The International Geo-Sample Number (IGSN) provides a globally unique identifier for physical samples used to generate analytical data. This unique identifier provides the ability to link each physical sample to any analytical data undertaken on that sample, as well as to any publications derived from any data derived on the sample. IGSN is particularly important for geochemical and geochronological data, where numerous analytical techniques can be undertaken at multiple analytical facilities not only on the parent rock sample itself, but also on derived sample splits and mineral separates. Australia now has three agencies implementing IGSN: Geoscience Australia, CSIRO and Curtin University. All three have now combined into a single project, funded by the Australian Research Data Services program, to better coordinate the implementation of IGSN in Australia, in particular how these agencies allocate IGSN identifiers. The project will register samples from pilot applications in each agency including the CSIRO National Collection of Mineral Spectra database, the Geoscience Australia sample collection, and the Digital Mineral Library of the John De Laeter Centre for Isotope Research at Curtin University. These local agency catalogues will then be aggregated into an Australian portal, which will ultimately be expanded for all geoscience specimens. The development of this portal will also involve developing a common core metadata schema for the description of Australian geoscience specimens, as well as formulating agreed governance models for registering Australian samples. These developments aim to enable a common approach across Australian academic, research organisations and government agencies for the unique identification of geoscience specimens and any analytical data and/or publications derived from them. The emerging pattern of governance and technical collaboration established in Australia may also serve as a blueprint for similar collaborations internationally.

No abstract available

The important role of information management in improving baseline data for natural hazards has been demonstrated through a collaborative pilot project between Geoscience Australia, Mineral Resources Tasmania and the University of Wollongong. The result is a 'virtual' landslide database that makes full use of diverse data across three levels of government and has enabled landslide data to be collated and accessed from a single source. Such a system establishes the foundation for a very powerful and coordinated information resource in Australia and provides a suitable basis for greater investment in data collection. This paper highlights the capacity to extend the methodology across all hazards and describes one solution in facilitating a sound knowledge base on natural disasters and disaster risk reduction.

Earth comprises systems of enormous complexity that sustain all life and control the distribution of our mineral, energy and water resources. Increasingly earth scientists are now moving away from focusing on single domain research on understanding isolated parts of these intricate systems to adopting multidisciplinary, computationally intensive integrated methodologies to model and simulate the real world complexities of earth systems science. Simultaneously developments in information technology are increasing the capacity of computational systems to credibly simulate complex systems. Real world Solid Earth and Environmental Science data sets are extremely heterogenous, complex and large, and are currently in the order of terabytes (1012 bytes). However, the size and complexity of geoscience data sets are also exponentially increasing, as more powerful modern computing systems combine with enhanced engineering capacity to design and build automated instruments to collect more data and new data types. We are rapidly moving into an era when Earth Scientists will need to have the capacity to analyse petabyte (1015 bytes) databases if they are to realistically model and simulate complex earth processes. Although digital geoscientific data sets are becoming increasingly available over the Internet, current Internet technologies only allow for the downloading of data (if the connection is fast enough): integration, processing and analysis then has to take place locally. As data sets get larger and more complex, then large computational resources are required to effectively process these data. Such resources are increasingly only available to the major industry players, which in turn creates a strong bias against the Small to Middle Enterprises, as well as many University researchers. For those that do not have access to large-scale computing resources, analysis of these voluminous data sets has to be compromised by dividing the data set into smaller units, accepting sub-optimal solutions and/or introducing sub-optimal approximations. It is clear that if we are to begin grappling with accurate analysis of large-scale geoscientific data sets to enable sustainable management of our mineral, energy and water resources, then current computational infrastructures are no longer viable.

With the increasing emphasis on electronic rather that paper products, the need for adequate metadata is becoming more and more pressing. The new AGSO Catalog is designed to address this problem at the corporate level. Developed from the AGSO Products Database, the AGSO Catalog is designed to encompass most of AGSOs outputs, datasets and resources. It does this with the help of various intranet and Web interfaces. Projects or authors must initiate Catalog entries, for without an acceptable metadata a product cannot be sold by the Sales Centre, or permission to publish will not be granted. The Catalog is the key to future systems of information distribution and sales. It will permit us to go directly from the metadata to the electronically stored objects, thus enabling automated information distribution and electronic commerce.

This documentation manual for the national mineral deposits dataset provides the necessary description of AGSO's mineral deposit database (OZMIN) - its structure, the main data and authority tables used by OZMIN, database table definitions, details on the Microsoft Access version of the database and a listing of those deposits in the dataset.

GSA Abstracts

The Australian National Marine Data Group was formed by the Heads of Marine Agencies (HOMA) to promote improved interchange of marine data in Australia. The ANMDG held a workshop of practitioners in May 2002 with the intention of identifying major areas of interest and tasks for working groups to address in order to make progress with development of marine data interchange in Australia. This Proceedings CD contains the presentations by speakers in the form of PowerPoint slides and a few Acrobat documents. It was distributed to participants in the workshop.

The Christmas Island Geographic Information System (CIGIS) is a collection of spatial data, viewing and analysis tools dealing with Christmas Island. The data include orthophotography, topographic, mining, cultural and environmental features of the island. Compilation of data and its organisation into a GIS together with documentation was undertaken by the Australian Geological Survey Organisation (AGSO) at the request of the Territories Office, Department of Transport and Regional Services (DOTRS). The data are presented in both ESRI ArcView and ArcExplorer projects. The ArcView projects require a licensed copy of ArcView. ArcExplorer is a free viewer and is distributed with the Cocos GIS CD-ROM. Data are stored as ESRI shapefiles and therefore readily useable with most modern GIS applications. Data were received from a variety of custodians and in many cases had no accompanying documentation. Lack of documentation made it increasingly difficult for AGSO with interpretation, translation and documentation of data. AGSO has attempted to include metadata for all datasets to ANZLIC core metadata standards, but the value of this is limited by the poor initial documentation. In addition to limited documentation, many datasets had inconsistent spatial accuracy. The CocosGIS comprises four main CD-ROMs with additional CD-ROMs containing full-colour orthophotography. A hard-copy user guide is distributed with the main CD-ROM set.

The Australian Geological Survey Organisation (AGSO) presents its solutions to mapping and GIS on the Internet. Software used is based on commercial and open source products. A distributed web mapping system is demonstrated, and concepts of distributed web mapping discussed. Systems for online delivery of spatial data are also demonstrated. AGSO has been providing Internet access to spatial data since 1996. AGSO is the main repository for national geoscientific data, and services a wide range of clients across industry, government and the general public. Data provided range from point data, such as site descriptions and scientific analysis of samples, to line, polygon and grid data, such as geological and geophysical surveys and associated maps. AGSO currently holds 500 MB of GIS data and a similar amount of image data on its web site; these data are expected to expand to a number of terabytes over the next few years. A primary role of AGSO is to provide its data to clients and stakeholders in as efficient a way as possible, hence its choice of Internet delivery. The major obstacle for supplying data of large volume over the Internet is bandwidth. Many AGSO clients are in remote locations with low bandwidth connections to the Internet. Possible solutions to this problem are presented. Examples of AGSO web tools are available at http://www.agso.gov.au/map/