Metadatabases in environmental information systems: the Locator and Communication Service (VKS-Umwelt)
Existing environmental information is frequently known only to insiders. Environmental offices have many hidden treasures that must be described in a metainformation system. Metainformation can be helpful in finding and understanding distributed environmental information. A Web-based facility, also referred to as the Locator and Communication Service Environment (German acronym: VKS-Umwelt), was designed for this purpose. VKS-Umwelt allows users in the German Federal Environment Agency to search for and directly access environmental information resources in the intranet of the agency. The main purpose of VKS-Umwelt is to simplify the utilization of the Web technology for the information transfer between suppliers and users of environmental information. One result of the VKS-Umwelt project is the catalogue of criteria for VKS-Umwelt. The user requirements have been identified and documented in several interviews and workshops with members of various departments in the UBA.
environmental information systems intranet metadata