Reusability in NASA's Earth Observation System Data and Information System (EOSDIS)

NASA's Earth Observation System Data and Information System (EOSDIS) has been operational since 1994. The term FAIR is relatively recent compared to the operational life of EOSDIS. However, given the evolutionary nature of EOSDIS in response to both the state of the art and community expectations, it is useful to assess where EOSDIS stands relative to the FAIR data management. In this presentation we evaluate EOSDIS against the Reusability principle, which calls for a clear and accessible data usage license, rich description of data, detailed provenance, and compliance with domain-relevant community standards.

EOSDIS complies with NASA's data and information policy (see https://earthdata.nasa.gov/collaborate/open-data-services-and-software/data-information-policy). EOSDIS data are typically described at both dataset and file level according to a common Unified Metadata Model in order to support discovery. In addition, most datasets (particularly the more modern ones) also include detailed variable-level metadata following community standards (e.g., Climate-Forecast Convention) to enable the use and machine-level interpretation of data in off-the-shelf tools.

In addition to the above discovery and use metadata, many metadata fields and documentation references are provided in the datasets and their landing pages to inform users about the scope and limitations of the data. Known issues are documented in many cases. Quality flags and indicators are provided to enable users to filter data before use. Progress is being made towards capturing more complete provenance and context information to ensure future reusability - NASA has developed a preservation content specification (PCS) and is leading the development of an ISO standard (ISO 19165-2) based on PCS and CEOS adopted Long-Term Data Preservation Contents.

Achieving consistent compliance for datasets is particularly challenging with the diverse community of missions and scientists providing data to EOSDIS. To address this, EOSDIS's constituent Distributed Active Archive Centers work with data producers to utilize the applicable standards and conventions. In addition, a guidebook is under development to provide comprehensive and understandable guidance on how to construct compliant, and thus more reusable, data products.