GLIMS Minimum Requirements list

[Bruce Raup]

On 2001-07-11 08:21 +0200,  Martin Hoelzle wrote:

> Desireable would be a link to older data with the help of the
> WGI-Number or lat & lon. How will the old data be integrated in the
> database?

The answer to your question is multi-fold.

1.  There is a field in the Glacier_Static table called "wgms_id", which
is there to link records in the GLIMS database to the World Glacier
Inventory (WGI).

2.  One might ask how this field will be filled in.  It should probably be
incumbent upon the Regional Center to know the WGI ID of glaciers in its
region, and send that information along with submissions of data.  It
might be possible to automate (or semi-automate) the processing of tying
the two together, but that would take some time and money.

3.  Another aspect of integrating new data with the old is continuity.
The WGI contains many scalar measures and descriptive parameters of
glaciers, such as profile type (even, hanging, cascading, etc.), length of
ablation area, mean elevations of various parts of the glacier, etc.
Although these fields are not currently in the GLIMS data dictionary (at
http://spot.colorado.edu/~braup/glims_database/), we intend on adding
many or all of those fields.  This will enable the ingest of WGI data into
the GLIMS database, as well as allow for the continued recording of such
data through GLIMS.

Bruce

-- 
Bruce Raup
National Snow and Ice Data Center                     Phone:  303-492-8814
University of Colorado, 449 UCB                       Fax:    303-492-2468
Boulder, CO  80309-0449                            Bruce.Raup at colorado.edu