The World Bank wished to provide a better understanding and assessment of the technical issues related to data dissemination tools that NSOs use (or could use) to distribute data to the public under an open data initiative.
Our solution
The Bank commissioned Whythawk to research and produce a report that defines a list of key criteria and evaluates relevant technology products according to those criteria.
Two key concerns related to data dissemination products were to be addressed:
- Can such products designed primarily for NSOs satisfy requirements for an open data initiative?
- Can such products designed primarily for open data satisfy the requirements of NSOs?
We conducted global interviews with all the leading and emerging data publication platforms - including 12 systems - and assessed them against a matrix of 17 criteria. We further interviewed experts at the Danish, Canadian and Rwandan NSOs, the US Census Office, and members of the Bank.
Outcomes
Both software developers and NSOs can take heart from the research developed and work together. Completing and meeting the recommendations in this report will ensure system interoperability, data migration, and community engagement for data reuse. The report itself has been download more than 2,000 times from the World Bank open research portal.
