Schema Transformation for INSPIRE

Abstract

Many Legally Mandated Organisations (LMOs) and other data suppliers who are providing data within the INSPIRE themes will retain their own schemas for the data that they collect, manage and publish. For INSPIRE compliance however, they must also ensure that there is a Transformation Service available to transform the data to the appropriate INSPIRE schema. This service may be provided by the supplier; by the national government concerned; or by a third party. It may be an offline service with the INSPIRE compliant datasets then published on the web for the INSPIRE GeoPortal (and others) to access; or it may be available as a web service - preferably capable of being invoked automatically at the time that data is requested. This paper describes the State of the Art Analysis and the subsequent development of Technical Guidance for INSPIRE Transformation Network Services, as carried out by a consortium of RSW Geomatics, 1Spatial, and Rob Walker Consultancy for the EC Joint Research Centre. It will be of use to any organisation implementing a transformation from one schema to another and specifically to the GML schemas required by the INSPIRE Implementing Rules. This paper concludes that INSPIRE Schema Transformation Network Services are feasible with adherence to international standards, some already specified in INSPIRE regulations, together with the use of discreet standards based components that can be supplied by a variety of vendors. The Technical Guidance (TG) should help to move INSPIRE into the mainstream of current developments on the World Wide Web and spread the interoperability of geo-spatial data to a wider audience.