[Auscope-geosciml] Event type vocabulary? what is it [SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]

Sun Mar 21 19:23:39 EDT 2010

As you would expect I object!

>In spite of potential ambiguities age is something that is recorded on 
pretty much all geological maps. 
Yes, but there is usually additional information, either in the legend (eg 
depositional environment) or accompanying explanatory notes, to indicate 
what this age means. 

> are the ones that we (as the experts in the geological survey) consider 
represent the age of the GeologicUnit ... For interoperability all 
information should be in the data, not embedded in queries.
To specify that this is a 'preferredAge' of someone in the survey without 
saying why this age is preferred or what the age represents is not to 
provide additional information, just opinion.

>I don't think telling users to work it out for themselves is a sufficient 
response (we are meant to be the experts), or telling them they can only 
get this information if the service is accessed through a portal 
controlled by us with queries constructed by us.
Its not about telling users to work it out for themselves, its about 
allowing users and clients to use the data for the purposes they require 
and providing sufficient information so they can. Clients like OneGeology 
should provide a view of 'age' based on their criteria (presumably 
deposition, intrusion, extrusion, peak meatamorphism, but since it uses 
'preferredAge' I've no certainty what this means). Other portals may 
choose a different criteria (eg last deformation age). Users who access 
the data directly can write their own filters to meet their purpose.

I repeat:
"The preferredAge property was deprecated because it has no real meaning, 
it is one age from the rocks geologicHistory, but with no capacity to say 
why this is the one chosen."

Cheers
Bruce

GeoScience Victoria
AuScope Grid
Australian Spatial Research Data Commons

Ph: +61-3-9658 4502
Fax: +61-3-9658 4555 
Mobile: +61 429 177155

<Oliver.Raymond at ga.gov.au> 
Sent by: auscope-geosciml-bounces at lists.arcs.org.au
22/03/2010 09:56 AM
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Re: [Auscope-geosciml] Event type vocabulary? what is it 
[SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]

How’s this for a compromise option.....

If we add an attribute to GeologicEvent called “preferred” (type = 
Boolean, 1..1, nillable), would that satisfy John’s needs without having 
to create a whole new event element?  Then it would be easy to identify 
which of a series of GeologicEvents is the one intended to map display.

Opinions please?

Cheers,
Ollie

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ollie Raymond

National Advice, Maps and Standards Project
Geoscience Australia

GeoSciML Design Group
IUGS Commission for the Management and Application of Geoscience 
Information

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Ph: +61 2 62499575 | Fax: +61 2 62499992 | Email: Oliver.Raymond at ga.gov.au 
| Google Map 
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http://www.ga.gov.au/minerals/research/national/nat_maps/nat_geol_maps.jsp
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http://www.ga.gov.au/resources/applications/ogc-wms.jsp
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-----Original Message-----
From: auscope-geosciml-bounces at lists.arcs.org.au 
[mailto:auscope-geosciml-bounces at lists.arcs.org.au] On Behalf Of Laxton, 
John L
Sent: Friday, 19 March 2010 11:04 PM
To: auscope-geosciml at lists.arcs.org.au
Subject: Re: [Auscope-geosciml] Event type vocabulary? what is it

Bruce,

In spite of potential ambiguities age is something that is recorded on 
pretty much all geological maps. In GeoSciML age comes with eventProcess 
and eventEnvironment which gives more information on what the preferredAge 
represents than has been provided on maps in the past, but maybe we do 
need to be able to state the reason for selecting an age more 
specifically. In OneGeology-Europe we are providing a preferredAge for all 
GeologicUnits as a term range. For many GeologicUnits we will also provide 
a full geologicHistory. I am not clear how we could do this when 
preferredAge has been deprecated as there is no way we can say which 
GeologicEvent(s) in the geologicHistory are the ones that we (as the 
experts in the geological survey) consider represent the age of the 
GeologicUnit. I don't think telling users to work it out for themselves is 
a sufficient response (we are meant to be the experts), or telling them 
they can only get this information if the service is accessed through a 
portal controlled by us with queries constructed by us. For 
interoperability all information should be in the data, not embedded in 
queries.

What will happen I suspect is that people will simply use geologicHistory 
as a preferredAge (ie with just one GeologicEvent), but that is then 
throwing away the ability to record a proper geologicHistory.

John

From: auscope-geosciml-bounces at lists.arcs.org.au 
[mailto:auscope-geosciml-bounces at lists.arcs.org.au] On Behalf Of 
Bruce.Simons at dpi.vic.gov.au
Sent: 18 March 2010 22:24
To: auscope-geosciml at lists.arcs.org.au
Cc: auscope-geosciml at lists.arcs.org.au; 
auscope-geosciml-bounces at lists.arcs.org.au
Subject: Re: [Auscope-geosciml] Event type vocabulary? what is it

John, 
The Question "How old is the rock? is meaningless.  It is dependent on the 
context. Within traditional paper maps we provide that context by the 
'type' of geological map and the legend. GSV has different maps where the 
rocks that make up the Omeo Metamorphic Complex are variously shown as 
Ordovician (age of deposition), Silurian (age of regional metamorphism), 
Devonian (age of contact metamorphism) and Tertiary (sic - age of recent 
uplift).  Which of these represent an age of the rock depends on the end 
users requirements. 

Presumably a client like the OneGeology portal will want to display an 
"age" map which represents depositional or intrusive age. The 
eventProcess/eventAge couplet allows the client to derive this, or if a 
WMS, derive a legend explaining what age means. 

The preferredAge property was deprecated because it has no real meaning, 
it is one age from the rocks geologicHistory, but with no capacity to say 
why this is the one chosen. 

Cheers 
Bruce

GeoScience Victoria
AuScope Grid
Australian Spatial Research Data Commons

Ph: +61-3-9658 4502
Fax: +61-3-9658 4555 
Mobile: +61 429 177155 

"Laxton, John L" <jll at bgs.ac.uk> 
Sent by: auscope-geosciml-bounces at lists.arcs.org.au 
19/03/2010 03:42 AM 

Please respond to
auscope-geosciml at lists.arcs.org.au

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"steve.richard at azgs.az.gov" <steve.richard at azgs.az.gov> 
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"auscope-geosciml at lists.arcs.org.au" <auscope-geosciml at lists.arcs.org.au> 
Subject
Re: [Auscope-geosciml] Event type vocabulary? what is it

Steve, 

At present data providers generally give a GeologicUnit an age and I would 
be wary about moving from this to telling users 'these are the ages of all 
the things that have happened to the rock, pick which age you want'. The 
latter approach implies that all users wanting the age of a rock will be 
aware of what the most significant event in the geologicHistory is which I 
doubt is always the case. We have to assume that our data is not just 
going to be accessed through clients under our control and with queries 
created by us. 

Maybe asking how old a rock is isn't as simple a question as it sounds, 
but it is one we have traditionally answered and I think we need to 
continue to do so. 

John 

From: Stephen M Richard [mailto:steve.richard at azgs.az.gov] 
Sent: 18 March 2010 16:16
To: Laxton, John L
Cc: auscope-geosciml at lists.arcs.org.au
Subject: Re: [Auscope-geosciml] Event type vocabulary? what is it 

John--I think the logic is that one would have to pose the 'how old is the 
rock' question by specifying the process of interest that defines what 
'how old' means. For sedimentary and igneous rocks, the answer is 
generally simple-- deposition, intrusion, or eruption, for altered or 
metamorphic rocks (composite genesis), the answer could be cooling, peak 
metamorphism, or protolith deposition, intrusion, or eruption. 

This issues is a good example of use of the interchange format for 
information encoding vs. a geologist-friendly query language. Same issue 
that was the basis for the recent geologic unit morphology discussion. I 
think the stored query approach with a 'common queryable' element (like 
CSW common queryables) for 'preferred age' is a better solution to the 
problem, because preferred age depends on the user in some cases (design 
decision is are there enough of these cases to allow flexibility?).

steve

On 3/18/2010 8:56 AM, Laxton, John L wrote: 
Steve, 

I think we have got confused somewhere here! 

The v2 preferredAge was there to answer the question 'How old is the 
rock?'. After deprecating preferredAge in order to answer the same 
question there needs to be a way of flagging one of the events in the 
geologicHistory as being the one that is deemed to represent the age of 
the rock. I don't see how this can be achieved with a query on 
eventProcess and numericAgeDate so I don't see how Action 15 from Quebec 
follows from the decision to deprecate preferredAge. That said I don't see 
how a query on eventType would either. I think eventType may have been 
introduced simply to follow the typing pattern used elsewhere (eg 
faultType), but faultType was introduced because of the complexity of 
querying for commonly used concepts such as 'reverse fault' without such a 
property. I'm not sure there is a similar use case for eventType, and as 
you say there is a danger of confusion with eventProcess and 
eventEnvironment. I think the requirement I identified for the ability to 
relate local events to larger scale events such as orogenies is best met 
through the use of  a classifier. 

So: 

1. I'm unclear of the requirement for eventType and unless there is a 
clear use case for it it might be best dropped 

2. I'm unclear how we can replicate the preferredAge concept with 
geologicHistory 

John 

From: auscope-geosciml-bounces at lists.arcs.org.au [
mailto:auscope-geosciml-bounces at lists.arcs.org.au] On Behalf Of Stephen M 
Richard
Sent: 17 March 2010 17:46
To: auscope-geosciml at lists.arcs.org.au
Subject: Re: [Auscope-geosciml] Event type vocabulary? what is it 

Yikes-- We added Classifier on event as well. That would be the logical 
place to have association of an event with a specific geologic event that 
might be reused (like Hercynian Orogeny, K-T boundary impact) and have its 
own GeologicEvent prototype description. 
So what use does that leave for EventType. The only one I can see that 
doesn't create confusion with eventProcess -  eventEnvironment is to use 
it in the sense of GeologicUnitType as a category that specifies 
variations in the content model/intention of the actual GeologicEvent 
element ('type' in the sense of data type). Examples --extended event 
(orogeny), instantaneous event (bolide impact, volcanic eruption). Maybe 
some coherent abstraction of the eventProcess vocabulary could be made to 
categorize events that have different kinds of prototype descriptions, but 
the danger is that if the eventTypes are just the broader categories from 
the eventProcess vocabulary, then its unclear which property to filter for 
those categories -- eventProcess or eventType.

steve

On 3/17/2010 9:58 AM, Stephen M Richard wrote: 

EventType property on GeologicEvent feature scope notes currently read: 
term 'to broadly categorise the type of event (e.g. depositional, 
tectonic, biological, metallogenic)'. Figuring out what should be in the 
EventType vocabulary opens a host of questions -- how to categorize 
events?, what are the use cases?. Kinds of event would be defined by 
process and environment by my reckoning, so it would appear that EventType 
would act as a short cut for some combination of eventEnvironment and 
eventProcess.

....snip...

Does eventType implements this classifier concept?  That seems like a 
potentially useful interpretation. In that case, something like the 
OneGeologyEurope OrogenicEvent vocabulary is a gsml:EventType vocabulary, 
and we get into the 'ontologic level' discussion about names, classifiers, 
types etc. (see the Dec Twiki summary to review that...). These categories 
are specific geologic events - they involve geologic process, geologic 
environment, geologic age, and geographic location.  This looks like a 
slippery slope. Does one look for the depositional age by specifying the 
eventProcess or eventType?. Does one look for structures related to the 
Laramide orogeny by specifying the GeologicEvent/gml.name, or specifying 
the EventType...

steve

snip...

-- 
Stephen M. Richard 
Section Chief, Geoinformatics 
Arizona Geological Survey 
416 W. Congress St., #100 
Tucson, Arizona, 85701 USA 

Phone: 
Office: (520) 209-4127 
Reception: (520) 770-3500 
FAX: (520) 770-3505 

email: steve.richard at azgs.az.gov 

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-- 
Stephen M. Richard 
Section Chief, Geoinformatics 
Arizona Geological Survey 
416 W. Congress St., #100 
Tucson, Arizona, 85701 USA 

Phone: 
Office: (520) 209-4127 
Reception: (520) 770-3500 
FAX: (520) 770-3505 

email: steve.richard at azgs.az.gov 

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