[ewlarson]

Each federal collection now offers both standard discovery and an asset-specific research workspace. The standard home remains the entry point; researchers can switch approaches without changing collections.

A shared Search & browse / Research workspace navigation appears in both interfaces, including search results and record pages. It remains visible on mobile, identifies the active pathway, and uses each collection’s localized research-task description. Both paths are directly linkable:

• #/: the existing branded discovery home, catalog, map, facets, search and full metadata.
• #/research: the optimized asset workflow.
• #/search: the full scoped catalog. #/about-collection remains a compatible home alias.

Collection	Research workflow alongside standard discovery
NASA GIBS	Choose an imagery layer, validate two dates against disjoint daily availability intervals, compare real WMS images over the same extent, and open the original source viewer.
The National Map	Define a study area, select overlapping 1/3 arc-second DEM tiles, access API-provided downloads, and export an original-tile JSON manifest.
Historical Topographic Maps	Find a state/scale index and sheet, distinguish editions from printings, compare synchronized georeferenced TIFFs, and download original GeoPDF/GeoTIFF assets.

The optional research YAML schema enables the shared pathway switch and selects reusable workflow capabilities. BTAA, UNR and UW keep their existing navigation. No institution-ID branches, new dependencies, backend contract changes, or server infrastructure. The original theme-path switching and per-theme resource-class cache fixes are retained.

Research behavior, URL parameters, supported assets and metadata API gaps · Source-site review, branding and collection scopes

Both pathways, side by side

Desktop screenshots use a 1440px viewport and live metadata/source assets.

Collection	Standard discovery	Research workspace
NASA GIBS
The National Map
Historical maps

Mobile evidence — both choices remain visible at 390px

NASA research	Elevation research	Historical research

Supported scope and API gaps

GIBS currently supports daily visual comparisons; unavailable/static/subdaily/polar layers retain metadata/source access. Elevation exports original tiles, not clipped or mosaicked rasters. Historical grouping is conservative within an index, and matching footprints do not guarantee pixel-perfect registration. The linked gap document proposes typed service/time capabilities, raster characteristics, canonical sheet/edition relationships, numeric asset sizes, checksums and immutable versions. The frontend does not assume those fields exist.

Catalog filters and research parameters stay independent. Browser Back restores the previous URL and its selections; switching through the pathway links opens that pathway’s entry point. Historical pan/zoom is synchronized within the session but is not encoded in the URL.

Validation

• GitHub CI passes on commit 75adbe4: 901 tests across 77 files; 83.23% line and statement coverage, above the unchanged 80% thresholds. Installation, lint, type checking and the production build all pass on Node 26.13.0.
• Tests include bidirectional pathway navigation and 15 research-workflow cases covering imagery dates and service failures, tile selection and manifest contents, historical editions and printings, linked map cameras, metadata search, and unavailable indexes.
• Fixed the Node 25+ native Web Storage / Vitest 3 collision by disabling native storage only in test workers, allowing happy-dom and jsdom to provide isolated browser storage. Added workflow coverage instead of lowering thresholds or excluding code. The exact CI commands also pass in a clean local checkout with Node 26.13.0.
• Type checking, lint, changed-file formatting and the GitHub Pages subpath production build pass. Existing large-chunk warnings remain.
• Browser verified: all three collection homes open discovery; each switches into research; return to discovery works on mobile; the switch remains available on a full metadata record; all research views fit 390px without horizontal overflow.
• Earlier workflow checks covered missing-day rejection, keyboard date changes, tile selection and downloaded manifest contents, changed extent clearing stale selection, linked historical zoom/printing selection and Wisconsin index search.

After deployment, use /ogm-discovery/nasa-gibs/, /ogm-discovery/usgs-tnm/, or /ogm-discovery/usgs-htmc/ for discovery; append #/research for the research workspace. These are complementary prototypes; researcher testing is still needed before claiming improvements over source applications.