Environmental Resources Information Network

Australian Spatial Data Directory (ASDD)

Quarterly Technical Report

July to September 1999

Introduction

This quarterly report provides a technical status of the Australian Spatial Data Directory (ASDD). ERIN, Environment Australia, is coordinating the technical implementation of the directory. At the end of September 1999, there were 16 nodes within the ASDD with a total of 34,058 dataset descriptions available for searching. Statistics are provided for the ASDD covering number, compliance and reliability of nodes, number of hits and records per node for the months of July, August and September.

ASDD Implementation Consultancy- IndexGeo Pty Ltd

AUSLIG, ERIN and ANZLIC have jointly funded this consultancy.

Achievements during past quarter

• New QLD nodes now available. Replacement for old QLD node at BRS and new node of aerial photography. 10-fold increase in response time.
• WALIS have upgraded their document collections to XML metadata and improved presentation documents. Also added new Bibliography node and more content in other nodes.
• Gathered and distributed information about Isite Y2K - current version 2.06 is certified as OK (older versions are too, but no certificate)
• Visit to NT - explained many of the problems that NT are seeing with their Zserver. Improved their understanding of ASDD Z39.50. Sent trip report.
• Visit to SA - presented overview of ASDD and technical background in ZML and Z39.50. Discussed SA Isite.
• Further investigated possibilities for NLA node. Awaiting decision on new Z39.50 environment.
• Assisted with planning for new TAS implementation in early November.
• Opened up "ASDD Node Managers" application so that anyone with Australian email address can join to describe and configure their new ASDD nodes. Previously limited to only existing nodes. Logfiles reveal that many people have tried to join.
• Provided access to each new Isite distribution (now 2.06d) some Isite nodes have upgraded.
• Refined official Geographic Extent Name (GEN) lists. Will be included in ANZLIC MET tool and also used for pick-lists in ASDD interfaces.

Expected during next quarter

• Continue technical implementation support for existing nodes until end of November
• Assist new nodes TAS, NLA, ACT Technical assistance site visits to some nodes
• Encourage remaining nodes to upgrade to XML document collections
• Implement improved ASDD gateway interfaces
• Tweaks to technical documentation
• Prepare final report

Nodes

The following table lists the nodes and the number of records per node that were accessible at 28 October 1999.

Usage

The total number of hits recorded for the ASDD pages on the Environment Australia web site for the months July to September 1999 was 3,988 compared to 4,512 for the previous quarter.

Usage for the months of July, August and September 1999 was 1138, 1546 and 1304 hits respectively. A breakdown of users by top-level domain for the each month is shown below:

Node reliability

A summary of node reliability for the period July to September is given below:

Node managers are automatically notified by email if a server goes down for a period longer than four hours.

Node descriptions

ASDD node descriptions http://www.ga.gov.au/asdd/tech/node/

It is the responsibility of each node manager to utilise the online document management application to describe their node and update the node description whenever they choose.

The following ASDD nodes are briefly described and include references to further information ...

• AUSLIG Data Directory

• BRS - Incorporating Other Commonwealth Data

• EA Environmental Data Directory (Green Pages)

• IndexGeo Pty Ltd - Eco Companion catalogue

• NT Spatial Data Directory

• Queensland (QSID) Aerial Photography

• Queensland (QSID) Spatial Data

• South Australia Spatial Information Directory

• Victorian Spatial Data Directory

• WALIS Interragator-Aerial photography

• WALIS Interragator-Environmental Impact Statements

• WALIS Interragator-Bibliographic Data

• WALIS Interragator-Spatial Data