Open-source Software for Geospatial Data Discovery, Exploration and Reuse.

As the open data movement continues to gain traction, research communities need systems that allow not only online data discovery, but also their exploration and reuse. The ability to view, combine, and interact with data online prior to download helps assess data suitability to streamline data gathering and research efforts. With a focus on geospatial data, the developed open-source software makes this possible. It is designed for academic libraries to harmonize research data across platforms and provide researches with a consistent interface to access data. This open-source software leverages existing technologies to facilitate harvesting, curation, and ingestion of these data. Once published, data is shared though a feature-rich web map interface which provides a user experience designed around playful interaction of data and the effortless display of underlying variables. We place special attention on maintaining a geospatial datasets integrity, along with support for multi-layer viewing. The system captures behavioral statistics on user interactions leading up to data download to provide metrics on data use which would otherwise be lost. The approachable multi-lingual interface aims to lower barriers to reaching broader audiences, and further multidisciplinary collaborative pursuits.