Distributed JXTA-based architecture for searching and retrieving solar data

This paper describes a hybrid distributed architecture, based on the JXTA technology, for searching and discovering data in a federation of solar observation archives. This work has been developed within the European project EGSO (European Grid of Solar Observations) with the intent of studying and analyzing a set of technologies and showing the brokerage capabilities of a highly controlled distributed network topology. Three roles have been identified: providers that contain data and metadata, brokers that manage providers and user queries, and consumers/clients. JXTA is used to develop all network system functionalities, while a native XML database is used to store resource descriptions.