Network Office

Gearing Up

Rapid changes at the Network Office have become the norm since the move from Oregon State University to the University of Washington last year. The original piece of hardware, a PCXT, is now part of the Network Office’s six-station local-area network and has a secure link to the University’s computerized accounting system. This system is used by Program Assistant Adrienne Whitener to monitor the complicated LTER Collaboration budget.

Network publications will be enhanced with the 80386-based PC used by Stephanie Martin, Publications Coordinator. The speed improvements and increased graphic support enable full utilization of Ventura Publisher desktop publishing software and management of complicated word processing files. By using Internet communication, computer text data and graphics files from any LTER site can be imported directly into publication software. This system also contains a 300 dot-per-inch scanner and computer-based FAX communications, which permit group distribution of hard-copy text or graphics.

Three integrated UNIX-based systems have been configured for LTER computer activities. A Sun SPARCstation 1 has been installed to support Network GIS and remote sensing work. The VAXstation 2000 supports LTER’s mail forwarding system, graphic bulletin board and database management systems. Both of these systems depend on a 33 megahertz 80386-based PC-AT network file server for data storage and peripherals. The file server will allow access of large data sets--including remote sensing image data--across the Network.

A magneto-optical (MO) disk to be installed in this system will allow temporary DOS or UNIX file systems as large as 300 megabytes to be accessed across the Internet. A CIPHER 6250 BPI tape drive will provide a more conventional mode of data exchange. The tape drive will primarily support remote sensing activities, since most satellite data are still distributed only in this form. The file server’s UNIX operating system also contains the VP/ix environment which allows MS-DOS-based programs and files to be used within UNIX.

Network Office

LTER Network-wide computer communications have been simplified with the University of Washington’s implementation of Ethernet-based networking. The Network Office uses this framework as the basis for its local-area network, which is a sub-network of the Internet (including NSFnet). In this sense, the Office’s local-area network and the entire LTER wide-area network are actually one and the same.

GIS Capabilities Expand

Previous funding from NSF to support the development of Network- wide geographic information system (GIS) capabilities helped to expand ecological research at LTER sites. Nearly all sites now have operational “Minimum Standard Installations” (MSI), consisting of ARC/INFO hardware and software.

Future implementations of an expanded: MSI will add remote sensing tools to existing GIS systems. ERDAS hardware and software will also be added, enabling LTER investigators to incorporate airborne and satellite remote sensing data in their research. LTER vendor contacts have been established and group purchase discounts arranged through the Network Office.

Following the November 1989 LTER Remote Sensing Workshop led by John Aber (Harvard Forest LTER) at the University of New Hampshire at Durham, plans are underway at the Network Office for consistent, Network-wide acquisition of remote sensing data. Acquisitions are planned for a panchromatic (10-meter resolution) scene from the SPOT satellite, a full scene from the multi- spectral Thematic Mapper sensor system of Landsat-5 (30 meter resolution), 1 kilometer resolution data from the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) of the NOAA spacecraft, and aerial information from the USGS High Altitude Photography program. Collectively, this information will allow LTER to expand research from the fine structural detail offered by SPOT imagery to the regional perspective of AVHRR data. The satellite data and aerial photography will provide an important historical record and common means of comparison among LTER sites.