Entry for National Maps / Belgium

Open Data Index Global Open Data Index 2016
1

The reviewer mentioned that the data is not available in an open format, however, the product info (at the bottom of CartoWeb.be - NGI for Dutch or http://www.ngi.be/FR/FR1-19-1.shtm for French) does mention that PNG tiles are available via WMTS.

In addition, several bulk downloads in open formats are available, e.g http://www.ngi.be/NL/NL1-5-1-1.shtm (GML, shapefile), althose these products are not free

To summarize:

  • please change the negative score for open format to a positive one (since PNG tiles are available, and GML can be bought)
  • please consider changing negative score for the bulk download to a positive one
2

Dear @barthanssens,

thank you very much for your feedback. We will follow up together with our reviewer, and will get back to you in the coming days.

All the best
Danny

3

Hi @barthanssens,

Thanks for this pointer. We looked at your feedback and decided not to accept it for the following reasons.

GODI only evaluates the most representative dataset that would allow the data to score highest. We do not consider data for assessment that is not available for free, for the reason that we would need to pay our reviewers to do so and we would need to apply this approach to all submissions.

Therefore if machine-readable data needs to be paid for, we won’t consider this data for assessment, but will take a note in the comments.

As our reviewer @codrina notes in her review diary, the use of WMS (and I assume WMTS is conceptually similar in that it displays maps online) conflicts with bulk downloadability. Codrina also elaborates why WMS does not allow for a meaningful download.

I’m not sure whether Codrina would consider WMTS an open, machine-readable format (I assume embedding PNG in the WMTS service does not fall under this category, but I leave it up to Codrina to give a better answer).

So there are some trade-offs we need to take into account when picking the most representative dataset. I would refer the assessment to the WMTS service (available for free and hence accessible to the public).

4

Ok, thank you for the detailed feedback

5

You are welcome. Codrina should get back to you about this.

6

Hi, @barthanssens!
As WMTS is not a data format, but a web service that offers access only to the rendering (a picture) of data (which is in png format), I stand by the decision @dannylammerhirt made.

7

Ok, thanks for the clarification @codrina

8

@barthanssens, with pleasure :slight_smile: