The development of a geospatial data Grid by integrating OGC Web services with Globus‐based Grid technology

Abstract Geospatial science is the science and art of acquiring, archiving, manipulating, analyzing, communicating, modeling with, and utilizing spatially explicit data for understanding physical, chemical, biological, and social systems on the Earth's surface or near the surface. In order to share distributed geospatial resources and facilitate the interoperability, the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC), an industry–government–academia consortium, has developed a set of widely accepted Web‐based interoperability standards and protocols. Grid is the technology enabling resource sharing and coordinated problem solving in dynamic, multi‐institutional virtual organizations. Geospatial Grid is an extension and application of Grid technology in the geospatial discipline. This paper discusses problems associated with directly using Globus‐based Grid technology in the geospatial disciplines, the needs for geospatial Grids, and the features of geospatial Grids. Then, the paper presents a research project that develops and deploys a geospatial Grid through integrating Web‐based geospatial interoperability standards and technology developed by OGC with Globus‐based Grid technology. The geospatial Grid technology developed by this project makes the interoperable, personalized, on‐demand data access and services a reality at large geospatial data archives. Such a technology can significantly reduce problems associated with archiving, manipulating, analyzing, and utilizing large volumes of geospatial data at distributed locations. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.