Author_Institution :
Center for Spatial Inf. Sci. & Syst., George Mason Univ., Fairfax, VA, USA
Abstract :
There are many important publicly available agricultural geospatial data products for the agriculture-related research, applications, and educational outreach programs. The traditional data distribution method cannot fully meet users´ on-demand geospatial data needs. This paper presents interoperable, standard-compliant Web services developed for geospatial data access, query, retrieval, statistics, mapping, and comparison. Those standard geospatial Web services can be integrated in scientific workflows to accomplish specific tasks or consumed over the Web to create value-added new geospatial application by users. In addition, this paper demonstrates, via real world use cases, applications of those services and potential impacts on facilitating geospatial Cropland Data Layer (CDL) retrieval, analysis, visualization, dissemination and integration in agricultural industry, government, research, and educational communities. This paper also shows that the geospatial Web service approach helps improve the reusability, interoperability, dissemination, and utilization of agricultural geospatial data. It allows for integrating multiple online applications and different geospatial data sources, and enables automated retrieving and delivery of agricultural geospatial information for decision-making support.
Keywords :
Web services; agricultural engineering; data analysis; data integration; data visualisation; decision support systems; geophysics computing; information dissemination; open systems; query processing; agricultural geospatial data; agricultural geospatial data dissemination; agricultural geospatial information automated retrieving; agricultural geospatial information delivery; agricultural industry; agriculture-related applications; agriculture-related research; data distribution method; decision-making support; educational communities; educational outreach programs; geospatial cropland data layer analysis; geospatial cropland data layer dissemination; geospatial cropland data layer integration; geospatial cropland data layer retrieval; geospatial cropland data layer visualization; geospatial data access; geospatial data comparison; geospatial data mapping; geospatial data query; geospatial data sources; geospatial data statistics; government; interoperability; interoperable standard-compliant Web services; multiple online applications; potential impacts; publicly available agricultural geospatial data products; real world use cases; scientific workflows; standard geospatial Web services; user on-demand geospatial data; value-added new geospatial application; Agriculture; Data visualization; Geospatial analysis; Servers; Standards; Web services; CropScape; CropScape, geospatial web service,; Cropland Data Layer (CDL); geospatial data sharing and interoperability; geospatial web service; service chain;