geography for marine areas and edges

[dustymc]

@sharpphyl here's what I have at the moment that might be useful for you. Let me know if you want screenshots of the maps or whatever.

create table temp_maybe_wet as select source,search_terms from external_gis_data where source in ('eez_land_union','iho_world_seas','seavox_areas');

temp_maybe_wet.csv.zip

[sharpphyl]

The list has a number of marine geographic areas that we are currently using. To help us better understand which sources best fit our specimens, could you show screenshots for the Sulu Seas (iho_world-seas) and SOUTH CHINA AND EASTERN ARCHIPELAGIC SEAS|SULU SEA (seavos.areas). Thanks.

[dustymc]

Sulu Seas (iho_world-seas)

SOUTH CHINA AND EASTERN ARCHIPELAGIC SEAS|SULU SEA (seavos.areas)

I think https://arctos.database.museum/place.cfm?action=detail&geog_auth_rec_id=4986 is using seavox_areas

[sharpphyl]

So, they appear to be identical. And are seavox_areas (and the others on your list) already in higher geography and we just have to select them? You can tell, we don't really understand how to use this data effectively.

[dustymc]

You'd request geography creation in the normal manner, I'd use these sources to build the initial CSV. Some of them are used, but not in accordance with https://github.com/ArctosDB/arctos/issues/5076 (which I'm going to assume has enthusiastic support unless told otherwise) - I think that just means we'll (eventually) drop "North Pacific Ocean" from https://arctos.database.museum/editGeog.cfm?geog_auth_rec_id=4986. That still seems entirely correct to me, it just adds confusion, there's not some other Sulu Sea in some other ocean (and we have the geography if I'm wrong about there, there's nothing ambiguous about the place).

[sharpphyl]

Can we make requests from this list within this GitHub issue rather than opening a new one each time? There is no footprint for Geography 10001035. Can you add this eez to that geography?

eez_land_union Republic of Mauritius|Republic of Mauritius|Republic of Mauritius|Union EEZ and country

[dustymc]

requests from this list within this GitHub issue rather than opening a new one

I think a new issue might be easier to manage, but I'm not sure it matters - the point is to answer "where'd this come from?", either probably does that even if some scrollin' and cussin' is required.

Geography 10001035.

That is self-conflicting and can't survive - https://github.com/ArctosDB/arctos/issues/5126 will determine what happens to it (the island gets a shape - if I have one - or it gets merged into something).

We can add Mauritius as a country....

and/or (as requested) a - claim?? This thing, whatever we call it.

For that latter (and "megaguam"), I'm happy to proceed as if we've all enthusiastically embraced https://github.com/ArctosDB/arctos/issues/5076, and under that eez_land_union is geography, which leaves the question of how we map the text data to our model.

I think we won't be able to automate that (it contains unpredictable and weird things), and I don't much like what we've done with "megaguam" (remarks is really the only place I can figure out what's going on, that's never good), and I don't much like the source (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guam, which mostly talks about dirt - there is a picture of a globe with a big circle, so maybe it's not ENTIRELY inappropriate). Unless someone shows up and stops us, let's just solve that here....

I tentatively propose we enter these with the political bits filed appropriately and suffixed by ' Exclusive Economic Zone.' It's kinda wordy, but surely EEZ looks like some placename in some language somewhere or something and I'll take wordy clarity any day.

For Mauritius everything's in the expected place, so the data would look like...

• country==Mauritius Exclusive Economic Zone
• source==https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mauritius
• spatial==eez_land_union Republic of Mauritius|Republic of Mauritius|Republic of Mauritius|Union EEZ and country

Higher_geog would be generated as Mauritius Exclusive Economic Zone

and that's it. (I'm still not thrilled with that source, but I don't think there's anything better - I'm hoping I'm wrong and someone will show me how.)

As a demonstration of the sub-country stuff that makes this complicated, Alaska....

...would end up as....

• country==United States
• state_prov==Alaska Exclusive Economic Zone
• source==https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alaska
• spatial==Alaska|Alaska|United States|Union EEZ and country

Higher_geog would be generated as United States, Alaska Exclusive Economic Zone

And I REALLY don't like the source on that one - AK doesn't (really) control that EEZ, but I still don't have any better ideas and as long as we're consistent I think it'll work.

Guam would just be a matter of deciding if Guam is more state-like or country-like and making things as consistent as possible. (And once again https://github.com/ArctosDB/arctos/issues/5076 makes this easy: It gets mapped to country because https://gadm.org/maps/GUM.html)

@ArctosDB/geo-group @mkoo and whoever else might ever care, we could really use some input here.

@sharpphyl if this sounds reasonable and nobody shows up to stop us, say "GO!" and I'll go....

[Jegelewicz]

Alaska

But that doesn't really solve @sharpphyl problem? She wants to say this thing was found in the water, but that EEZ includes land?

[dustymc]

She wants to say this thing was found in the water

If that's the case then the EEZ-combos perhaps aren't best - something like https://arctos.database.museum/place.cfm?action=detail&geog_auth_rec_id=1148 might be more appropriate.

I'll always prefer "might be more appropriate" over "just wrong," and things in the water close to AK and attributed to the EEZ won't be "just wrong" even if they do include a few hundred thousand square miles of extraneous dirt.

(Things on/near the beach - maybe water, maybe dirt, who knows - will also land inside the shape, and I think these are most of the actual problem.)

FWIW I had the suggester-thing running against the cache for a while (failed experiment), and a huge number of the 'no appropriate geography' localities land in one of the EEZ-union shapes. I can't say I'm entirely thrilled with the whole sorta-weird situation, but it does seem to very nicely solve a big chunk of a huge problem. It's probably not what I'd suggest if we had unlimited resources, but until then I don't see a better approach.

[sharpphyl]

but that EEZ includes land?

The spatial visual does include land, but the EEZ definition would only be the area offshore. I'm ok with that if others are - for Alaska, Guam, Mauritius, etc.

a huge number of the 'no appropriate geography' localities land in one of the EEZ-union shapes.

Ultimately, I think that's the heart of this discussion. How can we create spatial geography that is helpful - confirms that our coordinates are within the designated boundaries - rather than creating a ton of problem records. As long as what we do works for the aggregators, it's a plus for our collection.

[sharpphyl]

BTW, we've learned that Geolocate is working on a system for donuts around mountain tops (for elevation) and around islands. That may help with EEZ's and other island-related spatial geography. Is anyone in touch with them or know more about this?

[dustymc]

spatial visual does include land, but the EEZ definition would only be the area offshore.

I think maybe there's still some major miscommunication. The EEZ+country data provides a single shape which is the country plus the EEZ. The spatial visual is just a visualization of the shape, which is definitive. The summit of Denali is in "Alaska Exclusive Economic Zone."

If geolocate is doing something cool that can be imported into postgis and they're willing to share then it could be discussed as another spatial source.

[dustymc]

Merge-->https://github.com/ArctosDB/arctos/issues/5138