Portfolio

CMSi BARS Export Module

Fri, 23 May 2014 14:59:00 GMT

CMSi is software designed to support adaptive management of conservation and amenity areas. It is currently used for the management of many hundreds of sites across the UK and Europe. A significant proportion of the management activities entered into CMSi are actions that affect site biodiversity and so are directly relevant to BARS.

The BARS Export module for CMSi was commissioned by Natural England to help site managers to convert their CMSi projects to BARS actions, without the need to re-type them into the BARS website.

The contract included a period of consultation with the BARS technical team to establish the best translation between CMSi and BARS concepts. Next, a plugin interface was designed. The design goals for the interface were and to make it as quick, easy and transparent as possible for CMSi users to export their projects to BARS actions.

The solution was a single form in CMSi consisting of two panes and a set of editing controls. The top pane displays all CMSi projects in a grid with icons indicating whether they are ready for export or have been modified since the last export. These projects can then be copied down into the bottom export pane. Here the projects can be edited to match BARS term lists using auto-completion controls for bulk editing, filtering and sorting.

The module also remembers previous exports and displays a complete history including whether projects have been modified since the last export. This ensures that subsequent exports are even easier for users and the whole process is completely transparent.

Mike Lush

CMSi Designated Sites System

Tue, 03 Dec 2013 12:40:00 GMT

In this ongoing project, Natural England are extending CMSi to use it for managing all designated sites in England both replacing their ENSIS system and extending its use to Marine Conservation Zones as well. This will allow users to record the features on designated sites, their condition, the ownership on those sites, find out which other designations overlap their site including which SSSIs legally underpin Natura2000 site amongst other requirements.

This information is shared with the public and stakeholders through the bespoke web site https://designatedsites.naturalengland.org.uk/

Further information from Colin Wright.

Mike Lush

CMSi API

Fri, 22 Nov 2013 00:00:00 GMT

The CMSi API is a set of web services based upon the Odata open standard. It allows CMSi data to be exported and imported into other systems via a standard HTTP requests and is typically used by web sites, mobile applications or other systems that need to create, read, update or otherwise interact with CMSi data. The API is available for all plugin modules to CMSi (for example the Property and Agreements module, Observations and Vegetation module) and is part of the core CMSi system.

Further information from Laine Skinner.

Mike Lush

CMSi Property & Agreements Module

Fri, 05 Jul 2013 23:00:00 GMT

Working with GBNL and Natural England, exeGesIS created a set of modules for CMSi that allowed ownership data, all property transactions, agreements, rights and assets to be integrated with site and management plan data held in CMSi. This allows work carried out traditionally by land agents to be viewed by site managers as it affects their work and transforms CMSi into a complete site management system rather than just about conservation planning and recording.

Further information from Laine Skinner, or see the Property and Agreements module on our website.

Mike Lush

Species Observations and Vegetation Recording Module

Mon, 11 Mar 2013 14:12:00 GMT

The observations and vegetation mapping module for CMSi was developed to allow managers to integrate wildlife records and vegetation surveys with their site data.

Support is provided for entering data as CMSi monitoring projects associated with a site and for incidental records collected by volunteers. The module features a range of input forms that can be customised to suit a variety of recording needs. Data can be browsed from an intuitive tree interface, filtered, and viewed in the standard map window alongside other CMSi layers.

In addition, sophisticated reports can be specified using a wizard, which are then generated within the module and exported to GIS.

The system includes a mobile app (iOS, Android and Windows) and an API to communicate with the backend CMSi system. The mobile app is used by field surveyors throughout the GBNL consortium on iPads and a range of Android tablets. The surveyors record observations and sync these with the backend CMSi database. They typically deal with many thousands of observations and species dictionaries and data volumes are quite large.

The mobile app is map-centric and uses the device GPS and offline mapping for the entire country. The app also provides more advanced control over the map layers and allows additional KML and ESRI shape files to be imported and overlaid by the end user.

Mike Lush

Development of CMSi for use as a protected area management system for Netherlands

Mon, 19 Sep 2011 23:00:00 GMT

exeGesIS completed a project for a consortium of Dutch organisations including Natuurmonumenten and Staatsbosbeheer and the CMSi Community to develop a new version of CMS (CMSi) software application to be used across the Netherlands for the management of nature conservation protected areas. exeGesIS were closely involved in the system design and undertook all the software development and capacity building work.

Further information from t he CMSi team.

Mike Lush

Management plans for sites in Northern Ireland

Sat, 03 Mar 2007 00:00:00 GMT

Exegesis SDM produced a set of 20 management plans for some of Northern Ireland's top sites, such as the Giant's Causeway, for the National Trust and in conjunction with Allen Mellon Environmental. This was done through a series of workshops with wardening staff in which the following was identified:

The features of the site
The factors affecting the features
The monitoring required
The management projects required.

The final plans were handed over in CMS7 (the product now called 'CMSi'), giving the managers a working tool to record planned activities and data collected. CMS training was also provided to the site managers to allow future update of the plans.

Regional Conservation Advisor, Phil Davidson, said that “working with Exegesis has proved an effective way to get our management plans up and going and their approach of working alongside our staff has made the whole process more inclusive and stimulating”

Further information from the CMSi team.

Mike Lush

Topla Landscape Park Management Plan

Thu, 12 Oct 2006 23:00:00 GMT

In a joint project with Eurosite and the Slovenian Institute for Nature Conservation, we facilitated a management planning workshop to prepare a CMS plan for the Topla Landscape Park. Topla is a small alpine valley in northern Slovenia and has many SAC and SPA features including beech forests, capercaillie, black grouse and pygmy owls. Working out how to manage the interplay of these features made for a challenging but very productive workshop.

John Harvey, the Eurosite representative for the project writes, “The use of the CMS software was of great value in developing the plan, providing a structure within which decisions could be recorded, modified and manipulated with ease and speed. The skills of the exeGesIS representative enabled the software to be used to its maximum value.”

Further information from David Mitchel.

Mike Lush