Use of a Generic sensor format to store multibeam data

Abstract

Bathymetric swath surveying systems have become the predominant tool for collection of high‐resolution bathymetry and imagery data. The success of these systems has resulted in a variety of data formats being established by manufacturers, integrators, and users. The increasing sophistication of these swath‐mapping sonars has resulted in an ever‐expanding stream of data and, at this point, a significant amount of effort must be spent determining which version of a particular sonar was used to collect a given set of data. There must be a standardization of these data, if they are to be preserved in a usable fashion.

Earlier work was undertaken to develop a strategy for organizing swath‐mapping data in a logical, modular fashion. This presentation builds on previous work and illustrates how to use the Generic Sensor Format to store the complete data record of a modern, wide‐swath multibeam sonar system.

In addition to serving a role in data collection, this format is designed to support efficient processing and archiving of swath‐mapping data. Because different archiving systems may require data that be reformatted as database or tabular records, the Generic Sensor Format emphasizes organization of the data records. A byte‐stream‐oriented data structure has been chosen as the primary data representation; however, other representations can be used without destroying the logical coherency of the data. Tabular and ASCII text forms can also be supported in order to allow the data to be stored in a variety of forms.

Keywords:

• seafloor mapping
• swath sonar
• multibeam sonar
• data format