GENEVA, Switzerland -- The Group on Earth Observations (GEO) has announced a Call for Participation (CFP) in the 6th phase of the Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS) Architecture Implementation Pilot (AIP-6). AIP-6 aims to increase the use of GEOSS resources by end-users. An end-user might be, for example, a farmer in a developing nation whose cell phone app accesses an online service that supplies planting advice and market forecasts based on sophisticated processing of data acquired by satellites, local Internet-connected sensors, and social networks.
The Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) provides leadership in AIP-6 and invites OGC members and other organizations to respond to the CFP.
GEO was launched in response to calls for action by the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development and by the G8 (Group of Eight) leading industrialized countries. GEOSS technical architecture, data sharing agreements, capacity building and user engagement programs comprise a durable platform for exploiting the growing potential of Earth observations to support decision making in an increasingly complex and environmentally stressed world.
Through integration with the technology resources in the GEOSS Common Infrastructure (GCI), AIP-6 will demonstrate how users can now begin to benefit from a decade of GEO activities. The specific goals of AIP-6 are to:
- Increase Societal Benefit Area (SBA) use of GEOSS resources by end- users
- Increase the availability of GEOSS resources
- Focus on benefits and usability for Developing Countries
- Strengthen previous GEO results and technical achievements
AIP-6 builds on the results and infrastructure set up in prior AIPs.
The AIP-6 schedule will support the GEO Plenary and Ministerial Summit, to be held 15–17 January 2014 in Geneva, Switzerland. AIP-6 will also support the Sprint to Summit initiative from the GEO Implementation Boards. A Kickoff Workshop for AIP-6 will be held from 28–29 March in Washington, D.C.
This CFP invites GEO Members and Participating Organizations to participate in AIP-6 through activities such as:
- Leading GEOSS SBA demonstrations
- Tutorial development as expert guidance to GEOSS SBA users
- Client applications for GEOSS users to download and utilize GEOSS resources
- Support of GEO legal interoperability efforts, e.g., user registration
- Integration and testing to enable GCI promote helper applications for users
- Enhancements to the GEOSS test facility
Responses to this CFP are requested by 15 March 2013. Discussion and clarification of the CFP and the initiation of AIP-6 will be the topic of weekly teleconferences.
The Point of Contact for the AIP initiative is Bart De Lathouwer, [email protected].
About the OGC
The OGC is an international consortium of more than 480 companies, government agencies, research organizations, and universities participating in a consensus process to develop publicly available geospatial standards. OGC Standards empower technology developers to make geospatial information and services accessible and useful with any application that needs to be geospatially enabled.
About GEO
GEO, a voluntary partnership of 156 governments and international organizations, is coordinating efforts to build a Global Earth Observation System of Systems, or GEOSS.