Website: https://www.movebank.org/cms/movebank-main 

This article explains how to integrate devices with Movebank through Gundi. For data providers, it serves as a guide to sending data to Movebank. For Movebank users, it explains how to include your tags in a Movebank study.

Overview

Movebank offers a “Live Feed” integration with Gundi that enables users to import data from devices supported by Gundi. In order to see your devices in Movebank, tags must be connected to Gundi and assigned to one or multiple Movebank users who become tag owners. Tag owners can find their tags under the “Gundi EarthRanger” Live Feed, and can include their tags to Movebank studies for movement analysis.

Limitations

• Only GPS data is currently supported. Sensor data, such as speed, is not currently transmitted to Movebank through this integration. If you are interested in this data, please contact us.
• This integration does not automatically update Movebank studies. To include the relevant tags, study managers must either add them directly or share the study with a tag owner who can do so. These actions are performed through the Movebank interface.
• This integration does not create assignments between tags and animals.

Prerequisites

You will need:

• A working Connection with a device or data provider supported by Gundi. Refer to our guides to identify if your device is supported and learn how to integrate it. Please contact us if you need help with establishing a connection with your device.
   
• A Movebank account. Please note that Movebank usernames are case-sensitive. 

Configuration Steps in Gundi

Once your Connection with your device or data provider is available in the Gundi Portal and activity logs confirm that the Connection is set up correctly, follow these steps to include Movebank as a Destination.

1. Create a Destination.

• Click on Create Destination.
• Select Movebank.
• Enter a name for this connection. e.g., “Movebank (AccountUsername or Owner)”.
• Select your Organization.
• Leave the following fields empty. Note: We will remove these fields soon.
  • URL
  • Study
  • Permissions Definition
• Click Add Item under “Movebank Usernames”.
• Add one tag owner. This is the user that will be able to add tags to a Movebank study. 
• Repeat the last two steps to add more tag owners, if needed.
• When finished, click Add to finish setting up this destination.

2. Edit your Connection to include your new Destination.

• Click Connections in the top navigation bar of Gundi.
• Find the Connection with the data source you wish to integrate with Movebank. 
• Open the Connection.
• Click on the Destinations tab.
• Click on +Existing Destination.
• Select your newly created destination with Movebank. Once the destination has been added to the connection, the connection set up is complete in Gundi.

3. Confirm that the Connection activity logs indicate data is being correctly received and sent to Movebank.

Adding Tags to a Movebank Study 

This guide explains how Movebank study managers or tag owners can add tags to a study.

Please wait a few minutes after the data is sent to Movebank. The following guidance is provided by Movebank.org:

When a new tag is added to a feed, a Tag ID will be automatically created if it does not already exist in the study, and data will begin to import to your study. The first import typically occurs within minutes of adding a tag to a feed, but could take up to a few hours.

(…)

• Go to the Studies page and log in to Movebank.
• Select your provider name from under Live feeds. You will see a summary of your feed activity.
• To change what tags are in the feed, select Add/remove tags. A window will open showing a list of available Tag IDs.
• Select Add all tags, or select individual Tag IDs and click on or to add or remove tags from the list of Selected tags.
• Select Save.

Note: Access to tags in data feeds is administered by the data provider as described above. Users with permission to manage a data feed might not be the same as the users who are Data Managers for a study. If you will have multiple Movebank users editing a feed, each of these users must have permission from the provider to access the data for the tags. If a user without access to tags attempts to edit the feed, the feed may stop collecting new data. You will receive a warning before making any changes that might affect the current feed.

Source: https://www.movebank.org/cms/movebank-content/live-data-feeds#manage_existing_feeds/

Summary

1. Locate your Movebank study.

2. Click on Live Feeds .

3. Select “Gundi EarthRanger” from the available list of feeds.

You will be presented with a list of tags already selected for this Movebank study. Example:

4. To include your new tags, click Add/Remove Tags.

5. Locate your tags and select them.

Note: The list at the left ("Available Tags") displays all tags you own with an integration via the “Gundi EarthRanger” feed. The list at the right ("Selected Tags") are the tags that have been included in the Movebank study that you are currently editing.

6. Click Save

7. Click Close.

8. Click Tags under your study name to confirm that your tags were included in the study.
 

Movebank.org Resources 

How to add tags to your Movebank Study: Manage existing feeds | External Link (Movebank.org) 

Latency: Timing and frequency of feed updates | External Link (Movebank.org) 
 
 

Additional Resources

Configuring Movebank in Gundi's legacy portal.

Audience: Support Team.

Follow this guide in case that the data source is not going through the new portal yet. 

{}

{
  "broker": "gcp_pubsub",
  "feed": "gundi/earthranger",
  "permissions": {
    "default_movebank_usernames": [
      "Account1",
      "Account2"
    ],
    "permissions": [
    ],
    "study": "gundi"
  },
  "topic": "destination-movebank-prod"
}

{
  "broker": "gcp_pubsub",
  "feed": "gundi/earthranger",
  "permissions": {
    "default_movebank_usernames": [
      "victorl",
      "chrisd"
    ],
    "permissions": [
    ],
    "study": "gundi"
  },
  "topic": "destination-movebank-prod"
}

Issues Troubleshooting

Audience: Support Team.

Use this command to view the complete list of tags shared with Movebank, along with their owners.

curl --user "us:pw" -F "operation=read-user-privileges" -F "study=gundi" "https://www.movebank.org/movebank/service/external-feed"

Replace us:pw with the actual username and password. Contact the Gundi development team for additional help.

Legacy Documentation

Audience: Support Team.

https://allenai.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/CDIP/pages/29542809633/Movebank.+Gundi+Movebank 

 Tags: “Receiving data in Movebank”, “Adding device tags to a Movebank study”, data destination, Live Feed, animal tracking, movement data, Gundi v2.
Last Update: Sept 10, 2025