DMAC Activity Reports to the IWGOO The following is a compilation of excerpts from activity reports to the Interagency Working Group for Oceans and Observations (IWGOO) March 2008 Executing DMAC Coordination efforts with related standards groups:

• Coordinated with the NASA ESDSWG standards adoption process. ESDSWG and DMAC have agreed to coordinate and share resources to best meet the needs of both communities. A draft collaboration document has been reviewed by both organizations and is being finalized in the next month. A NASA ESDSWG member will attend the DMAC steering team meeting in May and DMAC will attend appropriate ESDSWG meetings.
• Continued participation in the GEOSS ISWG. As a member of the taxonomy focus team, helped refine the taxonomy used in the GEOSS standards registry. Initiated discussion with the ISWG team leads on coordination with DMAC standards adoption process.
• Created a team to coordinate efforts between the DMAC standards adoption process and the IODE process. IODE has adopted the DMAC process but will be making some changes to it to better fit the needs of IODE. DMAC and IODE will explore the best path forward. Standards review:
• Started review of a newly submitted best practice on the standards needed for species location data. The review was put on hold due to a problem discovered with the software used for commenting and evaluating the standards. The issue is currently being corrected by the contractor and it is expected that the process will start up again shortly.
• Based on lessons learned during the first DMAC standards adoption process, created a team and initiated discussions on better criteria for evaluating proposed DMAC standards. In order to move forward on the four standards that were tabled during the first standards adoption process, a series of teams have been organized to explore solutions regarding the standards. Draft recommendations will be presented at the May DMAC steering team meeting for discussion and potential resolution. Activities are as follows:
• Held a series of conference calls with DMAC steering team members interested in drafting a proposed method for adopting standards involving QA/QC.
• Reviewed and edited the documentation regarding a standard for HF radar to better fit the needs of DMAC. The draft will be presented at the May meeting. General
• Plans for the May 6-8 DMAC steering team are drafted and will be finalized in April. Logistics for the meeting have been arranged, a draft agenda has been circulated and a number of DMAC issues are being worked on for presentation and discussion at the meeting.
• Work continues on a new DMAC webpage. The goal is to update the information on the current page and provide more directions to the ocean and coastal observation community on how to implement DMAC. In addition, the new web server will allow the DMAC chair to update information as needed through a content management system. A layout has been agreed upon. A number of new pages have been created and several original pages have been updated to the new look and feel of the page.
• A team has been organized to look into the use of multiple vocabularies vs ontologies within DMAC. The team will put together a presentation for the May meeting to help DMAC team members better understand the pros and cons of both approaches. Assisting with new DMAC website February 2008 Executing DMAC
• Outlined a plan for addressing lessons learned from the first standards adoption process. Began organizing teams to develop drafts for presentation at the semi-annual DMAC Steering Team meeting in May 2008 – Ball
• Submitted updates to the standards adoption process website (ioosdmac.fedworx.org) for improving system use – Ball
• Drafted plans for updating four tabled standards for discussion at the May DMAC Steering Team meeting – Ball
• Began drafting a new DMAC web page in coordination with the contractor (Washington Square Associates) and the Ocean.US Outreach Coordinator. Layout, navigation bars, and initial text have been creates and are being reviewed – Ball, Eastman
• Attended the IOOS Data Grantee Workshop in Charleston, SC, for Regional Association grant recipients. Presented information on the DMAC standards process – Ball
• Participated in the “Ocean Sciences Curriculum Sequence and Sound in the Ocean Partners Meeting” to help develop curriculum for oceans science in elementary and middle schools using ocean observation data - Ball January 2008 Executing DMAC
• Bi-weekly conference calls on DMAC standards process, FY08 work plans and activity reports with DMAC team leads (expert team, caucus, and working group chairs). – Ball
• Continued work with NOAA IOOS program on improving the DMAC standards adoption website. - Ball
• Discussed coordination between NASA Earth Systems Data Standards Working Group (ESDSWG) and DMAC plan. Started developing an informal working document on how to best leverage each other’s activities. – Ball
• The four standards that were moved from “submitted” to “proposed” in the first cycle of the DMAC standards process are being submitted through the Federal Register for public comment. Disposition of the remaining four standards is under consideration. - Ball
• Attended the Census of Marine Life workshop on “Biological Ocean Observing: Exploring Components of IOOS from the Perspective of Census of Marine Life.” Discussed the role of biological data in DMAC and worked with the Ocean Biogeographical Information System (OBIS) representatives on submitting OBIS standards to the DMAC standards adoption process. - Ball November and December 2007 Executing DMAC
• Bi-weekly conference calls on DMAC standards process, FY08 work plans and activity reports with DMAC team leads (expert team, caucus, and working group chairs). – Ball
• Continued work with NOAA IOOS program on improving the DMAC standards adoption website.
• Discussed coordination between NASA Earth Systems Data Standards Working Group (ESDSWG) and DMAC plan. Started developing an informal working document on how to best leverage each other’s activities.
• First cycle of DMAC standards process was completed. Eight standards were received via the DMAC standards website (ioosdmac.fedworx.org). Each of these standards were reviewed and commented on by DMAC experts. DMAC steering team members were provided with expert comments and polled as to whether the standards should be moved from “submitted” status to “proposed.” The final decision was to move four of the eight standards to “proposed.” The steering team decided more time and information was needed on the remaining four standards. Two of the remaining standards involved QA/QC issues. The steering team felt that the role of DMAC in QA/QC issues needed to be addressed before these standards could be properly reviewed.
• A letter was sent to the IWGOO requesting each agency to name a member for the IOWG. The letter included a proposed list of responsibilities to help further DMAC during FY08.
• The dates for the next semi-annual meeting of the DMAC steering team was set for May 6 to 8 in Silver Spring, MD. Ocean.US is working with HLA on the logistics of the meeting. August through October 2007 Executing DMAC
• Cosigned letter to community with Jack Dunnigan outlining new DMAC standards process- Altalo
• Appointed Anne Ball new chair of DMAC Steering Team. Determined LOE and further developed work element task plan. – Altalo, Ball
• Worked with the NOAA IOOS program office to develop a website for the DMAC standards process. The website (ioosdmac.fedworx.org) was made public in September. This site will manage the entry of standards and review by the DMAC steering and expert teams. Training modules have been developed and will be delivered to team members in October. Any interested party may register for an account or view the page using a guest account. –Ball
• Bi-weekly conference calls on DMAC standards process, FY08 work plans and activity reports with DMAC team leads (expert team, caucus, and working group chairs). – Ball
• Continued Coordination of the joint OPeNDAP/Unidata/NSF project, the Unidata sponsored interoperability day during the OGC conference, and a netCDF standard that will be submitted to both the NASA Earth Science Data Standards Working Group (ESDSWG) and the DMAC standards process, being done by the DMAC Data Transport and Access Expert team members. - Ball
• Coordinating with the NASA ESDSWG project. The DMAC metadata expert team chair will represent DMAC at the upcoming ESDSWG meeting in Philadelphia in October. – Ball
• International Conducting bi-weekly meetings with members of the GEOSS International Standards Working Group (ISWG) to ensure coordination between standards adoption and development between the two groups. - Ball
• Participated in Regional Association meeting St. Petersburg, FL. Continued to work on plans and agenda for the 2nd IOOS Regional Development Workshop as a member of the Steering Committee for the workshop. – Altalo, Malone, Ball
• Drafted white paper which was distributed at the St. Pete meeting. - Ball May 2007 DMAC Expert Teams, Caucuses, and Working Groups
• A list of potential data servers has been collected by the DMAC staff and is being formatted for the web. These web servers have not been checked for compliance with DMAC at this time. Once completed the web page will be posted on the Coastal Information Repository (CIR) at http://www.csc.noaa.gov/cir/ and linked to from the DMAC web page. The list will be updated with additional servers on a regular basis.
• The NOAA IOOS program and NOAA Coastal Services Center conducted their first interoperability test for SST data. They are now reviewing the results to document current as-is capability for locating and downloading SST data using available community services (OGC and OPeNDAP). The results will be shared with the DMAC staff.
• The education caucus has a new member, Tammy Wells from GCOOS. Regular conference calls have been initiated.
• Some members of the Transport and Access Expert Team are attending the Global Organization for Earth System Science Portal (GO-ESSP) meeting in June. The focus is on standardizing data portals. See http://go-essp.gfdl.noaa.gov/ for more info.
• Kurt Schnebele (DMAC Steering Team Chair) gave a briefing on IOOS to the National Capital Section, American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. The audience was mostly system integration industry representatives and the briefing focused on the value of Service Oriented Architecture April 2007 DMAC Expert Teams, Caucuses, and Working Groups
• Instructions for NOAA/CSC Registry Project were discussed by the Regional Caucus. The RA Caucus provided input on the instructions, and the content. The final version was promulgated through the RA DMAC Technical Leads with instructions to forward the requirements through to the individual data providers in their region. A number of regions have already posted their information. See http://oceanobs.org/wc/map/ for a graphical representation.
• The Regional Caucus has been approached to participate on a project to promote interaction of the Regional Associations with NASA products. The project involves a user needs and requirements assessment and a workshop to refine usage of NASA products and quantify benefits. Thoughts and comments on how this project might enhance DMAC activities are welcome. Contact Matt Howard (mkhoward@tamu.edu).
• The final report of the Quality Assurance of Real-Time Oceanographic Data (QARTOD) workshop to develop minimum standards for calibration, QA/QC methods and metadata is available online. The Metadata and Data Discovery expert team led the metadata portions of the workshop. See http://nautilus.baruch.sc.edu/twiki/pub/Main/WebHome/QARTOD2006_v9.pdf.
• Mr. Kurt Schnebele attended MetOcean Workshops, April 26 -29, sponsored by the International Association of Oil and Gas Producers. Industry panelists were given presentations on various ocean data related projects; including IOOS, SeaDataNet, EuroGOOS, and their own project called SIMORC which provides access to data collected on producers’ platforms. See http://www.simorc.com/ for additional information on this new data service.
• Ocean.US has written the U.S. Contribution to the Global Ocean Observing System 2007 inventory. A major portion of the report centered on data management activities. The report will be available later in May from the Ocean.US web site. March 2007 Data Management and Communications –
• The DMAC Metadata Expert Team is reviewing the IOOS core variables for further refinement and definition. This will allow the core variables to be used in ontologies that support data discovery and interoperability. The ontologies will include mappings to the Global Change Master Directory keywords and other vocabularies at the Marine Metadata Interoperability project.
• The DMAC Metadata Expert Team is helping develop experimental IOOS data discovery portals at the Global Change Master Directory and through the National Spatial Data Infrastructure.
• The first meeting of the newly formed DMAC Education Caucus and Education Data and Technology Protocols met March 28-29, 2007, at Ocean.US. The agenda included needs assessments and DMAC education activities and coordination. November 2006 Education Caucus of DMAC – The statement of work for the Education Caucus of DMAC was sent to the DMAC Steering Team for approval. October 2006
• Community Information Repository – The Repository web site (hosted by NOAA’s Coastal Services Center) has been deployed. Initially recommended by the DMAC-ST in November 2005, the repository serves as a public reference for current information on IOOS development activities among the partners with particular emphasis DMAC activities. The site is available in the DMAC section of the Ocean.US web pages or directly via http://www.csc.noaa.gov/cir/.
• NOAA Global Earth Observation – Integrated Data Environment (GEO-IDE) – DMAC-ST members worked with this NOAA effort to build a coordinated work plan for FY07 08. Actual work will depend on availability of FY07 appropriations, but plans have been prioritized to allow selection of tasks at various funding levels. There is considerable overlap between the objectives of IOOS DMAC and NOAA GEO-IDE with opportunities to leverage each others efforts. Some activities in the ‘top ten’ for coordinated work include – adapting ‘service registry’ technologies for use in Service-Oriented-Architecture implementation; deploying prototypes using ‘web service’ technologies and standards such as WSDL, SOAP/REST, UDDI, etc; investigating alternatives for deploying such ‘web services’ in compliance with Federal IT security mandates; and specifying a common vocabulary for ocean environmental variables. Similarly motivated coordination will be done with NSF ORION/OOI project who will soon be evaluating proposals for the Implementing Organization of its Cyberinfrastructure effort.
• EDATP – Established the IOOS Education Data and Technology Protocols (EDATP) working group. The working group has four members and has had their first meeting. Josh Kohut (Rutgers) is chairperson.