Sustainability of Ocean Observing Systems – An Interdisciplinary Data Management Case Study Robert M. Branton 1, Tsafrir Gazit1, Andrew Sherin2

1 Dalhousie University, 1355 Oxford Street, Halifax, Nova Scotia, B3H 4R2, Canada,2Atlantic Coastal Zone Information Steering Committee Secretariat, 6414 Coburg Road, Halifax,

Nova Scotia, B3H 4R2, Canada

Email: bob.branton@dal.ca

Keywords. data management, data management planning, ocean observing, animal tracking.

This presentation and associated materials can be found at:http://coinatlantic.ca/index.php/scidatacon2014

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Outline

• Introduction• Ocean Tracking Network• Data Management Planning Tools

– ACZISC Information Accessibility Benchmark – DCC Data Management Planning (DMP) Online

• Results• Conclusions / Recommendations• Acknowledgements• Summary of Links

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Introduction

• Global ocean observing systems and associated research management practices are both evolving very rapidly.

• What happens to the data when core funding for global initiatives like the Ocean Tracking Network (OTN) is discontinued?

• Data management planning tools including: Canada’s Atlantic Coastal Zone Information Steering Committee (ACZISC) ‘Information Accessibility Benchmark’ framework and United Kingdom’s Digital Curation Centre (DCC) Data Management Planning (DMP) are intended to address such questions.

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Ocean Tracking Network (OTN)

• Headquartered at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Canada

• Part of the Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS)

• 202 projects involving 287 researchers at 90 institutions in 18 countries

See Public OTN Data Portal live at http://members.oceantrack.org

Gaps in Coverage by Economic Exclusion Zone

See OTN EEZ map live at http://www.arcgis.com

* A cursory look at 20 references randomly selected from 378 listed by ‘Kessel S. T. et al. A review of detection range testing in aquatic passive acoustic telemetry studies. In: Reviews in Fish Biology and Fisheries 2013’ showed that ½ were studies of species not contained in the OTN database.

*

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OTN Data Policies

• Free & open access to data following OECD* Principals & Guidelines

• Not all institutions share tag release metadata, hence mystery tags

* http://www.oecd.org/sti/sci-tech/38500813.pdf

http://members.oceantrack.org/data/data-collection

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OTN Data

• Annual growth generally exceeds 50% per year – 60 million

detections of 36 thousand known tagged animals of 72 species

– 17 million detections of 8 thousand mystery tags*

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Breaking News at 5th International Bio-logging Symposium (BLS5), Sept 22-27, 2014, Strasbourg, France …

• OTN … adopts the ‘Animal Acoustic Telemetry (AAT) Data Convention and Solutions’ recently reconciled by U.S. IOOS, NANOOS, OTN, and Australia’s Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS) and other partners.

• ‘AAT Data Solutions’ … facilitate data exchange between data centers, unite oceanographers and trackers and help users to get the data they want in formats they need

More Information: Wiki , ERRDAP , GeoServer Contacts: hassan.moustahfid@noaa.gov and Lenore.Bajona@dal.ca

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Data Management Planning Tools

• National research funding bodies, around the world now increasingly require their grant-holders to produce and maintain formal standardized Data Management Plans (DMPs), both at the bid-preparation stage and after funding has been secured

• Standards and tools such as these did not exist when OTN’s was first developed; hence a need to explore their use as a potential replacement

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ACZISC Information Accessibility Benchmark

http://coinatlantic.ca/documents/Data_Accessibility_Benchmark_Organizational_Self_Assessment_Tool.pdf

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Atlantic Coastal Zone Information Steering Committee (ACZISC) Information Accessibility Benchmark

Pedigree• Organisation for Economic Co-

Operation and Development’s (OECD) Principles and Guidelines for Access to Research Data from Public Funding.

• Government of Canada’s Operating Principles for the Open Government.

• United States Memorandum on Open Data Policy.

• G8 Charter for Open Data.

Principles1. Open Data by Default2. Completeness3. Primacy4. Timeliness5. Ease of Physical and

Electronic Access6. Non-discrimination7. Licencing8. Permanence9. Usage Costs10. Supporting Use11. Evaluation

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Using the ACZISC Information Accessibility Benchmark

• A laddered self-evaluation questionnaire and scoring system for determining an organization’s adherence to providing effective and easy accessibility to data

• What is your organization’s position on this ladder?

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ACZISC Information Accessibility Benchmark is a Self Assessment Tools

• Use separately to score multiple units within one organization.

• Have multiple persons from different perspectives (e.g. data manager, user, scientist) score within each unit.

• Use it repetitively over time to mark progress.• The individual scores for each ladder are more important

than the aggregate score: use the score to target areas to improve upon.

• Weight scores based upon internal priorities. • Some respondents may choose not to score some ladders

(n/a).

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DCC Data Management Planning (DMP) Online

http://www.dcc.ac.uk/dmponline

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Data Curation Centre (DCC) Data Management Planning (DMP) Online Tool

• ‘Data Management Planning Online’ (DMP) provides for building & editing of funder specific and or generic plans.

• DMPs are easily created, edited, shared, exported or deleted at anytime.

Create

Document

Use

Store

Share

Preserve

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‘OTN Data Management Plan’ using Generic DMP Online Framework

Co-owned by: Lenore.Bajona@dal.ca and bob.branton@dal.cal

http://coinatlantic.ca/SciDataCon2014/Ocean Tracking Network.pdf

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Example DMP Online question & answer

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Results

• Existing OTN planning and policy documents were used to conduct a preliminary assessment of data management practices using both the DCC and ACZISC frameworks.

• All ACZISC and DCC framework questions were answered using existing OTN text.

• DMP results are stored within DMPonline at DCC and ACZISC results are stored in a simple Excel spreadsheet.

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ACZISC / DMP Online Comparison Results were summarized and compared using this simple table.

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Online Form Based QuestionnaireA GoogleDocs Form was recently created and connected to a spreadsheet for analysis via R (see next slide). Groups being invited to use this form include: Ocean Tracking Network (OTN) and the NorthEast Coastal and Ocean Data Partnership (NECODP). The form and associated usage guide can be found by following this link.

RStudio / Lattice Visualization of AZCISC and DCCP Scores

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By ACZISC Principal By DCC Category

By Respondent and ACZISC Principal By Respondent and DCC Category

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‘AAT Data Solutions Plan’ using Generic DMP Online Framework

A work in progress

Co-owned by:hassan.moustahfid@noaa.gov , Lenore.Bajona@dal.ca and bob.branton@dal.cal

http://coinatlantic.ca/SciDataCon2014/Global Animal Acoustic Telemetry Data Sharing And

Visualization.pdf

Conclusions• Although not included in this study

DataOne’s DMPTool is generally considered complementary to DMPOnline.– Sallans & Donnelly (2012) DMP Online

and DMPTool: Different Strategies Towards a Shared Goal. The International Journal of Digital Curation. Vol 7, Issue 2

• The AZCISC and data management planning tools like DCC DMPOnline and DMPTool all have– same general scope with emphasis on

issues like ‘ease of access’, ‘open by default’, ‘permanence‘, ‘data collection’, ‘data sharing’ and ‘responsibilities’

• The ACZISC benchmark provides a practical basis for systematic assessment of data management organizations, plans and systems before, during and after data are collected and processed.

• In the case of international networks such as OTN/AAT, this would include: – identifying need for enhancements

at existing nodes– creation of new nodes and or

combining of existing nodes– migrating existing nodes between

institutions

Recommendation: Use DCC/DataOne based ‘OTN Data Management Plans’ and ‘AAT Data Solution Plans’ as templates to

prepare ‘Regional Data Management Plans’ 22

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Acknowledgments

• Authors thank … – Alexi Baccardax Westcott / ACZISC – Dalhousie U– Hassan. Moustahfid / IOOS – NOAA– Joyline Makani / Dalhousie U – Joy Davidson / DCC - Glasgow U– Lenore Bajona / OTN - Dalhousie U– Mary Kennedy / DFO Canada / OBIS Canada– Paul Boudreau / ACZISC – Dalhousie Ufor providing materials on relevant data systems and frameworks and for reviewing and commenting the extended abstract and this presentation.

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Sustainability of Ocean Observing Systems – An Interdisciplinary Data Management Case

Study

Pg Links

1 http://coinatlantic.ca/index.php/scidatacon2014

4 http://members.oceantrack.orghttp://bit.ly/1ouwou9

7 https://code.google.com/p/ioostech/wiki/AnimalAcousticTelDatahttp://data.nanoos.org/deverddap/index.html http://data.nanoos.org/geoserver/web/

9 http://coinatlantic.ca/documents/Data_Accessibility_Benchmark_Organizational_Self_Assessment_Tool.pdf

13 http://www.dcc.ac.uk/dmponline

15 http://coinatlantic.ca/SciDataCon2014/Ocean Tracking Network.pdf

19 https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1MJDBaBK8y-PE1XI6YmZ4BIqTGYwPmYGACNjIDVhXXsM/edit?usp=sharing

21 http://coinatlantic.ca/SciDataCon2014/Global Animal Acoustic Telemetry Data Sharing And

Visualization.pdf

Authors and Contact …Robert M. Branton 1, Tsafrir Gazit1, Andrew Sherin2

1. Dalhousie University, 1355 Oxford Street, Halifax, Nova Scotia, B3H 4R2, Canada,

2. Atlantic Coastal Zone Information Steering Committee Secretariat, 6414 Coburg Road, Halifax, Nova Scotia, B3H 4R2, Canada

Email: bob.branton@dal.ca

Summary of Links by Page …