MBARI Technology for Self-Configuring Interoperable Ocean Observatories

The ocean science and engineering communities have identified some key requirements for large-scale ocean observatories at a recent ORION-sponsored workshop, and these requirements are being refined by the ORION project and others. MBARI has developed and deployed hardware and software technologies that address many of these requirements. In particular, we describe how these technologies address several key issues: (1) scalable integration, configuration, and management of large numbers of diverse instruments and data streams, (2) reliable association of instrument data and contextual metadata, and (3) development of observatory infrastructure and components that are interoperable among a variety of observatory architectures, including at-sea systems with relatively limited power and bandwidth availability. We focus on three technologies developed at MBARI. These technologies work together to enable MBARI's self-configuring self-describing MOOS mooring-based observatory. Yet these technologies have been designed to be largely independent of an observatory's physical implementation, and will be deployed for testing on the MARS cable-to-shore observatory test-bed. Moreover each of the technologies provide components that could be selectively used by other observatories. For example, PUCKs could be widely useful and are not dependent in any way on SIAM middleware or SSDS metadata structures. We also describe lessons learned during development and deployment of these technologies, and how policies and human-procedures interact with the new technologies. Finally, we discuss how these technologies are being refined through community efforts such as the emerging Marine Plug and Work Consortium and Marine Metadata Initiative