Import Data

Cruise data are imported through a single form on the annotation website. The form is hierarchical and allows the importer to progressively add nested entities starting with the cruise itself.

There are four important sections of the form, Cruise Metadata, Import, Data Replacement and Bulk Data Upload.

Cruise Metadata

The form begins with a panel for inserting cruise metadata, including the name and leg, start and end dates, objectives, a summary and operational notes.

The ship can be selected from a drop-down (click the + button to add one) and crew and documents can be added by clicking the Add a Crew Member and Add a Document File buttons, respectively.

Click Add a Dive to add dives to the cruise.

Crew Members

For each crew member, select a person and a role from the list (click + to add one of either). Multiple entries can be created if one person has more than one role.

Documents

For each document, enter a URL or upload a file through the form and enter a title.

Dives

A dive's metadata include a name, start and end times, objectives, summary and operational notes, plus crew.

A dive has two attached platform configurations, one for the ship and one for the submersible. See the Platform Configs section, below.

Click Add a Crew Member to add crew, and Add an Events File to add events. Events can be added directly to a dive (rather than through an instrument configuration; see below) because logs of direct observations may be collected by crew (deck logs, live video feed logs, etc.)

Click Add a Transect to add a transect to the dive.

Crew

Dive crew are added in the same way as cruise crew.

Transects

A transect is a time-keeping entity which records the start and end times of one or more defined transects within a dive. The metadata for a transect are similar to those for a dive, without the subsidiary entities.

Platform Configurations

Each dive has two platform configurations, one for the ship and one for the submersible. The ship configuration is populated by default by the ship selected for the cruise and cannot be altered. The submersible is selected from the drop-down (click + to add one).

A configuration text field is provided for the insertion of a JSON object with properties relating to the configuration or condition of the vehicle.

Click Add an Instrument to add an instrument configuration to the platforms. An instrument configuration will be added to the platform configuration.

Instrument Configuration

This form is similar to the platform configuration: select an instrument (rather than a platform) and enter an optional configuration as a JSON object.

Click the Add a Stream File button to add a data stream or Add an Events File to add an events file.

Click Remove Instrument to remove the instrument from the platform.

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Bulk Data Upload

If a cruise has many dives using a single ROV with a complement of instruments that does not change from dive to dive (the usual case), it can be time-consuming and error-prone to configure an instrument and upload the data separately for each dive. The Bulk Data Upload section lets you update all dives simultaneously.

The "Replace Existing" checkbox determines whether the uploaded data will replace the existing stream of the same type on a specific instrument or be appended.

The first drop-down provides a choice between streams, events and annotations. The Streams option is for data streams, the Events option is for comments or vehicle status events and the Annotations option is for video or photo annotations.

• Stream
  • A new drop-down, Stream Type appears with three options, Measurements, 2D Coordinates and 3D Coordinates.
    • Measurements
      • A new drop-down is displayed, a list of measurement types with units. Select a measurement type.
    • 2D or 3D Coordinates:
      • No new fields are displayed.
• Events:
  • A new drop-down is displayed, Event Type with two options, Comments and Status.
    • Comments
      • No new fields are displayed.
• Annotations
  • Two new fields appear:
    • Annotation Type provides a list of annotation sources, currently Biigle and Generic.
    • Annotation Job provides a list of annotation jobs, one of which can be assigned to each event generated from the annotation file. A new annotation job can be created by clicking the + button next to the field.

The Platform drop-down selects the platform to apply the upload to, the ship or the ROV.

The Instrument drop-down selects the instrument which generated the data to be uploaded. A new instrument can be added by clicking the + button next to the field.

The file dialog selects the file to be uploaded. Click 'Choose File to select the file, then the upload button to upload it. Clicking the arrow button will then apply all the changes, adding an instrument configuration to each dive and attaching the uploaded data to it.

A single data file can be applied to all dives, because only the data with a timestamp between the start and end time of a dive will be attached to that dive.