Mapping Glacier Data and Photographs via GeoServer

and Virtual Globes

Lisa M. Ballagh, I-Pin Wang and Allaina WallaceNational Snow and Ice Data Center, Boulder Colorado

Background: Muir Glacier, 2004, taken by Bruce F. Molnia, Glacier Photograph Collection

• Glacier data sets

• Google Earth demonstration

• GeoServer overview

• NSIDC’s Virtual Globes site

OverviewGlacier Photograph Collection

World Glacier Inventory

• GLIMS

• Fluctuations of Glaciers

Glacier Photograph Collection

• Coverage primarily includes– Alaska and Greenland

• Doubled in size since Jan. 31, 2008– USGS Ice and Climate Project– Contributions from Austin Post

• 10,000+ photographs online

Arapaho Glacier

Junius Henderson September 1912

Jon Van de Grift August 2004

Henry A Waldrop September 1966

Repeat Photography

Holgate Glacier

Ulysses S. Grant July 1909

Bruce F. Molnia August 2004

World Glacier Inventory (WGI)

• Online database of 100,000+ glaciers• Snapshot of glacier data including

– Latitude/longitude– Total area– Mean depth– Photo year– Topographic scale– and more...

• http://nsidc.org/data/g01130.html

WGI in Google Earth

• Objective: Make WGI data accessible from Google Earth (or another Virtual Globe)

• Problem: Data set size would create an unreasonably large static KML file

• Solution: Dynamically request area-specific WGI data from GeoServer

WGI KML

SQL Server

GeoServer

SVG

OpenLayers

GeoRSS

PDF

KML

MySQL

Oracle

PostGIS

Shapefile

Input Output

A View from Google Earth

A View from Google Earth

A View from Google Earth

A View from Google Earth

At the Heart: GeoServer

• Open source server

• Key: interoperability

• Supports OGC standards

• “Share and edit geospatial data”

• GUI-driven

D:\AGU_and_GoogleTechTalk_presentations_2008\GeoServer_movie2_QuickTime.mov

GeoServer Google Earth

• Auto-generated KML file is user unfriendly• Use templates and Styled Layer Descriptors

(SLDs) to customize the output in KML– Create a KML template

• Helps with data presentation

– Develop a Styled Layer Descriptor

• Snowflake Placemarks

GeoServer

• Example SLD

GeoServer

• Example KML template (description.ftl)

NSIDC’s Virtual Globes Site

http://nsidc.org/data/virtual_globes/

Summary

• Glacier Photograph Collection has doubled• WGI now available as a KML file• GeoServer helps serve data through Google Earth• Users can view two data sets in a spatial environment• Thanks to NOAA’s National Geophysical Data Center• Questions/comments:

– Lisa Ballagh (vtlisa@nsidc.org)