• User needs
• Regional needs and interests
• Ownership and rights management
• Legal/convention reporting requirements
• Information
• Availability and Access
• Heterogeneous
• Data harmonisation
• Model standards
• Validation
• Technology
• Non-standardised, highly distributed
• Diverse I.T. capability infrastructure