Data, Processing, Client Tiers
WMS, WFS, WCS
ISO 19115, FGDC
Web: HTML, CSS, JavaScript, XML
SOAP - Simple Object Access Protocol
REST - Representation State Transformation
In the context of server platforms for online mapping with OGC services, there are several components that are of interest
The operating system - the software environment in which all applications on a computer operate (e.g. Windows, Mac OS X, Linux)
The web server - the application that listens for incoming requests from the Internet (e.g. Apache, IIS)
The mapping server - the application (that may also include the web server) that enables online mapping applications, that may include support for one or more OGC service interfaces (e.g. GeoServer, MapServer, CubeWerx, ArcGIS Server)
Sample Commercial Off-the-Shelf (COTS)
Sample Open Source
GeoServer is an Open Source, Open Standards supporting geospatial web services platform
GNU General Public License
WMS, WFS, WCS
Written in Java as a web application commonly hosted on the Jetty HTTP server and Java servlet engine
An appropriate version of Java must already be installed
OS-Independent Binaries are Available for Multiple Platforms (these are just ‘run’ to start the server)
Includes the Jetty HTTP server
Windows, Mac OS X, Linux
There are OS-specific configuration instructions for each operating system
GeoServer may be integrated into existing Java web servlet applications (such as Apache Tomcat) using the available Web Archive (WAR) file.
OS-Specific Installers are also Available
Include an integrated HTTP server
Windows and Mac OS X
After the initial setup as part of the installation process, other setup and configuration is performed through the web interface
All configuration activities require that you are logged in as an administrator
Default username and password for a new GeoServer are admin:geoserver
After logging in you can view and modify the configuration of the server and services - some of the configuration elements inform the OGC service capabilities
Server Status - summary information about the status of the currently running server
Contact Information - contact information for the person responsible for providing support for the server and services. This information is used to build parts of the Capabilities XML metadata returned by the services
Global Settings - settings that apply to the whole server - primarily focussed on options for logging
JAI Settings - settings related to the Java Advanced Imagery engine within GeoServer
About GeoServer - links to information about GeoServer
Options Common to all WxS services
Enable/disable the service, with or without strict CITE compliance
Maintainer and Online Resource URLs
Title/Abstract
Fees/Access Constraints
Keywords
Options specific to individual services
WFS - max. no. features, service type (basic/transactional/complete), GML styles
WMS - SRS subset specification, interpolation method, resource consumption limits, KML options, map image watermarking, PNG/JPEG/SVG format options
WCS - No additional configuration options
GeoWebCache Service (link to web information) - developmental tile-cache technology
Workspaces - Defined containers for related data products
Stores - Specific data sources (file or service based) with required data type and connection information provided in the Store configuration
Layers - Defined layers that are published by the server, with the layers based upon data provided by a Store, but with additional layer-specific settings (such as bounding box, applied and available styles,and attribution).
Layer Groups - Collections of Layers for specific projects/applications or other logical groupings.
Styles - A listing of defined layer styles for the server through which those styles may be accessed and managed.
Layer Preview - An interface through which a Layers may be previewed in a variety of formats
Users - Management of system users and their assigned roles
Data Security - Settings for read/write access to data products within the server
Service Security - Settings for managing service-level (i.e. WMS, WFS, WCS and related request types) access privileges by user role.
Catalog Security - Settings for managing how limited access layers are presented to users.