Access to earth observation/geo-referenced data

A workshop entitled "Access to earth observation/geo-referenced data" is being organized within the framework of the Fifth International World Wide Web Conference (WWW5) which will take place in Paris, France, on 6-10 May 1996. The workshop itself will be held on 6 May 1996.

The objectives of this workshop, which is being organized by the Institute for Space Applications (part of the Community's Joint Research Centre), are:

- To share experiences between developers of Web-based earth science data systems;
- To promote the interoperability of such systems, as well as software exchange;
- To provide better earth science resource location tools on the Web, and in particular to allow geographic-based searching;
- To exchange information with non-traditional earth science data systems.

The workshop is divided into three main sessions which roughly reflect current developments in earth observation and earth science services:

- Gateways to catalogues:
This covers WWW gateways to existing archives of earth observation and earth science systems. The gateways allow WWW users to submit search queries by translating the request into the appropriate protocol of the archive;

- Resource discovery/location:
This session concerns techniques for advertising and locating geographically-referenced resources on the Internet. It also examines how to establish cooperation between sites and their interoperability;

- On-line data/format access and visualization:
This session concerns techniques for accessing earth science datasets, visualizing them and developing distributed applications on the WWW.
For further information, please contact:

Institute for Space Applications
Centre for Earth Observation (CEO)
TP441
Joint Research Centre
I-21020 Ispra (VA)
Fax +39-332-785461
E-mail: clive.best@jrc.it or E-mail: yonsook@harp.gsfc.nasa.gov