Manuals: MDA

The MetaData Aggregator (MDA) returns metadata summaries from the IRIS DMC database including data availability and links to further services.

About the summaries ¶

Five levels of summary are available:

• network list
• network
• station
• location
• channel

The summary level is implied by the input parameters; i.e. if only a network is specified, the network summary level is returned.

It is possible for metadata to be defined for more than one time span, when such data is requested the time spans are listed in descending order.

Input parameters are specified in the URI as extensions of the form:

http://www.iris.edu/mda/[network]/[station]/[location]/[channel]

Use -- for [location] to specify a blank (space-space) location code.

An alternate form of the MDA URI for channel level summary is without [location]; if the 3rd parameter is 3 characters and no fourth parameter is specified assume it is the channel, e.g. http://www.iris.edu/mda/II/AAK/BHE

Data availability: ¶

The A ( A rchive) icon indicates data availability in the archive and the R ( R eal-time) icon indicates data availability in the real-time systems. Holding the mouse cursor over the symbol, in most browsers, should produce a tool-tip indicating data coverage. In appropriate places the icon can be clicked to go to next level of information.

In the network list a R ( R estricted) icon indicates that data access is restricted for all stations from the network and a P ( P artially restricted) icon indicates that data access is open for some but not all of the stations from the network.

Recognized parameter ¶

timewindow=YYYY[/MM[/DD]]-YYYY[/MM[/DD]] – Specify a time range that stations must be operating within

The timewindow parameter limits the metadata output for the specified time range. On the network and station output levels this parameters limits stations based on their start and end times. On the location and channel output levels this parameter limits channels based on their start & end times.

As a special case NOW may be used to indicate the current day for both the start and end times, e.g. timewindow=NOW would set the start and end boundaries to the current day.

If the end date is omitted is is assumed to be the same as the start time, for example timewindow=1999/1/1 would be interpreted as (1999/1/1-1999/1/1) i.e. operating on that specific day.

If the month and/or day is omitted from the timewindow start date the earliest month and/or day will be assumed, for example a start date of 2000 will be interpreted as 2000/01/01.

If the month and/or day is omitted from the timewindow end date the latest month and/or day will be assumed, for example an end date of 2000 will be interpreted as 2000/12/31.

Examples ¶

Basic example to summarize the IRIS/IDA network metadata: http://www.iris.edu/mda/II

Another example that will summarize II station AAK metadata: http://www.iris.edu/mda/II/AAK

Example to return the IRIS/USGS network metadata limited to the year 1990: http://www.iris.edu/mda/IU?timewindow-1990-1990

Example for _GSN virtual network summary: http://www.iris.edu/mda/_GSN