Back to HabcMeetingMinutes

---

Working Group Meeting

August 21, 2007

Attending:	Matt Austin	Paul Ramsey
	Sue Fox	Dave Nicolson
	Al Becker	Emily Gouge
	Anne Downton

Adenda

• Update
• Collaborators Meeting
• Data Layers

Discussion

Update

• Choosing the technologies
  • We have been reviewing PostgreSQL and SQL Server. From a strictly relational point of view database performance is about the same. Testing SQL Server was done because of the potential to use the OLAP technologies packaged with SQL Server. However the ability to support all the required queries using and OLAP query system (MDX) is in doubt. The benefits of OLAP is that for some queries the performance would be substantial improved over a straight relational database system.
  • We are still testing options for the user interface. This includes Google Web Toolkit (develop AJAX applications using Java); and Dojo (open source toolkit for web app developement).
    • GWT - develop web interfaces using Java technology. It includes various customizable gui widgets (trees, split panes, buttons etc.) and an interface for building server side services. All services (both client and server side) are developed as a single Java project. Upon deployment the client side application is converted to javascript/html and the server side deployed to a web server. This means we have little or no control over the javascript build and any potential issues the generated javascript produces. We are still investigating the difficulty of embedding custom javascript widgets (openlayers) into GWT.
    • Dojo - another AJAX framework that also provides various GUI widgets (buttons, split panes, tree etc.) and ADAX support. All components are created separately then combined together (there is no magic "deploy" button). This provides greater control over development; but likely longer development times.
  • We have begun a Systems Design document. This is a deliverable for Milestone Report #1 - due date.
• Nonfunctional Requirements
  • Sue read through these and modifications were made. A copy is located: Anne to post and link to it.

Collaborators Meeting

• The agenda has yet to be determined, but will include getting feedback on the user interface and the management of the data layers.

Data Layers

• A discussion needs to take place to determine:
  • What layers are going to be included
  • What variables users will want to use
  • Does the data need to be transformed; who will do this

Action Items

• Refractions to post the metadata template to the wiki.
  • The metadata template used during Phase2 is available here:

• Add to the nonfunctional requirements a statement about the refreshing/updating of spatial data as this relates to the accuracy of the data in Hectares BC. We may also want to include in the metadata not only how current the data is, but also the date when it was last pulled into Hectares BC. There are data that are updated on a daily basis and it may be worth while to specify this information.