IWICOS: Integrated Weather, Sea Ice and Ocean Service System

Abstract The objective of IWICOS is to develop a prototype marine information system that will provide end-users with a single-entry access point to meteorological, sea ice and oceanographic data and products in electronic form for users of operational services. These include national ice and weather services, shipping companies and sea traffic adminis- tration, icebreaker captains and ice pilots of ships, oil companies and offshore industry, fishing vessels and other ships operating in harsh climate, and finally climate research, education and media. The core elements of the IWICOS system are standardised formats (BSQ, GRIB, Shapefile and XML) a common metadata definition, a producer server, a broker, and facades that allow different client software to interact with the system. Practical demonstrations and evaluation of the IWICOS system have been performed for selected end-users during 2002. More information can be found on http://www.nersc.no/Mwicos