In previous posts, I've alluded to the fact that I was learning Python for a project that was getting under way at work. I never did say what the project was, however, so here we go.
The company I work for, Engineering and Environmental Internet Solutions (EEI) is a sister company to Global Watersheds Scientific (GWS). GWS (via EEI) does much remote data collection around Alaska using data loggers connected via the Internet (including satellite), radio, and even cell phone. This data is collected and displayed (both textual and graphical representations) on a variety of web pages, and is distributed to a variety of clients. See
this page for an example.
Quality assurance (QA) and quality control (QC) on this data, however, if done, must be done by manual inspection. Needless to say, this is a labor intensive process. The goal of this project, dubbed Photizo, is to create framework that will provide data processing, QA/QC, and data visualization, all in an automated fashion.
What does "Photizo" mean? The project name derives from a Greek word meaning "to enlighten, render evident, to give understanding to." The purpose of Photizo is to analyze data and give insight and understanding into said data, "rendering evident" the function (or malfunction) of a data collection network. Thus, the name Photizo (pronounced foe-tee'-zoh).
We are currently in the design phase, and things are going well. Python will be a good fit for this project, and give us great flexibility in our implementation, especially in areass where we must be able to accommodate various inputs (such as a variety of data file formats) or creating a framework to test data that will allow us to add and modify tests without editing the core code.
You can learn more, and keep track of progress on our wiki:
photizo.eeinternet.com. If you have questions, comments, or suggestions on this project, feel free to drop me a line at joshua (at) eeinternet (dot) com.
