Thematic User Environment for Water Body Information Systems and Beyond

Abstract

Today’s powerful programmable software tools in standard office environments, possibly enhanced by a GIS product and a relational database, principally already provide all functions to store, process and visualise environmental information. However, end users prefer to focus on their thematic task instead of customising generic tools. They expect systems that are tailored to their thematic knowledge and support them in the generation of thematic documents – being maps, diagrams or reports. A concept of a thematic user environment based on so-called User-Defined Objects (UDO) has been implemented by Fraunhofer IITB in operational Water Body Information Systems in Germany. UDObased thematic services offer functions from personalised information views, data acquisition, data analysis and quality assurance, maintenance and selection of master and measurement data, generation of thematic documents up to decision support. The presented approach is reusable for other environmental domains and may contribute to a harmonisation of information system concepts, especially for the Common Implementation Strategy of the European Commission for the Water Framework Directive.