Vol. 7 No. 3 Winter 1999
A Newsletter About New Jersey's Water Quality Programs

New Endex System to Facilitate Data-Sharing The process of creating environmental data can be very complicated and expensive. Imagine your frustration when you realize the data you just spent hours and money creating were available for free from another agency. Unfortunately, you didn't know how and where to acquire the data to avoid this duplication.

Tasked by executive order, the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) was instructed to organize and standardize how digital spatial data is collected and referenced. The FGDC has developed a standard to guide the public through the documentation of spatial data, otherwise known as metadata. Metadata contain descriptive information such as who, what, where, why, and how data was created. The FGDC requires a specific content and format for metadata to make it compliant with their standards and searchable over the internet. Utilizing the power of the internet, an FGDC clearinghouse node provides a forum for users to post, view and search compliant metadata as well as acquire the data set. One stop shopping through an internet Clearinghouse solves the problem of obtaining well-documented data in a timely and cost effective way. Additional information on the FGDC can be found at www.fgdc.gov.

ENDEX Is Born

The DEP recognized the benefits of having a data clearinghouse for the New Jersey community. This statewide initiative has evolved into the web-based Environmental Data Exchange (ENDEX). ENDEX will contain a FGDC compliant clearinghouse node, a digital library component for related environmental information and analysis templates for data manipulation. Accurate and reliable New Jersey information will be at the fingertips of DEP employees and other outside organizations. Integrated data analysis, data cataloging and data sharing will be centralized for easy access to the environmental community.

The goal of ENDEX is to demonstrate to the public and to other environmental agencies how open information access and data sharing on the internet can accelerate the transition to community-based environmental management. Information on ENDEX can be found on the internet site at: www.state.nj.us/dep/gis/.