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Exploring OGC API Integration to Advance NSDI Strategic Plan Goal 2
The FGDC NSDI and GeoPlatform R&D Services team is actively exploring, prototyping, and piloting the use of OGC API standards across leading geospatial platforms—GeoServer, ArcGIS Online, QGIS, and GeoPortal—to support Goal 2 of the NSDI Strategic Plan: Enhance the National Spatial Data Infrastructure through modern, interoperable services.
Why OGC API?
OGC API represents the next generation of web service standards for geospatial data, designed to be lightweight, RESTful, and developer-friendly. By leveraging these APIs, we aim to create a more interoperable, efficient, and intelligent geospatial ecosystem.
Key Benefits of This Research
Administrative Efficiency Our exploratory work demonstrates how OGC API can streamline data publishing and access workflows. By reducing redundant processes and simplifying integration, agencies can achieve greater administrative efficiency, freeing resources for innovation rather than maintenance.
Reducing the 80% Data Wrangling Burden Data scientists often spend up to 80% of their time preparing and cleaning data. Through standardized APIs and automated data pipelines, this effort can be dramatically reduced, allowing experts to focus on analysis and insight generation rather than manual preparation.
Enabling Generative AI Clean, accessible, and standardized geospatial data is the foundation for generative AI applications. By adopting OGC API, we pave the way for AI-driven solutions that can synthesize spatial data, generate predictive models, and create new insights at scale.
Intelligent Maps on Demand Imagine requesting a map that dynamically integrates authoritative datasets, applies advanced analytics, and visualizes results—all in real time. OGC API integration will enable intelligent maps on demand, transforming how decision-makers interact with spatial information.
Reducing the Burden of Standards Compliance Complying with geospatial standards has traditionally required significant manual effort and specialized expertise. By embedding OGC API capabilities into widely used platforms, compliance becomes automatic and seamless, reducing the administrative burden while ensuring interoperability and adherence to federal and international standards.
What’s Next?
Our pilots will inform best practices for implementing OGC API across federal geospatial platforms. This work is a critical step toward a modernized NSDI, where data is open, interoperable, and ready for next-generation applications.
Stay tuned for updates as we continue to advance Goal 2 and unlock new possibilities for geospatial innovation.