[open-government] Metadata and portal interoperability is the new open data black!

[Tracey P. Lauriault]

It is great to see that the Open Data gathering in Warsaw has metadata and
interoperabilityon its wish list
http://blog.okfn.org/2011/10/23/open-data-wishlist-for-the-next-year/.

This conversation began in Ottawa Last week at Gtec. I convened a small
meeting with Edmonton and Ottawa, a science data researcher, the founders of
the data liberation initiative (DLI) (
http://www.statcan.gc.ca/dli-idd/dli-idd-eng.htm), the creators of ODESI (
http://search2.odesi.ca/), and members of the IASSIST Executive
(IASSISTdata.org) to discuss scaling, interoperability and metadata.  This
was well received and we have agreed to introduce local data library experts
to members of the G4 in Vancouver, Edmonton, Ottawa and Toronto.  Librarians
& archivists manage thousands of datasets, curate them, deposit them in
repositories, describe them with common metadata and create portals that
harvest the metadata from other portals in order to expand cross
institutional searching.  Librarians and geomaticians have been doing this
for decades and doing it well.  The recommendation is for open data
initiatives to team up with these experts and collaborate on developing
common standards.

Current open data catalogs in cities in Canada will soon face a scaling
issue as the number of datasets contained within them grow, and without
common metadata amd adherance to interoperability standards, it will not be
possible to seach across them or to create a federated cataloguing system
where metadata can be harvested.

ODESI has done that, and there is 15 years experience in getting 10s of
thousands of data sets searched across Ontario University Data Libraries.
The *UK Data Archive* is another great example
(www.data-*archive*.ac.uk/<http://www.data-archive.ac.uk/>).
In addition, the Open Geospatial Consortium (http://www.opengeospatial.org/)
has been instrumental at developing test beds and interoperability
specifications for geospatial data and there is tremendous merit in working
with them.

ODESI, DLI, UK Data Archive and OGC are excellent examples upon which open
data initiatives can build upon instead of reinventing wheels.  Some great
cross polination can happen and there are some tremendous learning
opportunities to be had on all sides.

I look forward to seeing those discussions move ahead in Canada and
Internationally.

One point I would add is *capacity building,* and the DLI as well as the
Community Data Consortium (www.*communitydata*-donneescommunautaires.ca/Home)
have that in place for universities and for community based organizations
while the UK Data Archive has great resources on their websidte and it would
be great to see some open data apps developers collaborate with subject
matter specialists in other fields that are less tech savvy but increadibly
innovative in their capacity to deliver services and do community based
research.  Social Planning Councils who are great community based
researchers have also been working on this capacity building piece and there
is merit in working with them.  Finally, there is *Community Data
Canada*which has convened  a number of roundtables with various levels
of
government and departments at the Federal government with community groups(
http://www.cdc-dcc.info/).  This group is also involved at bridging
community groups and government institutions in terms of data access and
use.

*To the 10 principles (
http://sunlightfoundation.com/policy/documents/ten-open-data-principles/) I
would add*:

   - Metadata
   - Interoperability
   - Organizational Cultural Change
   - Capacity Building

Cheers
Tracey
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