GCP Pantheon

An important part of the Generation Challenge Programme (GCP) is the development of a comprehensive, distributed crop information platform to capture, store, analyze and disseminate GCP research results (Subprogramme 4 (SP4)). Given the diversity of data types and the global scope of the partnership, data exchange and information system interoperability is a significant challenge. A cornerstone of this implementation is the development of common standards for GCP data.  As they have been developed to date, these GCP standards consist of the following components:

This site documents these standards with their usage in end-user's applications that access and manipulate data using GCP platform compliant components . Pantheon is designed in a way that:

• It is possible to add the non-GCP data sources (created by GCP partners, or by third parties) and use them by Pantheon's end-user's applications, and
• It is possible to add the GCP data sources (contained in the Pantheon) to the non-GCP end-user's applications and to view (use, explore) them there.

This documentation shows and explains all parts of Pantheon and presents various tutorials how developers can and should use it. Sometimes it defines mandatory rules, sometimes it only suggests the best practices (recommendations) to follow. Remember:

GCP Models

The domain modeling is the central part of the GCP Pantheon. Actually, it is the only but ultimate rule - any application and data source that is part of the GCP (or even just used by GCP) must follow the GCP models.

There is one central model - called the GCP Domain Model (Bruskiewich et al. 2006) - that expresses attributes, behavior and relationships between its entities in a way that is not dependent on any specific technology (such as programming language) that is used to implement these entities. This model is very useful when talking with scientists and domain experts. Also developers get obtain here an overall understanding, the big picture.

The same principles and relationships are then expressed in several (technically) different ways, using patterns and paradigms specific for concrete technologies. These technology-specific models can (from technical reasons) slightly differ from the main domain model - but not significantly. These models are primarily used by developers, implementing GCP Pantheon.

• GCP Domain Model 
• GCP BioMoby Data Types
• GCP Java Interfaces
• GCP XML Schemas

GCP Platform Components

There are three major types of components in Pantheon:

• GCP Data Sources
• GCP Data Consumers
• GCP Data Transformers
• GCP Plaform Compliant Applications

For more information on these components please refer to the section on GCP Platform Compliant Components

Tutorials

Here are several tutorials on Pantheon. We suggest you read first the tutorials on the Core Pantheon components. The remaining tutorials concentrate on specific issues which may only be of interest to those working with specific technologies or parts of Pantheon.

Core Pantheon Tutorials

• Tutorial: How to use Pantheon
• Tutorial: GCP Data Sources
• Tutorial: GCP Data Consumers
• Tutorial: Using Maven from Ant
• Tutorial: Using EMF to create the GCP domain model
• Best Practices

Tutorials on optional Pantheon components

• Tutorial: Developing with Pantheon Eclipse (An Eclipse component based framework)

References

• Bruskiewich R, Davenport G, Hazekamp T, Metz T, Ruiz M, Simon R, Takeya M, Lee J, Senger M, Mclaren CG and Van Hintum T. (2006) Generation Challenge Programme (GCP): Standards for Crop Data. OMICS: The Journal of Integrative Biology. 10(2):215-219