home results SP7 - Data Management WP1 - Infrastructure requirements definition

WP1 - Infrastructure requirements definition

In order to identify the requirements of the RITMARE interoperable infrastructure, SP7_WP1 created a questionnaire submitted to 30 researchers among the representatives of Work Packages and Actions more involved in the creation and management of environmental data and, then, potentially interested in using the infrastructure. In most cases, filling has been performed by a direct interview guided by SP7_WP1 staff, following a workflow shown in Figure WP1.1.

Figure WP1.1: sketch of the workflow to define macro-requirements of RITMARE infrastructure

The list of researchers involved and the filled questionnaires are readable at http://sp7.irea.cnr.it/wp1/az1/questresults/interviste.php.

The 137 requirements obtained have been then grouped into 6 macro-requirements and submitted to an expert panel, coordinated by RITMARE direction; it defined an implementation priority order and added a further new requirement (use case on fishing).

The most requested functionalities are data discovery, visualization and download, while data uploading is requested in few cases. Almost all data typologies are needed, while data related to physic oceanography are prevailing.

This investigation let us conclude that the RITMARE infrastructure will be successful if it encourage researchers in sharing their own data (and metadata), by making available capacity building tools enabling and easing the less skilled participants.

A further SP7_WP1 activity was the investigation of available experiences about data infrastructure in international (Europe, USA and Australia) and national projects and practices not included in RITMARE, in relation to the obtained requirements.

In collaboration with SP7_WP2 and SP7_WP4, the resulting information has been organized into formatted sheets with the following fields:

  • information to identify and describe each initiative/project analyzed;

  • description of the main functions implemented by the initiative/project;

  • description of data and information made available, used or managed;

  • maturity level with respect to RITMARE infrastructure implementation;

Figure WP1.2  reports the list of the examined external initiatives.

Figure WP1.2: list of initiatives external to RITMARE inventoried by SP7_WP1
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