Hydroserver: A Platform for Publishing Space-Time Hydrologic Datasets

The Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science, Inc. (CUAHSI) is developing a Hydrologic Information System (HIS) that supports sharing of distributed hydrologic data through Web services and tools for data discovery, access, and publication. HydroServer is a computer server that contains a collection of databases, Web services, and software that allows data producers to store, publish, and analyze space-time hydrologic datasets. HydroServer is designed to permit local control of the data, while still being part of a distributed, national/international system allowing universal access to the data. We describe the HydroServer architecture and software stack, including tools for managing and publishing time series data for fixed point monitoring sites, as well as spatially distributed, GIS datasets that describe a particular study area, watershed, or region. We then describe a case study implementation of HydroServer for publishing water resources related space-time datasets for the Inland Northwest Research Alliance (INRA) Constellation of Experimental Watersheds (ICEWATER) network of research watersheds in the northwestern United States. KEY TERMS: Hydrologic Information Systems, CUAHSI, Cyberinfrastructur