About the details of this entry; “There are valuable datasets available form the Correo Uruguayo, but none are fully compliant with the requirement of this theme. There have been no address links to postcodes found .”
https://catalogodatos.gub.uy/dataset/codigo-postal; this dataset contains:
Zip codes.
Coordinates.
Data available for all country.
Also it’s in KML format and Shapefile format, open and machine readable.
It’s available publicly at the open data catalogue.
It’s available free of charge.
It’s downloadable and up to date.
It’s published under Uruguay terms and conditions for open data: Datos Abiertos | Sitio oficial de la República Oriental del Uruguay
Hi @gustavo_uy,
This is very useful. I assume our reviewer @codrina was referring to the data you just mentioned. I am happy to add these details because they make this entry much more useful.
But unfortunately for this edition of GODI we cannot change the score of this dataset. We decided to only assess location data if it contains addresses (with the exception that post codes are so granular that they function as address). We based this decision on a report by the Universal Postal Union.
It describes postal codes as identifiers for a collection of postal delivery points/addresses. Address elements are needed to specify a postal delivery point within a post code area. Both types of information (post code and address) have different use purposes which was the main criterion for us to only accept submissions of datasets that contain both data elements.
We assessed all countries applying the same criteria, asking if they provide all data in our key dataset. All countries were assessed against this same standard for two reasons:
- a more accurate and comparable ranking based on a standard definition of our dataset
- reducing personal judgement or bias of our reviewer
We are unable to change our data definitions for this year, because then we would have to change all entries that are affected by this decision. But we can add your input on the result page of the entry.
Reflections and how we may change this data category in the future.
We tend to make addresses an optional category in the future. Our reviewer @codrina wrote a review diary in which she explains why it would be reasonable to make addresses an optional data element. So we could accept more submissions as valid.
Also, we have to be aware that not all countries have address systems put in place (as this brochure by the Universal Postal Union shows). This applies for the entire category, and not only for the question whether we look into post codes or addresses. Our ranking is currently biased towards countries that produce postal location information. In the future we could:
- avoid to score it at all
- have an adjusted scoring
We would love to hear your input how we can develop this category further.
Danny
One comment to add for @gustavo_uy.
Could the coordinates you provide in the dataset somehow function as addresses, i.e. do they describe postal delivery points in a post code area? Then we might consider this dataset for our assessment.
@codrina what do you think about this? Is there a case to make that we see a geographical postal address here?
Hi Danny and @codrina.
The coordinates shows the boundaries of the zip code area but they don’t reference address point.
Thanks for your answer. It’s clear now that you’re looking for addresses rather than only zip codes in the dataset.
For 2018 edition you may consider scoring both possibilities, zip codes and adressess.
Best,
Gustavo.-
Hi @gustavo_uy,
thanks for the swift reply. Yes, as Codrina’s review diary discusses there are a couple of reasons why we should regard addresses as optional data, and assess the publication of either post codes or addresses.
Also it would be interesting to hear more about a government’s perspective on this topic. Very interested to hear about possibilities or blockages to provide post code data.
Best
Danny
Hi @gustavo_uy ,
It is exactly as @dannylammerhirt explained. We looked for a georeferenced dataset that had to have both zipcodes and addresses. This situation applies to a number of entries in the Global Open Data Index, some of which I numbered in the review diary. I would also be very interested to hear more from the national administrations in charge.
Cheers,
Codrina
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Well, I’m glad to tell you that soon we will be publishing zip codes and addresses, I’ll let you know.
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