From Google Spreadsheet to Data Package on Github

Aside: splitting this out as a separate conversation - one topic per question is usually best

Continuing the discussion from Core Datasets Managing Curator:

@alexpeek1 you don’t need to create JSON at all. CSV is perfect.

Re github: have you used “git” the tool before? If you have we can walk through creating files locally on your machine then pushing them to github using git.

If you haven’t I suggest taking a look at Creating files on GitHub - The GitHub Blog (basically you will want to copy and paste the contents of your CSV file into the file you create. Again we can help walk you through how you get the contents of your CSV file - download it from google docs, then open it with notepad or similar …).

PS: you can ping me on skype for help - i’m rufuspollock

/cc @yannael

@alexpeek1 how did you get on here? How is your data packaging going?

Hi Rufus,

I just uploaded the package for GDP by Industry by Country. I’ll do the
same for the other 3 statistics I suggested on the registry.

  • Alex

@alexpeek1 that’s fantastic - well done!

BTW: where did you upload the package?

I put it here: GDP by industry by country 1970-2013 by mcnabber091 · Pull Request #111 · datasets/awesome-data · GitHub I hope this works.

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@alexpeek1 can you put this in its own repository rather than a pull request?

  • Create a repository
  • Add the files (either locally on disk and push or through web interface)
  • Ping the link here

If you want I can do this for you if you have any issues creating a repository :smile:

I’m confused on how to do this. I got stuck on this page:
mcnabber091/macroeconomicdata · GitHub. I created a
repository tho.

  • Alex

OK, you’ve created the repo at mcnabber091/macroeconomicdata · GitHub

What you need to do is now add the data to it and the datapackage.json

Just put a CSV file in that repo.

I haven’t been able to fork and send PR because mcnabber091/macroeconomicdata was an empty repository
so I quickly create a new repo available at

I put csv file into and make a datapackage.json

but http://data.okfn.org/tools/validate?url=https%3A%2F%2Fgithub.com%2Ffemtotrader%2Fmacroeconomicdata

doesn’t validate.

Any idea ?

I also wonder what type should I use for years (1970, 1971, …) fields

1 Like

That’s fixed.

  • float → number
  • DataPackage name didn’t respect rules

Hi femto, looks really good. Thanks for uploading GDP by Industry by Country.

I apologize for digging this thread but it felt unnecessary to start a new one to ask something that could be asked here, as it relates the step of changing from Spreadsheets/Excel to Data Packages and GitHub:

  • The Data Package Manager and the other data package repositories need some improved instructions. I know you guys have eased the job by creating online tools to create the needed files. But then, there is this that I made with Ricardo Lafuente once:
    https://github.com/okfn-oe/datapackage-validator. Obviously, he took care of the coding parts, I improved the documentation about it. And, in the end, it seems fairly straightforward to create and validate datapackages by using a few codes in the terminal.

I don’t know exactly what he changed from the original validator. As far as I know, it was forked from one of your repositories. But can we try to work on the documentation to enable users to create datapackages in the terminal, without the process being too technical and/or time-consuming?

@gsilvapt are you suggesting better documentation? I think that’s good but think you probably want to split your reply out as a separate topic (there’s now an option to do that if you look at the tools for your post).

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Done here, if you want/don’t mind taking a look at it and perhaps letting me know your thoughts on this.

Thanks!