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With regard to licensed data and the possibility to download 
large data sets, it is essential to develop a safe and stable web- 
interface (see 2.4). Therefore the web-interface provides several 
features depending on the authorization of the TR32DB visitors. 
Guests (not authorized TR32DB users) of the TR32DB web- 
interface are only able to view general project information that 
contain the cross cutting groups and clusters including project 
sections, their duties and participants. They are able to view and 
search some project data that is disposable for every web- 
interface visitor. 
Authorized users (only project participants) of the TR32DB 
web-interface have further opportunities than guests have. They 
are permitted to search for explicit project data and their 
metadata, the project phases, or topics (climate, soil, land use or 
publications). They are allowed to obtain more detailed, 
extended, internal project data and research results. Furthermore, 
they are able to download these project data. The web-interface 
also provides temporary download of purchased geodata 
(limited by license agreements) with password protection. A 
principal duty of the web-interface is to enable the input of 
corresponding metadata to project data for authorized TR32DB 
users. Each authorized user is able to view all data of his project 
section that is stored in the AFS and has no metadata yet. By 
selection of a data set the user is able to feed metadata into the 
database. Depending on the type of data there will be a 
particular metadata input wizard. Users are able to enter 
metadata like title, description, instrument or creator as well as 
the access restriction of the data set. Finally, there is an 
opportunity to add an explanation document. 
The integrated WebGIS of the web-interface is developed to 
access the spatial geodatabase with the purpose to illustrate the 
purchased geodata and the prospective spatial-related research 
results. Another functionality of the WebGIS is to generate 
uniform map layouts for all TR32 participants that may be used 
for publications. Further GIS-analysis-functions e.g. overlay, 
statistics will be included in the WebGIS. 
4. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION 
Spatial data infrastructure or rather data management in huge 
interdisciplinary research projects are becoming more and more 
important in context of the current discussion about the 
Infrastructure for Spatial Information in Europe (INSPIRE) and 
consequential for the national geodata infrastructure (GDI) of 
the European Union member states including metadata 
management (Bernard et al. 2005 and Yeung et al. 2007). 
The central data infrastructure and management within the 
scope of a huge interdisciplinary research project involves 
different problems that contain or rather have the requirement to 
store heterogeneous data sets in a explicit and ordered structure 
including their metadata (Miickschel et al. 2007). In the context 
of the computer-based developing and enhancements of e.g. 
data standards there are different process approaches. Data 
management systems are also advanced due to the exchange of 
administration experiences. 
Examples of research projects with a central project data 
management in Germany are: the Collaborative Research 
Centre (SFB) 552 (http://www.storma.de) and SFB 299 
(http://www.sfb299.de/) as well as the Research Union (RU) 
402 (http://www.bergregenwald.de/) and RU 816 
(http://www.tropicalmountainforest.org/). 
The project data management structure of the SFB 552 and the 
SFB 299 offer a similar structure. The SFB 552 benefits from 
the gathered experiences of the SFB 299. Both use open-source- 
software that includes the LAMP components (Linux, Apache, 
MySQL and PHP/Perl) and the open-source Content- 
Management-System TYP03 as well as the UMN Mapserver 
and PostgreSQL with PostGIS to visualize and store geodata 
(Miickschel et al. 2007). 
By contrast the developments of the RU 816 just benefit in 
some basic parts from the RU 402; the RU 816 is rather a 
further technical development of the RU 402. The RU 402 is a 
combination of file system with a corresponding relational 
metadatabase. The RU 816 is more a complex ‘data warehouse 
system’ approach where all project data including actual project 
data with corresponding metadata is stored directly in a 
database. The RU 816 is implemented by a MySQL database 
and a realization with java server pages. The difference between 
theses systems is the opportunity to store, search and download 
single data files. The RU 402 approach is more appropriate to 
interdisciplinary projects in contrast to the RU 816 approach 
that is more qualified for interdisciplinary to integrative 
orientated research projects (Nauss et al. 2007). 
There are different projects overseas which realize similar data 
management approaches. One example is the Canadian Carbon 
Program (CCP) which is represented by the internet-based Data 
Information System (DIS) (http://fluxnet.ccrp.ec.gc.ca/). The 
project data storage is realized in a clearly structured folder 
system. It is just permitted to save project data files in ASCII 
format. The upload and submission of project data and 
corresponding metadata is implemented with FTP. The data 
access operates with FTP or seamless links from the DIS 
(Fluxnet Canada 2004). Some developments of the CCP are not 
able to enhance within the TR32. The application of FTP is for 
example not permitted within the TR32 due to security reasons 
at the ZAIK/RRZK. Furthermore, the use of ASCII is not 
realizable. Saving all data in this common file format has the 
advantage of being widely accessible and useable. The 
disadvantage is that not all data can be formatted in such a file 
format and that those data files tend to be very large. Without 
the usage of a database it is more difficult to administrate and 
enquired the huge amount of project data. 
In contrast to the mentioned examples above, the TR32 follows 
other interdisciplinary research goals and tries to combine the 
advantages of the described systems. With regard to different 
scales of data (SVA) and a prognosticated huge amount of big 
data files the TR32DB is developed in a secure, stable, sorted, 
and well organized structure within the environment of an 
institution (ZAIK/RRZK). This will ensure the availability of 
the database after the end of the project. The structure enables 
upload, download, and high sophisticated backup of project 
data as well as metadata. The whole system is developed in 
cooperation and with the agreement of the local computing 
centre. 
REFERENCES 
AFS, 2008, http://www.openafs.org (accessed 14. April 2008).