[Minutes] Re: W3C eGov Meeting on Open Data: 14 December 2012

Minutes from today's very interesting call are at 
http://www.w3.org/2012/12/14-egov-minutes.html and copied below in plain 
text for convenience


                          eGov IG Atlantic time

14 Dec 2012

    [2]Agenda

       [2] 
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-egov-ig/2012Dec/0001.html

    See also: [3]IRC log

       [3] http://www.w3.org/2012/12/14-egov-irc

Attendees

    Present
           PhilA2, agipap, +1.312.493.aaaa, +1.571.331.aabb,
           bhyland, +1.703.281.aacc, +1.202.684.aadd, Brand,
           DanielBennett, +1.301.384.aaee, Owne, Hudson,
           [IPcaller], +1.509.464.aaff

    Regrets
           Jeanne Holm

    Chair
           PhilA

    Scribe
           gwyn_sutherlin, Gwyn

Contents

      * [4]Topics
          1. [5]Creating Visualizations Using Linked Government
             Data
          2. [6]Gov Linked Data Community Directory
          3. [7]Social Media documentation
          4. [8]Crossover Workshop
      __________________________________________________________

    <alvaro> Is there a more standard place?

    <PhilA2> scribe: gwyn_sutherlin

    <bhyland> dialing, my apologies.

    <DanielBennett> hi yes Daniel Bennett

    <bhyland> Chair: bhyland

    <bhyland> Chair: PhilA

    <bhyland> Scribe: Gwyn

    <Owen> 301 is me

    <DanielBennett> also would like to remind folks of the social
    media project during the call, please

    <DanielBennett> hey Hudson

    <PhilA2> -> Hudson Hollister presentation
    [9]http://www.datacoalition.org/issues/data-act.html

       [9] http://www.datacoalition.org/issues/data-act.html

    <DanielBennett> is Hudson on IRC?

    <DanielBennett> slides or video/

    <DanielBennett> ?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> hudson:begins presentation with background on
    data transpancy coalition

    <gwyn_sutherlin> founded as voice for technical community and
    data community with gov't

    <gwyn_sutherlin> founded april 2012 in US with legislative
    mandate

    <gwyn_sutherlin> for focus on organizing data and making it
    open in 5 different areas with 'data act' pending in US
    congress

    <gwyn_sutherlin> is only open data gov't law proposed and up
    for a vote in US with goal of changining the way reporting
    spending is reported

    <DanielBennett> wow that means there are second acts acts

    <gwyn_sutherlin> due to many complex layer, non-public, of data
    spending is inaccessible and non-transparant... goal it to
    change this

    <DanielBennett> a real cliffhanger

    <gwyn_sutherlin> coming to end of session in US congress, ans
    due to other legistlative pressure, this act will not be
    addressed this session and will have to be re-addressed in the
    next session

    <gwyn_sutherlin> why is this important?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> the legislative focus is important because of
    lack of standarization and publishing of gov't data

    <gwyn_sutherlin> these are the problem the coalition is
    addressing through legislation

    <gwyn_sutherlin> our webpage shows a youtube link explaning our
    aims

    <gwyn_sutherlin> hudson: questions?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: as a co-chair of gov data working
    group, we work on best practices within org such as 'you-or-I',
    I didn' know how far along this project was

    <PhilA2> Wendy Seltzer

    <gwyn_sutherlin> ... con't... why is the w3 missing in these
    conversations? there is a gap between executives applauding
    these projects and yet no support later on? we have one of our
    champions has temporarily stepped back for personal reasons
    george thomas, a major loss. and asking jaffe, what can we do
    to get more support?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> ...con't... connecting gov't, research, and
    industry, how can we connent these standards organizations and
    groups?

    <PhilA2> -> Wendy's short bio
    [10]http://www.w3.org/People/#wseltzer

      [10] http://www.w3.org/People/#wseltzer

    <gwyn_sutherlin> are you reaching out to other standards
    organizations?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> hudson: yes, but there is a gap between policy
    and technical expertise and advocacy. Also, we need to provide
    'air support' for our champions. They need more public support,
    for ex. when there is a legislative proposal pending, this
    influences the executive branch

    <Owen> W/re mandates, U.S. federal agencies already have a
    mandate to publish their strategic and performance plans and
    reports in machine-readable format.

    <Owen> So the issue is how well they will do so.

    <Owen> E-FOIA also requires agencies to make records available
    in whatever formats they are likely to be requirested.

    <gwyn_sutherlin> hudson: the white house still opposed the data
    act, their finical office still opposes the act philosophically
    because they base standards on something else, and not open
    data.

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: response: so it's just too much to
    comply. from my perspective we must do a better job of showing
    how it's less expensive and easy to make these changes. it
    takes time to write business cases.

    <gwyn_sutherlin> hudson: it also takes cultural change, which
    you (we) are pursuing.

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: who is paying?

    <DanielBennett> go xbrl

    <gwyn_sutherlin> husdon: membership pays, but it is complicated
    and members have political motivations. I am not a technical
    person I am a lawyer. My goal was to make the data regulation
    simpler. The task force realized the instiutional opposition ws
    immense.

    <gwyn_sutherlin> hudson: congressional proposals needed
    techical community's support. I havea dual role-- in congress
    trying to convince them that tech industry will thank them and
    convince tech industry that congress wants this.

    <gwyn_sutherlin> phil:question: businesses opposition to
    standards fancinating.... based on my experience in UK, we had
    a consultation on open data and were met with friction because
    suppliers/vendors thought they might lose contract

    <gwyn_sutherlin> hudson: this has not exactly, but we are at
    the beginning

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: response: the contractors in defense,
    for example, have experience in the data standards, human &
    machine readable content, but in other areas they may have less
    and.... the complexities of institutional cultural play a role
    that need to be considered when making the pitch for change as
    well as efficicency

    <gwyn_sutherlin> con't... w3 could recommend and help

    <gwyn_sutherlin> phil q: based in DC?

    <PhilA2> acl DanielBennett

    <gwyn_sutherlin> Daniel: question: how can gov't data website
    have data readable for humans and machines with html5 for
    example with micro data availabilty... could you get a larger
    community around these possiblities, accessibility, human
    readability?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> hudson: response: human readable component is
    essential for proposals to be accepted ex: XBRL in financial
    docs

    <gwyn_sutherlin> daniel: in legislative standards I'm looking
    at micro data.. I'm not sure how far along things are here

    <gwyn_sutherlin> hudson: we have pushed for these standards,
    and the tech community has been important here. that's why
    legistation is important. they need more support

    <gwyn_sutherlin> daniel: an aside about US gov for non-US
    members, congress is a mess

    <gwyn_sutherlin> thank you to bernadette for extra info on
    technical background

    <Owen> PDF/A-3 allows for embedding or attaching other
    renditions of files, including machine-readable formats, e.g.,
    XML.

    <DanielBennett> thanks Hudson

    <bhyland> +1 great overview, many thanks for sharing about your
    important efforts — may the force be with you ;-)

    <DanielBennett> reminder that I would like to remind folks of
    social media project for our group

    <alvaro> [11]http://graves.cl/presentation.pdf

      [11] http://graves.cl/presentation.pdf

Creating Visualizations Using Linked Government Data

    <DanielBennett> +1 Hudson's presentation

    <gwyn_sutherlin> great pres hudson, thanks. interesting work

    <gwyn_sutherlin> alvaro: from 'tetherless world', phd candidate
    in cognitive studies, looking at linked data...

    <gwyn_sutherlin> alvaro: slide 3: linked data definition. gov't
    should use linked data because it allows you to publish in a
    structured manner, friendly, machine readable, connects with
    others

    <gwyn_sutherlin> slide 4: challenges remain, such as getting
    people to use it and explore it. How do we get people to find
    errors fr exaples?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> slide 5? linked data allows you to see the big
    picture and discover and detect anomalies

    <gwyn_sutherlin> slide 6: an example

    <gwyn_sutherlin> slide 7: discovering trends, shows graph of
    tempatures

    <gwyn_sutherlin> slide 8: visualization is challening. there
    are some available such as google, etc... but they have
    limitations

    <gwyn_sutherlin> slide 9: my solution is 'visualbox', it
    combines many features of other applications.. next slides take
    you through steps of using 'visualbox'

    <gwyn_sutherlin> slide 12: ex of UK school system based on
    sparql query, slide shows query next slide shows visualization

    <gwyn_sutherlin> slide 13: you can easily manipulate or change
    your query because of linked data

    <gwyn_sutherlin> slide 16: you ability to dervive conclusions
    or ask complex questions is enhanced with visualization tool
    because of all the access to linked data

    <gwyn_sutherlin> slide 17: can generate mixed and linked data
    with complex visualizations

    <gwyn_sutherlin> slide 18: many examples of the types of
    visualizations possiblewith 'visualbox' [very pretty]

    <gwyn_sutherlin> slide 19: more info on how to get 'visualbox'

    <gwyn_sutherlin> alvaro: questions?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> phil: thank you and very intersting.... this
    is a virtual service? how sophiticated? is it a virtual library
    or what?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> alvaro: it is a service similar to Drupal

    <gwyn_sutherlin> alvaro: it allows you to created multiple
    sparql endpoints and many visualization filters so you have
    many options

    <gwyn_sutherlin> you have a testing area so you can test your
    query etc.

    <DanielBennett> a job for xslt

    <gwyn_sutherlin> phil: question: we at w3 focus like linked
    data, but the developer community doesn't as much, does
    visualbox allow you to bridge the gaps between different data?

    <DanielBennett> and better yet, rdfa

    <gwyn_sutherlin> alvaro: right now you have a table
    visualization based on csv

    <gwyn_sutherlin> phil: can you mix linked and non-linked data
    or 4 and 5 star data?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> daniel: thank you and great presentation.
    follow-up to idea of bridge between sparql endpoints and other
    types of data.... there should be a library to allow for that
    to happen and people in the middle should be able to see the
    data and then do as they please

    <gwyn_sutherlin> particularly for gov't agencies

    <gwyn_sutherlin> daniel con't: have you played with RDFa?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> q: how are RDFa vs RDF different

    <Owen> The form that Joe Carmel created that Daniel just
    mentioned is at
    [12]http://xmldatasets.net/XF2/stratmlxform3.xml

      [12] http://xmldatasets.net/XF2/stratmlxform3.xml

    <DanielBennett> and also:
    [13]http://xmldatasets.net/homepage.html

      [13] http://xmldatasets.net/homepage.html

    <gwyn_sutherlin> alavaro: the plan for the future is have
    sparql as the query language, but to be able to incorporarte
    other data [is this right???]

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: are you doing this as part of your
    phd project?

    <DanielBennett> allows you to paste a URL of an XML page and it
    will transform it into HTML table and expose the metadata in
    human readable HTML text

    <gwyn_sutherlin> alvaro: not exactly because many people don't
    use gon't data because of visualization. very few people
    publish using linked data, or know how to use it, for example
    in data journals, to I decided I will do this to move these
    things forward so I decided to create 'visualbox'

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: so it is a product?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> alvaro: it is much more general, because it
    just for visualization unlike loudspeaker.

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: what are you using on the backend for
    the linked data?

    <Owen> Here's a file to test at the URL Daniel provided:
    [14]http://xml.gov/stratml/carmel/eGovIGRM.xml

      [14] http://xml.gov/stratml/carmel/eGovIGRM.xml

    <gwyn_sutherlin> alvaro: it's a more agnositc approach, you can
    have as many endpoints as you want and query as many as you
    want.

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: you doin it on the fly? you're doin
    git all in real time?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> alvaro: I have one that we renew one every
    week for instance.

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: you're not storing everything in
    triple store, no persistent store?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> alvaro: no

    <gwyn_sutherlin> phil; thank you.

Gov Linked Data Community Directory

    <PhilA2> [15]http://dir.w3.org

      [15] http://dir.w3.org/

    <DanielBennett> reminder to everyone to please contact me with
    your interest in the social media paper

    <DanielBennett> thanks

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: an update about the directory. it's a
    community started in june 2011

    <alvaro> thanks for having me

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: open source, open standards
    compliant, RDF, we still have lots to do in terms of
    visualizations.

    <PhilA2> Community Directory based on Callimachus (open source
    tool [16]http://3roundstones.com/tag/callimachus/)

      [16] http://3roundstones.com/tag/callimachus/)

    <bhyland> [17]http://dir.w3.org

      [17] http://dir.w3.org/

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: we are working on regulatory groups
    links

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: in terms of visualisations, looking
    at directory we use maps and we want input on what you'd like
    to see in the directory what the community wants

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: in terms of linked data ethos, there
    shouldn't be one directory, but it is open source and we want
    people to use it, have the RDFa, use the data, continue to link
    it and know what is available

    <gwyn_sutherlin> bhyland: questions?

    <DanielBennett> thanks

Social Media documentation

    <gwyn_sutherlin> phil: daniel

    <bhyland> If you have further questions about the LOD Community
    Directory, please email the W3C public GLD WG
    <public-gld-wg@w3.org>

    <gwyn_sutherlin> DanielBennett: put up notes on wiki for
    project on social media, please come forword, contact me by
    email to start working on different aspects.

    <bhyland> Any suggestions you have about the directory & what
    you'd like to see are welcome. WE're going to refocus on
    improving the UI & workflow, including adding RDFa generation
    to be added so the site pro-actively slurps up RDFa rather
    requiring users to update the directory. Stay tuned.

    <gwyn_sutherlin> DanielBennett: alternate meeting time?

    <gwyn_sutherlin> PhilA2: will check on alternate meeting time

Crossover Workshop

    <PhilA2> [18]http://www.crossover-project.eu/workshop.aspx

      [18] http://www.crossover-project.eu/workshop.aspx

    <DanielBennett> for the other time zone folks. look at wiki
    homepage

    <gwyn_sutherlin> PhilA2: crossover project meeting coming up
    (see link) it focuses on policy.. coming up in DC.

    <gwyn_sutherlin> PhilA2: closing and thanks to everyone.

    <DanielBennett> thanks. happy new year. merry xmas. happy happy
    happy

Received on Friday, 14 December 2012 17:35:57 UTC