Wetransform is currently participating in an exchange programm for young scientists from countries in the West Balkan. Nikolina is researching how to use INSPIRE to exchange and display information on atmospheric conditions relevant for geodesic applications. This article is based on a recently published IJSDIR paper she has authored.

Currently, the Republika Srpska and the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina have strategies at the state level, and national level strategies are under development. The idea for the future is that after adopting this national strategy, the iGEO portal will play the role of the core component for NSDI services.

Towards a national strategy: The Role of INSPIRE

Eleven years after INSPIRE was conceived and five years after its formal adoption, we can see clear results and benefits. Every day, more and more spatial data within the framework of INSPIRE becomes available throughout the EU e.g. Geodata Services for European soil data. They may not yet be harmonized, since that process has just started, but data is already available for discovery and viewing.

The INSPIRE process has involved hundreds of experts and professionals from all over Europe. This participatory approach is certainly innovative, not only in relation to the development of SDIs, but also for the formulation of public policy at the European level.

Current Situation

The online geoportal (named “iGEO”) makes it easier for citizens, governments, and private-sector users to find and access vast quantities of national geographic information and related services. The iGEO portal is currently an experimental research application, but it may have the potential to become the official national Bosnian and Herzegovinian portal for SDI.

The geoportal has already proven its value as an essential component of civil infrastructure planning and design. An actively operating geoportal means that other governmental organizations can use iGEO data and make their data accessible. This is the first step in establishing a Bosnia-Herzegovinian national geoportal as part of a national SDI.

The geoportal is modeled after the EU INSPIRE Directive to share geographic information across Europe. This geoportal was created by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The data available through the geoportal includes digital orthophotos, base maps, administrative units, and land survey information (Figure 1).

Wetransform is currently participating in an exchange programm for young scientists from countries in the West Balkan. Nikolina is researching how to use INSPIRE to exchange and display information on atmospheric conditions relevant for geodesic applications. This article is based on a recently published IJSDIR paper she has authored.

Currently, the Republika Srpska and the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina have strategies at the state level, and national level strategies are under development. The idea for the future is that after adopting this national strategy, the iGEO portal will play the role of the core component for NSDI services.

Towards a national strategy: The Role of INSPIRE

Eleven years after INSPIRE was conceived and five years after its formal adoption, we can see clear results and benefits. Every day, more and more spatial data within the framework of INSPIRE becomes available throughout the EU e.g. Geodata Services for European soil data. They may not yet be harmonized, since that process has just started, but data is already available for discovery and viewing.

The INSPIRE process has involved hundreds of experts and professionals from all over Europe. This participatory approach is certainly innovative, not only in relation to the development of SDIs, but also for the formulation of public policy at the European level.

Current Situation

The online geoportal (named “iGEO”) makes it easier for citizens, governments, and private-sector users to find and access vast quantities of national geographic information and related services. The iGEO portal is currently an experimental research application, but it may have the potential to become the official national Bosnian and Herzegovinian portal for SDI.

The geoportal has already proven its value as an essential component of civil infrastructure planning and design. An actively operating geoportal means that other governmental organizations can use iGEO data and make their data accessible. This is the first step in establishing a Bosnia-Herzegovinian national geoportal as part of a national SDI.

The geoportal is modeled after the EU INSPIRE Directive to share geographic information across Europe. This geoportal was created by small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The data available through the geoportal includes digital orthophotos, base maps, administrative units, and land survey information (Figure 1).

Figure 1.Overlaying transparent and opaque layers: geodetic plan scale 1:1000 overlayed over the 1m orthophoto

Technically, the iGEO geoportal offers web services allowing access to the most precise base map data. This data can be accessed by Bosnia-Herzegovinian local municipalities, government agencies and utility infrastructure organizations. The portal provides full catalogue service web (CSW) functionality via the CSW plug-in. The following standard CSW operations are currently supported:

• GetCapabilities
• GetRecords
• GetRecordById
• GetDomain
• DescribeRecord

The Internal Catalogue Store supports two metadata schemes:

• Dublin Core
• ISO Metadata Profile

iGEO raster and vector layers are registered using metadata, which describes the location, age, quality, and other characteristics of the resources (Figure 2). With access to this mapping material information, organizations can make decisions based on the best resources available. iGEO represents the geoportal component of the NSDI initiative in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Figure 2. Utilizing raster imagery – Municipality Prijedor: topographic map 1:25.000 (TK 25)

The Geoportal provides the datasets concerning the following aspects:

• administrative boundaries
• buildings
• cadastral parcels
• colored DTM
• scanned maps (regardless of map scale)
• geographical names
• hydrography networks
• ortho-photographies (regardless of resolution)
• railway networks
• road networks
• airports runways
• governmental buildings
• cadastral trigonometric points (levels I-IV)

Currently, we are working towards establishing interfaces with the GeoNetwork platform to enable setting up an INSPIRE view service with GeoNetwork and GeoServer.

The impact of iGEO - One Infrastructure, Many use cases

At this point iGEO-related experimental web services already handle data requests from local municipalities and utility companies, such as the Municipality of Banja Luka, the Municipality of Prijedor, the Municpiality of Gradiška, the Municipality of Teslić, M:Tel (telecommunications provider based in the Republic of Srpska), Vodovod i kanalzacija (RS-based local water and sewer company), Elektro-Krajina (regional electricity company), and many others.

There are two software projects under development based on the iGEO services geoportal as a principal data source: AreaCAD-GIS and BrownInfo. More iGEO-based specialized applications are envisioned and their planned architectures are at different stages of completeness by utility infrastructure organizations regionwide.

Figure 3.Overlaying raster and vector layer/geodetic state map grid (scale 1:5000) over the orthophoto layer

The web services provided carry detailed metadata on accompanying data layers, according to ISO/TS 19139-2:2012 Geographic information – Metadata standard based on OpenGIS Consortium (OGC) rules (Figure 3):

• Web Map Service (WMS)
• Web Feature Service (WFS)
• Web Coverage Service (WCS)
• Web Map Tiled Service (WMTS)
• Catalogue Services for the Web (CSW)
• Streaming KML
• Geography Markup Language (GML)

All data provided by iGEO are serviceable by all the before mentioned web services.

Figure 4.Point-wise vector layer visualization/cadastral trigonometric points over the topographic map layer

Figure 5.Streaming KML/KMZ services in Google Earth/Municipality Prijedor: 3D buildings and building metadata

Figure 6.Streaming super-overlays in Google Earth/Municipality Banja Luka: topographic map draped over DTM

Figure 7. OpenLayers (web-based) representation of administrative boundaries of Republic of Srpska, Bosnia and Herzegovina

AreaCAD-GIS

AreaCAD-GIS is INOVA informaticki inzenjering’s project representing a multi-tier GIS technology enabling organization-wide authoring and publishing spatial plans, metadata and design information quickly and easily for distribution, internally or on the web. The application targets municipal spatial (urban) planning departments’ productivity improvement and reduction of the time necessary for the issuing of building permits and tracking of their execution, as well as building legalization issues (Figure 8). It also serves as a bridge between a centralized municipal GIS repository and spatial planner acquisition tools by using various types of thin clients – to display acquired cadastral and urban data.

Figure 8. City of Prijedor's municipal AreaCAD-GIS Server web portal

AreaCAD-GIS utilizes iGEO-based web services to query and visualize Bosnia-Herzegovinian administrative data and topographic maps (Figure 9).

Figure 9. City of Banja Luka's municipal AreaCAD-GIS implementation running on the Autodesk Map 3D platform

BrownInfo

BrowInfo is a University of Banja Luka research project initiated with the aim of defining universal standards of identification, inventory and classification of brownfield sites. It aims to devise sets of effective methods for the collection, systematization, presentation and storage of brownfield-related data for use in the future as a basis for decisions on starting brownfield regeneration projects. Figure 10: BrownInfo software implementation related to Business Zone Incel, Banja Luka

BrownInfo software utilizes iGEO-based web services to query and visualize utility infrastructure data and orthophoto maps for targeted Banja Luka region (Poslovna zona Incel/Business Zone Incel).

Conclusion and outlook

The main stakeholders have already been “inspired” in each country as well as at the European level, which has triggered many other initiatives. Awareness has been raised throughout the public sector and individuals and organizations have been encouraged to think about their roles and the datasets for which they are responsible.

All eyes are now clearly focused on the MS. Their experiences of implementing INSPIRE in the coming period will be crucial for the planning and preparatory activities already started for the review of the INSPIRE Directive. The efficient implementation of INSPIRE also involves cost–benefit considerations, which are a core part of the process. It is important to raise awareness, especially among users, of the need to monitor the benefits, which will not immediately be obvious.

In Bosnia and Herzegovina there is no official strategy for establishing NSDI, there are just borderline strategies at the entity level for Republika Srpska and the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Administrative borders and complex relations between these two entities have resulted in a situation in which we are still waiting for Bosnia and Herzegovina to officially adopt a national strategy for NSDI. Our idea for the future is that after adopting this strategy, iGEO portal will play the role of the core component for NSDI services.

The Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Republika Srpska have not yet assigned a national geoportal, but significant progress has been made with the help of iGEO. The primary challenge faced by them in their INSPIRE Implementation is one that is faced by the majority of INSPIRE Implementers: data harmonization. This challenge, though, can be dealt with easily if the right tools such as Hale Studio are at hand.

A few months back, we described how you can setup hale connect to fully automate metadata generation, re-use and validation. In the past months, we have worked together with a reference customer, the LGL Baden-Württemberg, to extend the metadata tools in hale connect substantially. LGL Baden-Württemberg is one of 16 state-level cadastral, mapping and spatial planning authorities in Germany and maintains the state spatial data infrastructure.

The Problem

The problem that the LGL approached us with is one that we have seen many times already: there is a specific metadata profile, but both in terms of process and tools, the maintenance and implementation of this profile requires a lot of extra effort. The LGL used a massive Excel Table with more than 400 rows to describe their profile. This Excel table conflated profile rules from different levels (ISO, INSPIRE, national, and local), which all needed to be updated and kept in sync.

Excel table containing LGL Baden-Württemberg requirements. The excel table contains rules from ISO, INSPIRE, national and local schemas.

In implementation of the profile, there were often ambiguities or different interpretations of certain aspects of the profile. Furthermore, the documentation was a bit unwieldy and hard to read for most people outside the immediate circle of editors.

Thus, LGL reached out to us to understand how they could improve on this situation. Wetransform originally conducted a UML and Metadata workshop to explore whether developing the profile in a UML Tool such as Enterprise Architect would make sense. However, some aspects such as a nice differential documentation and the generation of an executable test suite directly from the profile proved to be quite hard.

Thus, in early 2018, LGL asked wetransform to develop a toolset that would support the creation of a fully formal profile definition of the ISO metadata schemas. This toolset would enable the definition of profiles on any XML-based schema, be it the CSW 2.0.2 Application Profile ISO 1.0.0 or a GML Application Schema.

The Solution

There were several key requirements that the profile toolset should resolve:

1. Definition of type and property constraints (e.g. on cardinality, allowed content and allowed property types.)
2. Definition of consistency constraints (e.g. “If A exists, B must also exist”) and other advanced validation rules.
3. Addition of documentation via tagged values.
4. Automated generation of printable documentation.
5. Automated generation of differential documentation.
6. Automated generation of Executable Testsuites (ETS) for the INSPIRE Reference Validator (ETF.)
7. Automated generation of example XML instance documents for the profile.
8. Be easy to use for people without in-depth knowledge in technologies such as XML, XML Schema, Schematron and ETF.

A few months back, we described how you can setup hale connect to fully automate metadata generation, re-use and validation. In the past months, we have worked together with a reference customer, the LGL Baden-Württemberg, to extend the metadata tools in hale connect substantially. LGL Baden-Württemberg is one of 16 state-level cadastral, mapping and spatial planning authorities in Germany and maintains the state spatial data infrastructure.

The Problem

The problem that the LGL approached us with is one that we have seen many times already: there is a specific metadata profile, but both in terms of process and tools, the maintenance and implementation of this profile requires a lot of extra effort. The LGL used a massive Excel Table with more than 400 rows to describe their profile. This Excel table conflated profile rules from different levels (ISO, INSPIRE, national, and local), which all needed to be updated and kept in sync.

Excel table containing LGL Baden-Württemberg requirements. The excel table contains rules from ISO, INSPIRE, national and local schemas.

In implementation of the profile, there were often ambiguities or different interpretations of certain aspects of the profile. Furthermore, the documentation was a bit unwieldy and hard to read for most people outside the immediate circle of editors.

Thus, LGL reached out to us to understand how they could improve on this situation. Wetransform originally conducted a UML and Metadata workshop to explore whether developing the profile in a UML Tool such as Enterprise Architect would make sense. However, some aspects such as a nice differential documentation and the generation of an executable test suite directly from the profile proved to be quite hard.

Thus, in early 2018, LGL asked wetransform to develop a toolset that would support the creation of a fully formal profile definition of the ISO metadata schemas. This toolset would enable the definition of profiles on any XML-based schema, be it the CSW 2.0.2 Application Profile ISO 1.0.0 or a GML Application Schema.

The Solution

There were several key requirements that the profile toolset should resolve:

1. Definition of type and property constraints (e.g. on cardinality, allowed content and allowed property types.)
2. Definition of consistency constraints (e.g. “If A exists, B must also exist”) and other advanced validation rules.
3. Addition of documentation via tagged values.
4. Automated generation of printable documentation.
5. Automated generation of differential documentation.
6. Automated generation of Executable Testsuites (ETS) for the INSPIRE Reference Validator (ETF.)
7. Automated generation of example XML instance documents for the profile.
8. Be easy to use for people without in-depth knowledge in technologies such as XML, XML Schema, Schematron and ETF.

To fulfil these, we developed a formal model that could capture all the required information, as well as a set of editing functions that extend the existing schema modelling tools in hale connect. The formal profile contains type and property constraints, consistency constraints and tagged values:

Formal profile model diagram. The diagram displays the formal profile model developed by wetransform.

To create a profile, you first have to create a schema using any of the methods supported in hale connect. For creating a metadata profile, use either the ISO 19139 preset or the CSW 2.0.2 Application Profile ISO 1.0.0 preset.

After this step, you have to create a profile of that schema. This is also done through the “Create new Schema” process, using the “Create Profile” option. When the profile has been created (which takes up to 30 seconds), you can go to the Feature Types section and start applying type and property constraints.

Type level constraints. The toggle switch can be used to make a type mandatory.

To make a single type mandatory, you can just toggle it in the type header. Making it mandatory means that an object of this type has to occur at least once in any document. This is particularly useful in GML Feature Collection, where you want to state which types of objects have to be present.

Most of the constraints are set using the Edit Mode, which you can access through the Pen icon in the type header. Clicking this icon brings you to a powerful editor, where you can set a number of constraints:

• Content Required: If not already true, you can set this to true to make sure that the given property always has to have content. The semantics of this constraint are equivalent to setting the nillable flag to false.
• Minimum Cardinality: The minimum number of times this property needs to occur in any given type. It needs to be higher than the one defined in the schema, but lower or equal than the value given for maximum cardinality.
• Maximum Cardinality: The maximum number of times this property needs to occur in any given type. It needs to be lower than the one defined in the schema, but higher or equal than the value given for minimum cardinality.
• Allowed Values: In this field you can define an enumeration of the actually allowed values. If the property uses an enumeration or code list, you will be able to activate or deactivate options from that enumeration or codelist.
• Allowed Types: If this field uses a Choice, Substitution Group or Union, you can limit the allowed types by deactivating options.

In addition, you can add any number of tagged values to each property. You can use any keys you want, but some control specific behavior:

• label-testcase: Label for this test case in the ETF Testsuite
• description-testcase: Description for this test case in the ETF Testsuite
• module-id: ID of the TestModule group to which the test case generated for this property will be added
• example: Content to be used for the generation of XML sample files. If the property is a complex element, setting this value to “true” leads to the element being generated.

Consistency constraint editor: Consistency constraints are added to schema elements.

The second big block of functionality is to be found in the “Consistency Conditions” section of the profile. When you go there, you will be able to define various sets of rules, such as:

• If A exists, B must/must not exist
• If A has value “X”, B must have value “Y”

You can combine any number of such rules through logical operators (AND, OR, XOR). To each Consistency Condition, you can add a label and a description, as well as tagged values.

Generated documentation example. Profile documentation can be printed easily.

When you want to review your profile at any time, the differential documentation is a handy feature, especially in big schemas like the ISO 19139 schema. It hides all elements (types and properties) for which no change or addition was made in the profile, resulting in a compact, well-readable format.

Either the full profile or the differential documentation can be printed to any device, specifically to PDF. This enables you to get a document that you can send around to any user.

By going to the “Files” section of the profile, you can also export sample XML instance documents for your profile.

And finally, you want to make sure that any data you receive complies with your profile. For this purpose, hale connect can also export an Executable Test Suite, again through the Files section. This ETS can be run in the ETF (INSPIRE Reference Validator).

The profile tools described here can also be used in conjunction with the metadata generation tools introduced with hale connect 1.0. Ask us to learn how to do so, especially if you are already a hale connect user.

If you want to know more about how to use these tools, check out the online help.

Getting Access to the Metadata Tools

We presented the new metadata tools at the INSPIRE conference 2018 in Antwerp just a few weeks back and can now announce general availability.

The new metadata tools are part of all hale connect licenses, independent of deployment mode and license level. While Metadata Generation has been part of hale connect since version 1.0, the profile management tools have been released with version 1.11.0, which is available since October 17th, 2018.

The tools are available starting from 2.900 € per year (Micro Org Public Cloud license). Special pricing is available for multi-year contracts, partners, and customers with support subscriptions.

Try it out for free!

In our daily work to publish and maintain INSPIRE-compliant view and download services for our customers, the importance of supporting the portrayal rules outlined in data specifications is ever present. We have thus been working for a long time to provide as complete as possible portrayal rules, which we provide as presets for any INSPIRE services published on our cloud platform, haleconnect.

What is an SLD, and why might I need it in INSPIRE?

The technical guidelines for each of the 34 INSPIRE themes contain a list of required or recommended layers which define the cartographic representation of data sets provided as view services. The chosen model for feature display in INSPIRE is the Styled Layer Descriptor (SLD) and Symbology Encoding (SE) standards, developed and published by the OGC.

The OGC standard SLD is an XML document that uses the OGC standards Symbology Encoding (SE) and Filter Encoding (FE) to define the cartographic rules by which to display features. The SLD standard extends the OGC Web Map Service (WMS). A basic WMS supports named layers and styles which do not enable end-users to define custom symbology. The SLD standard extends the WMS standard to allow users to provide styling rules in a Styled Layer Descriptor file. Web map services that support SLDs retrieve features from web feature services and apply the styling rules contained in the SLD.

What systems can I use to implement SLDs?

At wetransform, we use the open source framework deegree to provide OGC- and INSPIRE-compliant view and download services. deegree view services (Web Map Services) support the use of SLDs. Like most web map servers, deegree supports several deegree-specific functions which extend the SLD, SE and FE standards to enhance styling. Our development process for each SLD was to first check the examples and requirements in the INSPIRE data specification, and then to use an XML editor to iteratively implement the SLD. We directly tested is on our cloud platform haleconnect, with data sets specifically developed for this purpose. When a dataset is published on the haleconnect platform, the feature type is identified and our INSPIRE SLD library is searched for a matching style layer. INSPIRE SLDs are then applied if available.

What are the positives?

SLDs can display features with simple symbology requirements, and for many INSPIRE themes, the SLD standard is adequate. Filter encoding (FE) can be used to make selections and apply symbology to different geometries, or attributes. Many INSPIRE SLDs are based on INSPIRE codelist values. Datasets are filtered based on codelist values to obtain the desired feature sets, and symbology is applied to only those features matching the filter criteria. In other cases, SLDs are based on geometry type. At wetransform, we apply deegree-specific filter functions to filter datasets by geometry type in order to apply the correct symbology.

In our daily work to publish and maintain INSPIRE-compliant view and download services for our customers, the importance of supporting the portrayal rules outlined in data specifications is ever present. We have thus been working for a long time to provide as complete as possible portrayal rules, which we provide as presets for any INSPIRE services published on our cloud platform, haleconnect.

What is an SLD, and why might I need it in INSPIRE?

The technical guidelines for each of the 34 INSPIRE themes contain a list of required or recommended layers which define the cartographic representation of data sets provided as view services. The chosen model for feature display in INSPIRE is the Styled Layer Descriptor (SLD) and Symbology Encoding (SE) standards, developed and published by the OGC.

The OGC standard SLD is an XML document that uses the OGC standards Symbology Encoding (SE) and Filter Encoding (FE) to define the cartographic rules by which to display features. The SLD standard extends the OGC Web Map Service (WMS). A basic WMS supports named layers and styles which do not enable end-users to define custom symbology. The SLD standard extends the WMS standard to allow users to provide styling rules in a Styled Layer Descriptor file. Web map services that support SLDs retrieve features from web feature services and apply the styling rules contained in the SLD.

What systems can I use to implement SLDs?

At wetransform, we use the open source framework deegree to provide OGC- and INSPIRE-compliant view and download services. deegree view services (Web Map Services) support the use of SLDs. Like most web map servers, deegree supports several deegree-specific functions which extend the SLD, SE and FE standards to enhance styling. Our development process for each SLD was to first check the examples and requirements in the INSPIRE data specification, and then to use an XML editor to iteratively implement the SLD. We directly tested is on our cloud platform haleconnect, with data sets specifically developed for this purpose. When a dataset is published on the haleconnect platform, the feature type is identified and our INSPIRE SLD library is searched for a matching style layer. INSPIRE SLDs are then applied if available.

What are the positives?

SLDs can display features with simple symbology requirements, and for many INSPIRE themes, the SLD standard is adequate. Filter encoding (FE) can be used to make selections and apply symbology to different geometries, or attributes. Many INSPIRE SLDs are based on INSPIRE codelist values. Datasets are filtered based on codelist values to obtain the desired feature sets, and symbology is applied to only those features matching the filter criteria. In other cases, SLDs are based on geometry type. At wetransform, we apply deegree-specific filter functions to filter datasets by geometry type in order to apply the correct symbology.

Symbology encoding is used to apply scale ranges and symbology choices in SLD layers. The MaxScaleDenominator and MinScaleDenominator elements can be used to control display ranges for your datasets. We use scale ranges to control the display of Administrative Units layers, so that each administrative hierarchical level displays at only one scale range.

Map 1 Administrative Units, Catalonia. Filter and scale range applied to Administrative Hierarchical Level 3rd order.

Map 2 Administrative Units, Catalonia. Filter and scale range applied to Administrative Hierarchical Level 5th order.

Symbology encoding also offers standard cartographic styling options. Surface features can be styled using color or graphic fill options, and opacity. Line features can be styled in various ways by applying color and opacity, line casing, dashed lines and line join options which control how line features are symbolized where they join. Point features can be symbolized using graphic symbols, such as icons, or the WellKnownName element that includes the values square, circle, triangle, star, cross, and x.

The Symbology Encoding standard (SE) also supports the styling of text labels. Font family, style and size selection are all supported. Label placement rules enable the user to control how labels are displayed in relation to the geometry they describe, including offsets, rotation and splining.

What are the challenges?

In some cases, the SLD standard cannot handle the complexity of INSPIRE data models. Feature types with properties which contain links to geometries, and indirect geometries, commonly found in the Transport Network theme, cannot be symbolized.

There are also challenges associated with the display of INSPIRE compliant, complex GML which contains multiple features with the same geometry type, which are overlapping. The Administrative Units layer displays with all administrative hierarchical levels at once, and from the perspective of the viewer, the information displayed is indiscernible. The Administrative Units theme also contains feature types with linked features, which makes partitioning by feature type problematic. As mentioned, wetransform applies scale ranges to control display in this case (See Map 1., Map 2.).

In many themes, a further challenge is the requirement to provide one SLD layer per codelist value - That’s a lot of SLD layers! Some codelists, such as those found in the Habitats and Biotopes theme, have hundreds of values. To complicate matters, codelists which exist in externally referenced documents, such as Natura200, make symbolization based on their values difficult.

In our work with the Utility and Governmental Services theme, we discovered a need for a standardized icon library for the symbolization of point geometries found in the Administrative and Social Governmental Services codelist. Objects defined in this codelist include hospitals, schools, police and fire stations, and other institutions which offer essential services, and should be symbolized using standardized iconography.

A further challenge of the SLD standard is the need to rely on web map server-specific functionality to apply advanced cartographic styling such as hatching, patterned fills, marker lines and the display of continuous data using interpolation over color ramps, and more.

What is wetransform working towards?

Portrayal recommendations vary widely across the data specification documents of all themes, and often contain unusable SLD code examples, however many of the descriptions contain adequate information to create working SLDs. Many SLDs are based on required attributes, such as geometry, and lend themselves to generic implementation. We are currently building an extensive library of INSPIRE compliant SLDs across all 34 Annex themes. In the future, we hope to develop functionality which will provide end-users with more fine-grained control of the attributes symbolized.

INTERGEO 2018 is right around the corner, and will be bigger than ever. From 16th to 18th October, the EU Geodata community will come together in Messe Frankfurt with the aim to influence and innovate the very DNA of digital initiatives: geodata. With a diverse range of speakers and organizations joining in, all participants will be exposed to different perspectives on the rapid changes currently happening in the world of geodata.

Join us at our booth 12.1F.033 to learn about unique possibilities in Data Modeling, Data Transformations and Publishing and Viewing of WFS, WMS and ATOM services. See how you can solve challenges around INSPIRE, XPlanung, and ALKIS by leveraging our tools, Hale Connect and Hale Studio.

INTERGEO 2018 is right around the corner, and will be bigger than ever. From 16th to 18th October, the EU Geodata community will come together in Messe Frankfurt with the aim to influence and innovate the very DNA of digital initiatives: geodata. With a diverse range of speakers and organizations joining in, all participants will be exposed to different perspectives on the rapid changes currently happening in the world of geodata.

Join us at our booth 12.1F.033 to learn about unique possibilities in Data Modeling, Data Transformations and Publishing and Viewing of WFS, WMS and ATOM services. See how you can solve challenges around INSPIRE, XPlanung, and ALKIS by leveraging our tools, Hale Connect and Hale Studio.

Finding and retaining great talent has never been easy, and in today’s economy, companies need to offer the right work life balance. It’s important to keep things dynamic and offer team members the environment to help customize their work experience and make the most out of their personal and professional lives.

At wetransform, we want our team to grow professionally and personally and we wanted to know what they think is important to keep the ideal work-life balance. Take a look at what some of their favorite perks of working here are:

Florian Esser/ Senior Software Engineer

Cologne, Germany

Remote work

At wetransform, I can work remotely up to 60% of my time. Since we have a strong remote culture and have central communication platforms that all team members use continuously, I never feel disconnected from the team when not at the office. This flexibility allows me to contribute to wetransform’s success while living with my family in Cologne.

Johanna Ott/ Geospatial Consultant

Darmstadt, Germany

Flexible working hours

I really appreciate to be able to work with flexible working times. That allows me to work at the time of the day when I am most productive and also enables to run errands if needed during conventional working hours.

Kate Lyndegaard/ Product Manager

Darmstadt, Germany

Standing on the forefront

The best thing about working at wetransform is the opportunity to immerse myself in INSPIRE and open data standard implementation, at the most detailed level, on a daily basis. Working with geospatial data in all formats, across various software and platforms, there is never a dull moment!

Akshat Bajaj/ Marketing Manager

Berlin, Germany

Gym Reimbursements

Wetransform gives a monthly stipend for fitness related activities. This has allowed me to try out different gyms and also provides me with the option to try out other activities such as MMA classes!

Eleazar Alejandro Araujo/ Full Stack Web Developer

Darmstadt, Germany

Concrete learning opportunities

One of the things I like the most about working at wetransform is that I can play an active role on how the products are planned, designed and implemented. As a software developer, it is really fulfilling to grow and learn beyond the coding tasks and actually understand how it all fits a bigger purpose.

Finding and retaining great talent has never been easy, and in today’s economy, companies need to offer the right work life balance. It’s important to keep things dynamic and offer team members the environment to help customize their work experience and make the most out of their personal and professional lives.

At wetransform, we want our team to grow professionally and personally and we wanted to know what they think is important to keep the ideal work-life balance. Take a look at what some of their favorite perks of working here are:

Florian Esser/ Senior Software Engineer

Cologne, Germany

Remote work

At wetransform, I can work remotely up to 60% of my time. Since we have a strong remote culture and have central communication platforms that all team members use continuously, I never feel disconnected from the team when not at the office. This flexibility allows me to contribute to wetransform’s success while living with my family in Cologne.

Johanna Ott/ Geospatial Consultant

Darmstadt, Germany

Flexible working hours

I really appreciate to be able to work with flexible working times. That allows me to work at the time of the day when I am most productive and also enables to run errands if needed during conventional working hours.

Kate Lyndegaard/ Product Manager

Darmstadt, Germany

Standing on the forefront

The best thing about working at wetransform is the opportunity to immerse myself in INSPIRE and open data standard implementation, at the most detailed level, on a daily basis. Working with geospatial data in all formats, across various software and platforms, there is never a dull moment!

Akshat Bajaj/ Marketing Manager

Berlin, Germany

Gym Reimbursements

Wetransform gives a monthly stipend for fitness related activities. This has allowed me to try out different gyms and also provides me with the option to try out other activities such as MMA classes!

Eleazar Alejandro Araujo/ Full Stack Web Developer

Darmstadt, Germany

Concrete learning opportunities

One of the things I like the most about working at wetransform is that I can play an active role on how the products are planned, designed and implemented. As a software developer, it is really fulfilling to grow and learn beyond the coding tasks and actually understand how it all fits a bigger purpose.