OHD/HL - HydroXC: newsletters 2007

As you know, phase 3 of the HydroXC work wrapped up in the end of August. Momentum and interest within the consortium is growing, however, and we are exploring several options for continuing the work and integrating it with other, similar efforts.

HydroXC was recently recognized internationally by the Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Research Organization(CSIRO), who became aware of this effort through a presentation at the last GeoInformatics conference in May of this year. Michael Piasecki and Apex met with an Australian delegation in September to discuss the specifics of the HydroXC work and its relevance to the mission of the CSIRO. Additionally, recently Michael Piasecki presented HydroXC's work to the CUAHSI group to build their interest in HydroXC and discuss the possibility of including the HydroXC efforts within, or as a part of, another larger effort that may have the structure or resources to keep HydroXC going long term.

Please continue to reference the HydroXC website for access to all of the work that we completed during the last phase of HydroXC:

• HydroXC XML Schema 3.0
• HydroXC Proof-of-Concept Data Adapter
• Specific Hydrologic Object Representations
• Phase 3 Summary Report

Although phase 3 of this HydroXC work has come to a close, we will continue to facilitate specific discussions around next steps and areas of work that members decide to take on and will continue to send newsletters on a quarterly basis through March of 2008. Please feel free to contact Dr. Michael Piasecki (mp29@drexel.edu) or Alexis Karnauskas (akarnauskas@apexds.com) if you would like to get more involved in the HydroXC effort or have items to share in the newsletters. As always, refer to the HydroXC website for all of the latest Consortium information.

This past month we published the finalized proof-of-concept data adapter to the HydroXC website. We also developed an Installation Guide and Technical Development Considerations document to accompany the HydroXC data adapter. All of the finalized data adapter work and documentation is posted to the HydroXC website. As we have discussed, we hope this example can serve as a stepping stone for SHEF to HydroXC translation and provide guidance for adapter creation from other groups interested in sharing data in other formats.

In August we also finalized a Summary Report on the HydroXC Phase 3 activities. The final report contains a summary of topics including an overview and background of the activities completed during Phase 3, which is broken into three sections - Research, Development, and Community Building. The report also highlights possible next steps for HydroXC. The report can be found on the HydroXC website.

In addition, Michael Piasecki's team has created an additional hydrologic object representation for a reservoir object. The finalized reservoir object is now posted to the HydroXC website.

The HydroXC work has also been recognized internationally, more specifically by the Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Research Organization(CSIRO), who became aware of this effort through a presentation at the last GeoInformatics conference in May of this year. Michael Piasecki and NOAA/OHD are planning on meeting with an Australian delegation in September to discuss the specifics of the HydroXC work and its relevance to the mission of the CSIRO.

Another important aspect of the HydroXC work that has been in our general discussions is the possibility of including the HydroXC efforts within, or as a part of, another larger effort that may have the structure or resources to keep HydroXC going long term. The ongoing CUAHSI effort has been discussed as a good candidate for this objective and more on this will transpire once Michael Piasecki has presented the HydroXC work to the CUAHSI HIS group later this year.

Phase 3 of this HydroXC work has now come to a close. We will continue to facilitate specific discussions around next steps and areas of work that members decide to take on and will continue to send newsletters on a quarterly basis through March of 2008. Please feel free to contact Dr. Michael Piasecki (mp29@drexel.edu) or Alexis Karnauskas (akarnauskas@apexds.com) if you would like to get more involved in the HydroXC effort or have items to share in the newsletters. As always, refer to the HydroXC website for all of the latest Consortium information.

After completing the final workshop last month, we spent time throughout July to finalize the proof-of-concept data adapter work. In August we will be publishing the finalized proof-of-concept data adapter and its accompanying documentation to the HydroXC website. As we have discussed, we hope this example can serve as a stepping stone for SHEF to HydroXC translation and provide guidance for adapter creation from other groups interested in sharing data in other formats.

We have also been composing a summary report on the HydroXC Phase 3 activities and will be finalizing it in August. When the report has been completed, we will post it to the website. In addition, Michael Piasecki's team has created an additional hydrologic object representation for a reservoir object, which we will also add to the website.

Another important aspect of the HydroXC work that has been in our general discussions is the possibility of including the HydroXC efforts within, or as a part of, another larger effort that may have the structure or resources to keep HydroXC going long term. The ongoing CUAHSI effort (http://www.cuahsi.org/his) has been discussed as a good candidate for this objective. Dr. Michael Piasecki will spend time exploring this possibility in more detail with the CUAHSI HIS (Hydrologic Information System) group over the next few months.

Phase 3 of this HydroXC work will be coming to a close by the end of August. We will continue to facilitate specific discussions around next steps and areas of work that members decide to take on and will continue to send newsletters on a quarterly basis through March of 2008. Please feel free to contact Dr. Michael Piasecki or Alexis Karnauskas if you would like to get more involved in the HydroXC effort or have items to share in the newsletters. As always, refer to the HydroXC website for all of the latest consortium information.

In June we held our second and final online workshop with the Consortium, for Phase 3 of the HydroXC work. During this workshop, we shared our progress on a prototype HydroXC XML adapter that is capable of converting specific SHEF messages to HydroXC-compliant XML, and converting HydroXC XML messages of SHEF-related data into SHEF-formatted messages. The data adapter demonstration included: conversion from the SHEF binary representation to HydroXC, conversion from HydroXC to a SHEF source file, mapping to and from internal location data to latitude /longitude pairs, mapping of name/value pairs, and algorithm insertion for value mapping (i.e. invocation of the conversion function instead of mapping the file lookup). You can view the presentation we shared during the workshop on the HydroXC website. The attendees discussed several options for future progress on this and other adapters, and we look forward to hearing more after the concepts are discussed within the various organizations.

In the coming weeks (within the third quarter of this year), we will be publishing the finalized proof of concept data adapter and user instructions to the HydroXC website. This example will provide guidance for adapter creation for other groups interested in developing adapters for sharing data in other formats.

Another important aspect for the HydroXC work is to investigate the possibility to embed it into or attach onto an effort that has a larger scope. The ongoing CUAHSI effort would seem to be adequate candidate for this objective and the third quarter will be used to explore this possibility in more detail.

As we announced last month, we have finalized the schema version 3.0 and specific hydrologic object representations, including a rating curve, a river reach, and a channel cross section. The finalized products are now posted on the HydroXC website. You can view the specific hydrologic object representations on the HydroXC website. You can also view the version 3.0 HydroXC schema file on the website. In the third quarter of this year, we will also be finalizing and posting to the website a HydroXC-based reservoir object.

Phase 3 of this HydroXC work will be coming to a close by the end of the third quarter of this year. We will continue to facilitate specific discussions around next steps and areas of work that members decide to take on and will continue newsletters monthly through July of this year and on a quarterly basis through March of 2008.

As always, please feel free to contact Dr. Piasecki by email if you have any technical questions and reference the new HydroXC website for general consortium information. Additionally, you may contact the HydroXC coordinator, Alexis Karnauskas, for general consortium information.

During May we continued work on defining requirements and building a prototype HydroXC XML adapter that is capable of converting certain SHEF messages to HydroXC-compliant XML, and converting HydroXC XML messages of SHEF-related data into SHEF-formatted messages. Our hope is that this example will provide guidance for adapter creation for other groups interested in developing adapters for sharing data in other formats. We will present our progress on the prototype data adapter development and implementation in an online consortium workshop this month. During this workshop we will demonstrate the SHEF - HydroXC data adapter. This demonstration will include: conversion from the SHEF binary representation to HydroXC, conversion from HydroXC to a SHEF source file, mapping to and from internal location data to lat/long pairs, mapping of name/value pairs, and algorithm insertion for value mapping (i.e. invocation of the conversion function instead of mapping the file lookup).

This online workshop is scheduled for Thursday, June 21st from 1:30 pm to 3:00 pm EDT. You should have received an invitation to attend the consortium meeting by email last week. Please let us know by the end of the day on Friday, June 15th if you will join us for this important upcoming workshop and we will send out materials just before the presentation.

We are excited to announce that we have also finalized the schema version 3.0 and specific hydrologic object representations, including a rating curve, a river reach, and a channel cross section. The finalized products are now posted on the HydroXC website. You can view the specific hydrologic object representations on the HydroXC website. You can also view the version 3.0 HydroXC schema file on the website.

As always, please feel free to contact Dr. Piasecki by email if you have any technical questions and reference the new HydroXC website for general consortium information. Additionally, you may contact the HydroXC coordinator, Alexis Karnauskas, for general consortium information.

This past month we have continued our work on defining basic requirements for an example HydroXC XML adapter that is capable of reading and writing certain SHEF messages and generating HydroXC-compliant XML. We will share our progress on the data adapters development and implementation in a second online consortium workshop in June. Our hope is that this example will provide guidance for adapter creation for other groups interested in developing adapters in other formats. You should receive an invitation to the next consortium meeting by email in the coming weeks.

We have also continued to develop additional hydrologic objects, such as a rating curve and a river cross-section, in addition to working on expanding the coverage of larger objects like a reservoir. This upcoming month we will finalize the *.XSD schema file (HydroXC Schema version 3.0) and all of the current list of hydrologic objects and post the finalized products to the HydroXC website. In the meantime, you can view the draft specific hydrologic object representations for a river reach, a reservoir, and a SHEF message on the HydroXC website. You can also view the draft HydroXC schema version 3.0 *.XSD file on the website.

As always, please feel free to contact Dr. Piasecki by email if you have any technical questions and reference the new HydroXC website for general consortium information. Additionally, you may contact the HydroXC coordinator, Alexis Karnauskas, for general consortium information.

We are excited to announce that the new HydroXC website is now live. You can visit the website at the following URL: http://www.hydroxc.org. We hope that you will find the new design both aesthetically pleasing and easy to navigate. The content simply replaces that from the previous website, but we plan to continue to improve and expand it. We encourage you to visit the site and provide feedback to the HydroXC coordinator, Alexis Karnauskas.

This past month we shared our progress on the HydroXC schema work with the consortium in an online workshop. During the workshop we demonstrated how the schema has been implemented as a *.XSD schema file. We also shared our progress on developing hydrologic object representations such as a river reach and a reservoir that can be used for data translation services. You can view the presentation document from the workshop on the Events page of the HydroXC website.

We will continue to develop additional hydrologic objects such as a rating curve and a river cross-section. In addition, we will finalize the *.XSD schema file (HydroXC Schema version 3.0) and all of the hydrologic objects and post the finalized products to the HydroXC website in the coming weeks. In the meantime, you can view the draft specific hydrologic object representations for a river reach, a reservoir, and a SHEF message on the website. You can also view the draft HydroXC schema version 3.0 *.XSD file on the website.

Additionally, we have begun work on defining basic requirements for an example HydroXC XML adapter that is capable of reading and writing certain SHEF messages and generating HydroXC-compliant XML. We will share our progress on the data adapters development in a second online consortium workshop in June or July of this year in hopes that this example can provide guidance for adapter creation for other groups and formats.

Please feel free to contact Dr. Piasecki if you have any technical questions and reference the new HydroXC website for general consortium information. Additionally, you may contact the HydroXC coordinator, Alexis Karnauskas, for general consortium information.

This past month has seen good progress on the HydroXC schema work. The schema has been implemented as an XML based *.XSD schema file and has also been reviewed for content. While the review process is still ongoing, it became clear that issues pertaining to geo-referencing need to be carefully evaluated and reflected upon to make sure that the HydroXC schema and the derived schemas handle this crucial area in a sensible fashion. Work also continued on deriving hydrologic object specific sub-schemas from the HydroXC schema. As a first test, hydrologic objects like a river reach and a reservoir were selected for sub-schema development. These hydrologic objects were chosen from the Geographic Markup Language (GML) feature list, which provides a list of hydrologic objects deemed important, among other things, for homeland security. At the same time, efforts were expended in creating a SHEF type sub-schema that could be used for data translation services.

We will share the updated schema and sub-schemas (Schema Version 3.0) with the HydroXC community in an online meeting format in the end of March. At the end of the meeting, we will allow for feedback from all members. Details for the Schema Version 3.0 presentation were sent to members of the consortium by email on Monday of this week. Please contact the HydroXC coordinator, Alexis Karnauskas, if you did not receive your invitation by email.

The stand-alone HydroXC website will launch on it's own domain, http://www.hydroxc.org at the end of this month. You will find attached to this email, a sample page with a preview of the new design.

Additionally, we have begun work on defining basic requirements for a HydroXC XML adapter that is capable of reading and writing certain SHEF messages and generating HydroXC-compliant XML. We will share our progress on the data adapters development in a second online consortium meeting later this year.

Please feel free to contact Dr. Piasecki by email if you have any technical questions and continue to reference the current HydroXC website (http://www.weather.gov/oh/hydroxc/index.html) for general consortium information. Additionally, you may contact the HydroXC coordinator, Alexis Karnauskas, for general consortium information. We look forward to hearing from all of you during the upcoming consortium meeting in the end of March.

This past month we have been working on taking the more general schema we created during the last phase of this work and creating more object-specific sub-schemas. Dr. Michael Piasecki has taken the lead on creating the object-specific sub-schemas for this phase of the HydroXC work. This involves identifying suitable applications or objects that can be parsed from the general HydroXC schema into more specific sub-schemas that contain the appropriate controlled vocabularies to describe the data content. For example, he is currently considering objects based on the SHEF and HEC-DSS data types to see how the HydroXC schema could be used to build specific schemas for those two formats. The ultimate goal would be to use these two sub-schemas as a data exchange interface to seamlessly move data from one format to the other. In addition, he also considering the GML feature catalogue as a basis to define descriptions for hydrologic features like a watershed or a stream reach that could be based on HydroXC.

We look forward to sharing the updated schema and sub-schemas (Schema Version 3.0) with the HydroXC community in draft and updated forms in an online meeting format, allowing for feedback from all members after the meeting. Details for the Schema Version 3.0 presentation will be sent to members of the Consortium in the next few weeks.

Development of the stand-alone HydroXC website is also underway. We are finalizing the design this month and will provide a sample page of the new design, for those who are interested, in the next monthly newsletter. The website will launch at the end of March on it's own domain, http://www.hydroxc.org.

Please feel free to contact Dr. Piasecki by email if you have any technical questions and continue to reference the current HydroXC website (http://www.weather.gov/oh/hydroxc/index.html) for general consortium information. Additionally, you may contact the HydroXC coordinator, Alexis Karnauskas, for general consortium information. We look forward to working with all of you to further the mission of HydroXC.