WAIS through the Web - Discovering Environmental Information

Future Requirements

To improve facilities in this area a number of further developments are required :

• A smarter spatial query interface is required that can allow the interactive definition of a region of interest by panning, zooming, and selecting a region of any shape. To be a truly effective spatial tool we need to go beyond the simple point-and-click raster image. A prototype of this facility is available now with the United States Geological Survey (USGS) spatial WAIS clients [spatialWAIS].
• The ability to associate scripts and programs with the client so that some work can be done at the WWW client before sending a query on to the WWW server. This would be one way to implement the first wish of a spatial query interface. It would also be a way to pick up a local data file (say sample locations of endangered species) and send it to a remote server to run through a modelling program.
• Mac and Windows clients to implement the facility whereby an IMAGEMAP can be imbedded in a FORM.

• Ability to query more complex regions or localities ...
  • an irregularly shaped polygon
  • an irregularly shaped polygon with holes in it
  • in the Murray-Darling River basin
  • 15 km along Black Stump Highway from Bourke towards Woop Woop
  • on the Shoalhaven River upstream from the junction with the Ettrema River
• A very forgiving parser that can take a locality description such as "25km NW of Woop Woop", decode it, look up a gazetteer, calculate a geographic position, present possible solutions, and pass the choice on to the WAIS server. This is probably a job for server scripts. US Geographic Name Server is a good example.
• Ability to make WAIS queries by operating directly on the point, line, polygon, and raster objects inside a Geographic Information System or Relational Data Base Management System. The user community of people interested in developing spatial capabilities of WAIS is currently discussing the next version of the z39.50 protocol on the ZMAP Listserver [ZMAP].
• Methods to run WAIS server script so that once a data set is discovered other information could be generated by the server before delivering the document. This might be used to produce an up-to-date image of the geographic information or regenerate the metadata report.
• Prepare a map on-the-fly to mark up the extents of each discovered data set on to a composite image to show the coverage of the set of returned data sets. In conjunction with a concise query this could show, for example, gaps where vegetation surveys need to be carried out.