A GISbased Vegetation Database of the Austrian Alps an application of JODI

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A GIS-based Vegetation Database of the Austrian
Alpsan application of JODI

• Peterseil J., Moser D., Willner W. Grabherr G.

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Organisation

• Project leader Georg Grabherr
• Wolfgang Willner
• Johannes Peterseil Dietmar Moser
• Andreas Exner
• Christine Jakomini Siegrun Ertl
• Financed by the Austrian Academy of Science

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Project aims

• Development of the database structure
• Input of relevés from the Austrian Alps
• Linking of the relevés with GIS
• Exemplary analysis

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What are the main problems?

• Different sampling approaches
• Systematic errors
• Missing data
• Different methods and scales
• Different accuracy of localisation
• Assigned vegetation types
• many others

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How to deal with them?

• Design a consistent and flexible database
  structure
• Building of central definiton lists, e.g. species
• Design of tools for the selection, edit and
  aggregation of data
• Design of interfaces to other commonly used
  vegetation databases, e.g. TURBOVEG, VegBank or
  analysis programs, e.g. MEGATAB, VEGI, JUICE,
  SYNTAX, ...

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JODI

• Microsoft Access database application splitted
  into
• User Interface
• Definition lists
• Link to Spatial Data
• Data (project, literature, species, environmental
  data)
• Flexibility
• Original data are stored unchanged
• Translation done via Central Definition Lists

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Data model
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Data model
Normal structure
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Methods

• What are methods?
• A summary of
• DATA FIELD, e.g. slope
• UNIT, measured as
• DEFINITION LIST, e.g. a list of free entries
• Additional information, e.g. type of device
• What are they for?
• Used for the generation of user defined input
  forms
• Documentation of the used methods

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Data model
S1_SAMPLE_DATA
VALUE
ROW TEXT
DATA FIELD
SAMPLE_ID
SCALE_ID
Category, text or numerical value
COVER
LAYER
UNIT
1 1 1 1 2 2
All All All HL All All
Altitude Slope Aspect Layercover Altitude Slope
Seehöhe in m Neigung in Expostion Schichtdeck.
Altitude Slope category
m CLS CLS
Free Free Free Free RA01 SL02
250 300 - 350 10 - 15 180 75 montanous slightly
100 100 100 100 100 100
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Data Model
DATA FIELDS
RELEVÉ HEADER
DEFINITION LISTS
Fixed table structure Flexible data structure
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Definition Lists

• Problem Different Lookup Tables for the data
• Solution Central Definition List

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Definition Lists
Problem Different thematic resolutions of the
data Solution Hierarchical structured
definition lists
Example Syntaxonomical Units
Assigment on different hierarchical levels
possible Aggregation of the data on a certain
hierarchical level
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Definition Lists

• each category is assigned to a parent category
  and a certain hierarchical level
• with a special designed functions it is possible
  to aggregate data on certain hierarchical levels,
  e.g. on the alliance level.

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Spatial Data

• ArcView Shape Files
• Accuracy of localisation
• Coordinates
• Most propable location
• ArcView application for the communication to the
  vegetation database
• POLYGON_ID

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Data Selection
Manage huge data amounts All data fields within
the database can be used for the
selection Selection can either done by data query
or by spatial selection
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Data Export
Interfaces to vegetation databases, e.g.
TURBOVEG, VegBank, or analysis programs, e.g.
MEGATAB, JUICE, SYNTAX, VEGI
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Data Export

• Transformation and aggregation based on the
  central definition list
• Possibility of User defined aggregation of the
  values of a DATA FIELD
• Aggregation files can be saved and used again

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Data Export

• Transformation and aggregation based on the
  central definition list
• Possibility of User defined aggregation of the
  values of a DATA FIELD
• Aggregation files can be saved and used again

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Structure of the Application
JODI97 - User Interface Entry, import,
management, export, analysis,
SPATIAL DATA Location and accuracy of the samples
DEFINITION LISTS Hierarchical structured
defintion lists
DATA Project, Literature reference, Vegetation,
Environmental data,
ArcView
Microsoft Access Database
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Timetable
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Status Quo

• Design of the database structure
• Design and check of the input, selection and edit
  tools
• Review of the existing literature for the
  Austrian Alps
• 16.374 relevés
• 9.891 polygons

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Summary

• Advantages of this design of the data model
• Flexibility
• Original values preserved
• Transformation of data is not nessecary at the
  stage of the data entry only the link between
  the lookup table and the Central Defintion List
  has to be defined
• Easy access on all data for selection and export
• Integration of different data sources and
  methodological approaches into one database
  possible

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Thank you!

• Departement of Conservation Biology, Vegetation
  and Landscape Ecology
• Institute of Ecology and Conservation Biology
• University of Vienna