Nicole Kong
Assistant Professor, GIS Specialist
Purdue University
Geospatial information is widely used in many disciplines. Traditionally, this information has been provided by maps or by geographical information system (GIS) librarians via physical or digital maps collections in libraries. In recent years, however, with the exponential increase of geospatial information and the advancement of web map technology, this information has begun to exist on multiple platforms with various data formats, and it is challenging to provide an efficient system to catalog, manage, and discover the information. Many map and geospatial libraries have started to build their data portals, including the Open Geoportal project that originated at Tufts University, and the GeoBlacklight project initiated by Stanford University. These two projects are open source and can be adopted by any individual library. However, as we have adopted the tools at the institutional level, we have realized that takes time to set up the cyberinfrastructure, and to learn and adopt the project at each institution. It would be more efficient to collaborate in deploying such a data portal. Starting in July 2015, under the umbrella of the Committee on Institutional Cooperation, nine academic institutions have come together to create a portal for discovery and access to geospatial resources spanning eight states. In this project briefing, we will introduce the scope and current status of this project, the collaboration approach and lessons learned, as well as the details of metadata workflow, interface selection, etc. The collaborative nature of this project helps each participating university to simplify workflow in setting up a geospatial data portal on their own, encourages communications between universities, and increases data collections from single institution to multiple states.
CIC Geospatial Data Discovery Project Task Force:
University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign: James Whitacre, GIS Specialist
University of Iowa: Cathy Hodge, Monograph & Cartographic Resources Cataloging Librarian; Rob Shepard, GIS Specialist
University of Maryland: Kelley O’Neal, GIS, Geography, and Maps Librarian; Bria Parker, Metadata Librarian
University of Michigan: Mara Blake, Spatial & Numeric Data Librarian; Tim Utter Manager, Clark Library
Michigan State University: Kathleen Weessies, Geosciences Librarian; Amanda Tickner, GIS Specialist
University of Minnesota: Ryan Mattke, Map & GIS Librarian; Kevin Dyke, Spatial Data Analyst/Curator; Karen Majewicz, CIC Geospatial Project Metadata Coordinator
Pennsylvania State University: Linda Ballinger, Metadata Strategist; Nathan Piekielek, Geospatial Services Librarian; Paige Andrew, Maps Cataloging Librarian
Purdue University: Nicole Kong, GIS Specialist
University of WisconsinMadison: Jaime Martindale, Map and Geospatial Data Librarian; AJ Wortley, State Outreach Specialist
https://sites.google.com/a/umn.edu/cic-geospatial-data-discovery-project/
http://geodata.lib.purdue.edu/ogp/
Presentation (PDF)