Prototypical transformation of spatial data to INSPIRE in the cross-border Lake Constance region

The mapping and cadastre authorities of Baden-Wuerttemberg, Bavaria, Austria and Switzerland launched a pilot project which aims at prototypically transforming the topographical data together with the cadastre data to the INSPIRE data models from Annex I of the INSPIRE Directive using semantic transformation and to provide them via view and download services. The semantic transformation is executed by means of two different approaches, the format-driven approach as well as the model-driven approach.

Project description

In the context of the EU INSPIRE Directive harmonised European data models, called INSPIRE Data Specifications, are defined for certain themes such as administrative units or hydrography. For data providers such as environmental authorities of mapping agencies, who are required to provide INSPIRE-compliant geospatial data, this means, that the data has to be transformed into the data models specified by the EU before providing them to the user. In this context, the mapping and cadastre authorities of Baden-Wuerttemberg, Bavaria, Austria and Switzerland launched a joint pilot project which aims at prototypically transforming the topographical data together with the cadastre data to the INSPIRE data models from Annex I of the INSPIRE Directive using semantic transformation and to analyse the method of the semantic transformation prototypically.

Above that, it will also be compared in how far the four countries are capable of filling the INSPIRE Data Specifications with regard to the compulsory data and the optional voidable information. Valuable advice is expected from the prototypical analysis on how to provide the customers in the short and long term as efficiently as possible with the spatial base data by means of a cross-border spatial data infrastructure, without the user having to take care of complex data integration into his/her applications.

In a first step the focus is on the format-driven transformation. Here the transformation is defined and executed directly on the format level (e.g. SHAPE files). The description and the following implementation of the transformation process are to be carried out based on the AAA model with the software FUSION Data Service (FDS) from the company AED-SICAD AG. The FDS is based on the Feature Manipulation Engine (FME) from the company Safe Software Inc., which has been extended by the Semantic Mapper module through the company AED-SICAD AG.

In a second step the model-driven transformation is to be realised for individual spatial data themes. Here the transformation rules between the country’s source data models and the INSPIRE Data Specifications are defined on the conceptual level and afterwards are applied to the actual spatial data. The source and target data models of the individual countries and of INSPIRE are defined using the Unified Modelling Language (UML). For this purpose, the scientific foundations have to be developed and technical solutions for the prototypical transformation have to be implemented first. The transformation results and especially the approach of defining the transformation rules of the two alternatives can then easily be compared. The research will be based on the results from a study which analysed different modelling languages and profiles; furthermore the mdWFS approach of the GIS Group and the ETH Zurich will be employed there. The main focus of the analyses will be on the model-driven semantic transformation based on differing modelling languages. As a possible solution to this problem the definition of a core profile of the modelling language UML with subsequent metamodel transformation is taken into account.

Duration

2010-2012

Project sponsors

• Federal Office for Topography swisstopo, Switzerland
• Federal Office of Metrology and Surveying, Austria
• Agency for Surveying and Geoinformation, Bavaria
• State Agency for Spatial InfACormation And Rural Development, Baden-Wuerttemberg

Contact person

• Dipl.-Inf. Tatjana Kutzner

Project leader

• Prof. Matthäus Schilcher

Project contributors

• Tatjana Kutzner
• Dr. Andreas Donaubauer
• Bianca Aderhold
• Michael Lill

Project partners

• Runder Tisch GIS e.V.
• AED-SICAD AG
• Bundesamt für Kartographie und Geodäsie, Deutschland