Dear all,

a bit of technical clarification (based on my experience mapping data from the SeaDataCloud project to INSPIRE data specifications a few years ago)

• CDI files are based on the ISO 19115 standard for spatial metadata, same standard as is used for metadata under INSPIRE
• Some additional fields have been defined for the CDI extension, hosted by seadatanet.org. Unfortunately, at least in the version my examples use, this schmema file has issues (it imports ISO schema components from an invalid URL)
• While the CDI files do contain a bit of GML, this is purely metadata, providing information on spatiotemporal extent of the data being provided (same as INSPIRE metadata)
• One should probably to a check to assure that all metadata elements specified for INSPIRE are contained in the CDI files (many elements required by INSPIRE are optional in the ISO 19115 standard, may not be contained within the CDI)

To my understanding, as long as the potential issues in the last point are covered, it should be possible to provide CDI files as INSPIRE metadata. The data the CDI files are describing should then be provided in accordance with the relevant INSPIRE Data Specifications (Elevation Model (EL) for Bathymetry, Oceanographic Features (OF) and Environmental Monitoring Facilities (EF) for marine measurement data

Hope this helps

:)

Kathi

Hi Kathi,

Thanks for your feedback.I can confirm that today the SeaDataNet CDI's pass the Inspire validator test and are therefore fully Inspire compliant. The following is from the SeaDataNet site:

" More recently (December 2019), activities have been concluded in discussion and cooperation with the INSPIRE team at EU-JRC to update the CDI XML coding in full compliance with the latest INSPIRE ISO19139 metadata schema. This can be validated using the latest version of the new ETF validator of INSPIRE. Whereby one has to select metadata for interoperability as the target conformance class."

The questin from Fanny as far as I understand was more about the somewhat cryptic description in an original comment from Marc Roesbeke from the Flamish Hydrography about the coding of CDI data. 

Cheers 

George

Thank you all for your good discussion.

Answering the former qustion from Fanny, "As I can not find anything about point cloud data in the Elevation specfication I am even wondering if they are out of  scope", regardless point clouds are not covered as a common data format in the INSPIRE Data specification on Elevation, bathymetry vector data is totally in the scope of INSPIRE (see the mentioned "Vector Elements" schema - "Spot Elevation" spatial object).

Therefore, if you are working with bathymetry data sets in point cloud format, such data sets are in the scope of INSPIRE and they are candidates to be transformed and provided for INSPIRE according the rules defined in the Directive.

In my view, the original post from Mark Roesbeke here (let me remember his closing sentence: "The ideal would be for European EMODnet member states to be able to deliver the created CDIs with the associated BAG files for both the INSPIRE Data Portal and the EMODnet Data Portal. Less work for the hydrographic organizations") does not only refer to CDI metadata file but also the bathymetry data (BAG files) described by them.

Concluding, it would be really helpful if you (ALL) could share with the community any issues you may have encountered while transforming your bathymetry data sets for the purpose of the INSPIRE Directive.