On the request of participants of the Central and East European (CEE) regional ILTER and GTOS meetings held in Budapest (Hungary, 1999) and Nitra (Slovakia, 2000) and with the support of ILTER, GTOS and the Hungarian Academy of Sciences a five-day workshop was organized in Vácrátót (Hungary) at the Institute of Ecology and Botany of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, where a network of computers were made available to participants.
The workshop was a combination of lectures, demonstrations, discussions and hands-on computer lab experience focusing on data management and accessibility issues. It had both training and research objectives. The latter was the involvement of participants in integrating the CEE LTER (Long-Term Ecological Research) sites into the metadata networks of ILTER (International Long-Term Ecological Research) and the GTOS TEMS database.
Inclusion of the CEE LTER sites into these networks was a powerful demonstration to workshop participants of the value of metadata and the potential for international collaboration. Participants were asked to bring datasets from their research sites to use in laboratory exercises. The training was provided in a helpful and collaborative atmosphere.
Participants presented short informal reports and slide demonstrations on the characteristics of their sites. They provided information on their sites monitoring and research activities and in some cases provided information on the type (paper, computerized, etc.) and management of site data.
Data sources useful for both LTER and GTOS were identified and participants made proposals to finish developing the metadata and to bring databases online to meet GTOS objectives. After the workshop participants dedicated some time in completing GTOS questionnaires with their site data.
