Managing Audio Monitoring Data with SIMON – Concept for Data Administration, Online Repository and Dissemination

Automated observations of natural occurrences play a key role in monitoring biodiversity worldwide. With the development of affordable hardware like the AudioMoth (Hill et al. 2019) acoustic logger, large scale and long-term monitoring has come within reach. However, data management and dissemination of monitoring data remain challenging, as the development of software and the infrastructure for the management of monitoring data lag behind. We want to fill this gap, providing a complete audio monitoring solution from affordable audio monitoring hardware, custom data management tools and storage infrastructure based on open source hard- and software, biodiversity information standards and integrable interfaces. The Scientific Monitoring Data Management and Online Repository (SIMON) consists of a portable data collector and a connected online repository. The data collector, a device for the automated extraction of the audio data from the audio loggers in the field, stores the data and metadata in an internal cache. Once connected to the internet via WiFi or a cable connection, the data are automatically uploaded to an online repository for automated analysis, annotation, da