: Sharing Diverse

Hydrologic Data Types and

Models as Social Objects within a
Hydrologic Information System
Jeffery S. Horsburgh
Mohamed M. Morsy, Anthony M. Castronova, Jonathan L.
Goodall, Tian Gan, Hong Yi, Michael J. Stealey, David G.
Tarboton, and the rest of the HydroShare Team

CUAHSI Hydrologic Information System

Enabling Water Science Data Discovery

But, data and models used

by hydrologists are diverse

Time series
Geographic rasters
Geographic features
Multidimensional space/time
Model programs
Model instances

We needed to move beyond time series to a more

general Hydrologic Information System that better

supports the data/models we use and the way we work

To the Cloud!

Convenient sharing
Accessibility anywhere
Cross platform
Low cost

But
Storage, but not much else
File formats, content, and
semantics still matter

New Opportunities for Data Sharing

and Preservation

Emerging data repositories

Functionality archival/preservation
Still very much discipline specific
Impact is higher if you choose carefully!
Data repositories do data but not models
Model repositories dont support data and
most dont support model instances
Most rely on curation of static products
with no real collaborative capabilities
CUAHSI

HIS

Sharing hydrologic data

Social Objects
Objects around which social
networks form

Jyri Engestrm

What do we want to do?

Easily create a digital instance of a dataset or
model (a Resource)
Quickly share it with colleagues (perhaps
privately)
Add value through annotation and iteration
Describe with metadata
Eventuallyshare publicly or formally Publish
Data and models are social objects shared among
scientists

Web-based system for

advancing data and model
sharing
Building on what we learned in
developing the CUAHSI HIS to
support more diverse data
types and models

Our goal: Allowing

scientists to create
social objects that
add value

Why is it hard to enable sharing of

hydrologic data and models (Resources)?
Among a host of other technical challenges:
Resources may be made up of a single file or
multiple files
There may be a hierarchical structure
Resources of different types may have different
content data models
File formats/hierarchies
Syntax

First we needed to define our social objects

Resources consisting of hydrologic datasets
and models
Then, HydroShare needed a generalized
structure within which those objects could be
created, stored, described, annotated, and
packaged for transmitting over the Internet

HydroShare Resources
Resource = primary unit of digital content
Create
Share
Own
Access
Filter
Discover
We needed to be able to
manage all of this
functionality consistently
across all resource types.

HydroShare Resource Data Model

An profile of the Open Archives Initiatives Object Reuse and Exchange
(OAI-ORE) standard
An XML
document
that encodes
the
description of
a Resource
and the
Aggregation
A file that is
part of a
Resource

OAI-ORE = A general standard

for description and exchange of
aggregations of web resources

A list of all of the

objects/files
aggregated within
the resource

Simple Example: Hydrologic Time Series

Formal semantic terms are used to express relationships among objects:

o The Resource Map document describes the Aggregation
o The Aggregation aggregates the content file
o Expressed as RDF triples

A computer can learn the structure of a

Resource by reading its Resource Map
document

Resource Metadata: Dublin Core

Common to Every Resource

Resource Content Data Models

Resource Metadata: Extended

Specific Elements for Each Resource Type

Packaging
Resources
How to store
resources on disk?
What do you get
when you
download a
resource?

Packaging Resources for Storage

and Transfer
Bag-It!
A hierarchical file packaging format for storage and
transfer of arbitrary digital content
Storage on disk and serialization for download

Model and Model Instance Resources

Public and
Private Sharing
Set as Public or
Private

Choose a license

Decide who has

access and what
permissions they
have

Ratings and Comments

+1 a
Resource

Start a
Conversation
+1 a
Comment

Receive
notifications

Information Content of Data and Metadata

What if?
Dataset synthesized
and leads to another
publication

Paper using the

Dataset is
published

Dataset deposited
in HydroShare
Time

Dataset annotated
by HydroShare
users

Summary
Hydrologic datasets and models are social objects
HydroShares Resource Data Model enables us to
consistently handle diverse Resource types
Machine and human interpretable
Resource content data models add structure to
known Resource types

Resource Data Model = Container

Resource Content Data Model = Whats in the container

Storage on disk, access control, transport over the

Internet, and cataloging are consistent for all
Resource types

Web Resources
HydroShare system:
http://www.hydroshare.org
HydroShare project website:
http://hydroshare.cuahsi.org
HydroShare GitHub repositories:
https://github.com/hydroshare/

Questions?
jeff.horsburgh@usu.edu

Support:
ACI 1148453
ACI 1148090