Using DCOM to support interoperability in forest ecosystem management decision support systems

Forest ecosystems exhibit complex dynamics over time and space. Management of forest ecosystems involves the need to forecast future states of complex systems that are often undergoing structural changes. This in turn requires integration of quantitative science and engineering components with socio-political, regulatory, and economic considerations. The amount of data, information and knowledge involved in the management process is often overwhelming. Integrated decision support systems may help managers make consistently good decisions concerning forest ecosystem management. Integrating computer systems using a system-specific or custom approach has many disadvantages. We compare a variety of current approaches, suggest characteristics that an approach should have, and propose that the Distributed Component Object Model is an approach that is very suitable for forest ecosystem decision support system integration.