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AN OGC COMPLIANT INTEROPERABLE NETWORK TO DISTRIBUTE 
GEOLOGICAL MAPS AND DATA OVER THE INTERNET 
S. Gadenz" , M. Latini®, J. .Mugnaini®, L. Carmignani® 
“CGT, Centre for Geo-Technologies, University of Siena, via Vetri Vecchi 34, 52027 San Giovanni Valdarno (AR) 
Italy- gadenz@unisi.it 
KEY WORDS: Web-based GIS, Inter-operability, Metadata, Databases, Geology, Mapping 
ABSTRACT: 
During the 2003, the Centre of Geo-Technologies (CGT) of University of Siena (Italy) and the Regione Emilia-Romagna Geological 
Office (RERGO) have developed a system to search, visualize, distribute and share geological information and maps through the 
Internet. 
The aim of the project was to distribute and share the geological knowledge and data collected during the life of the above 
mentioned office and already available in digital format. 
The data to be distributed consisted of a series of geological raster map images and vector map data at various scales. Particularly 
the raster images represent maps belonging to the series named "Geological Map of the Emilia-Romagna Apennines arca at the scale 
of 1:10000* produced before the extensive adoption of GISs and the vector data refer to the series of CARG products so far realised 
by RERGO. All the data have been described by metadata in standard formats following the ISO directives. The whole collection of 
metadata has been stored in a centralised repository. 
The data have been published on the Web using an OGC WMS compliant IMS, particularly the OGC connector within the ESRI 
ArcIMS, and they can be accessed either by the means of a standard OGC compliant client application or through the provided Web 
interfaces. 
The system is made up of a Metadata Explorer Web Application, of an OGC Web Map Server (WMS) and Web Feature Server 
(WES) interfaces and of a series of Web Mapping tools . 
The system is supported by an administration module that allows the administrator to manage the user privileges, the content layers 
to be used for each map, the interface look and feel and functionalities to be used. 
I. INTRODUCTION 
During the last years the Geological Office of the Emilia 
Romagna Administrative Region (RERGO) has collected a 
large digital repository of geological data and maps. 
As long as geological data are concerned the RERGO has a 
series of institutionary tasks to perform, namely: 
- to survey, update and publish the geological map of the 
Whole regional territory; 
*  toset rules and lay down methodologies and procedures in 
order to design and update geothematic (landslide risk, 
groundwater pollution, etc. hydrogeological 
(groundwater body studies and surface drainage network), 
seismic and geotechnical maps at any scale; 
* to promote and organize research activities in the field of 
renewable resources and exploitable materials; 
- lo support geothematic and geotechnical data acquisition 
and maintaining for other Institutions working on the 
territory; 
- lo provide data and services for decision makers, 
environmental planners and other offices and agencies 
within the same organisation; 
> lo collaborate with organisations coping with emergency 
management and disaster relief. 
The traditional distribution of geological data by the means 
Paper maps, the visual language of geologists (Asch, 2003), 
Presents high costs of preparation and updating. Moreover a 
Paper map represents a snapshot taken from one or few 
geologists at a certain time at a scale that is fixed. Geographical 
Information Systems (GISs) and database driven cartography 
can mitigate the updating difficulties and produce seamless 
geological view of any area within the data extent potentially at 
any scale. The use of the Web, and the Internet in general, 
coupled with GISs offers an optimal way to distribute the data 
to a large public. Obviously making all this possible require a 
big effort for digital data acquisition and database entry as well 
as for database maintaining. 
Furthermore, managing geological data presents a series of 
peculiar characteristics to be taken into account: 
- the scale is an important factor and generalisation 
procedures can change the meaning of the data; 
- the symbology is usually different among different 
organisations; 
- the legend is the key for reading the map and it is related 
to the scale of the data; 
- the Web is very useful to distribute up to date data but 
usually geologists need or prefer a paper map. 
During the 2003, the Centre of Geo-Technologies (CGT) of 
University of Siena (Italy) and the Regione Emilia-Romagna 
Geological Office (RERGO) have developed a system to 
search, visualize, distribute and share geological information 
and maps through the Internet. 
The aim of the project was to distribute to the professionals and 
general public the geological knowledge and data collected 
during the life of the above mentioned office and already 
available in digital format. 
The file format, the spatial and time accuracy, the scale and 
other properties of this set of data are very heterogeneous and 
for this paper two sets of data have been considered 
representative of the whole repository: 
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