1. Introduction to Google Earth Engine

Jan 3, 2023 · 1 min read · intro datacalog  ·
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1.1 What is Google Earth Engine?

Google Earth Engine is a cloud-based platform that helps access high-performance computing resources for processing and analyzing large geospatial datasets (Noel Golerick et al.,2017).

1.2 Objectives:

  • Be accessible to various professionals without being experts in handling supercomputers.
  • Reduce pre-post processing time of satellite images on a local, regional or global scale.
  • Implement application development without being a backend/frontend expert.
  • Boost the development of big data for remote sensing.

1.3 Components:

  • Data catalog: Curated collection of several petabytes of geospatial datasets widely used in remote sensing available to the general public.
  • High performance computing service: Google’s computational infrastructure to optimize parallel processing and distribution of geospatial data.
  • API and client libraries: Application programming interface for making requests to Earth Engine servers.
    • API
      • Client libraries
      • Code Editor
      • REST API
    • Client libraries:
      • JavaScript
      • Python
      • R (no official)

1.4 Quickly review of Data catalog