Establishing the GCOOS Regional Association's data portal

The Gulf of Mexico Coastal Ocean Observing System Regional Association (GCOOS-RA) received two multi-year NOAA grants to develop regional data systems supportive of the U.S. Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS). One grant provides modest support to ten sub-regional observatories to modify their existing data systems to allow them to become stand-alone interoperable IOOS data nodes. The other grant supports the establishment of a regional data portal. The following describes the evolution and current status of the GCOOS-RA's data portal and some of the challenges encountered by the developers.