NICTA Copyright 2013 From imagination to impact

National MapOverviewKeith Grochow, NICTA

(Initiative of Commonwealth Department of Communications, NICTA and Geoscience Australia)

NICTA Copyright 2013 From imagination to impact 2

The Problem

• Main Driver– The Australian government must make data open by default.

• Current State– Most gov’t entities (~all) have very little experience in how to do

this in a usable, reliable way.

– Larger organizations (Fed/State) usually have an existing content management system.

– Smaller ones have nothing or, if a motivated soul exists, they have an open source solution like GeoServer.

– The viewing solutions are limited (2D) or expensive (GE).

• Goal– They are searching for cheaper solutions that are compelling,

flexible, open, and leverable across various gov’t environments.

NICTA Copyright 2013 From imagination to impact 3

The National Map Project

• Initiative of Department of Communications to:– Provide easy access to authoritative and other spatial data

to government, business and public– Facilitate the opening of data by federal, state and local

government bodies– Provide an open framework of geospatial data services that

supports commercial and community innovation

More users using data services

More data services available

NICTA Copyright 2013 From imagination to impact 4

Map browser code and

data mgmt

Govt open data

directory

Vision: An open national map

Web browser

…

Value-add commercial and community services (analytics, visualisations, mashups)

Map imagery

Tile map server

Elevation data

Terrain server

C/wealth govt agency authoritative data services

Internet

Tablet

Other data and

services

Data.gov.au

ABS data

GA data

BoM data

…

State govt authoritative data services

WA data

QLD data

State data

…

NICTA Copyright 2013 From imagination to impact 5

System design goals: open national map1. Open data

– Direct service from open data repositories (like data.gov.au and similar state ones)– Easy access to actual data sets from NM UI (not just visualisation)

2. Open protocols and data formats– Supports OGC protocols (WMS, WFS), GeoJSON, KML, CSV, etc– All data services can be accessed outside National Map as well as inside it

3. Open source– Open source front-end; back-end data services can use open source

4. Vendor neutral at back end (government agency)– ESRI’s ArcGIS, Google Maps Engine, open source software (eg Geoserver)

5. Vendor neutral at front end (browser)– Work with any modern browser (Chrome, Firefox, IE9 and later, iPads, etc)

6. Direct access from data custodian– Live data service direct from government agency (or delegate)

7. Authoritative data services– Eg Administrative boundaries, place names

8. Multi-jurisdiction– Commonwealth, states, local government

9. Multi-custodian– Data from many different agencies - GA, ABS, BoM, ATO, Dept of Comms, state agencies

10. Platform for commercial, community and agency innovation– Interfaces to support value-add services (eg analytics, visualisation, sharing, printing)

NICTA Copyright 2013 From imagination to impact 6

Existing open source software

Architecture: In-browser

Browser (eg Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari) on desktop and mobile

National Map User Interface

Leaflet (open source 2D map display)

Geospatial Data Manager(Selecting and loading data sets and services)

Cesium (open source 3D map display)

NICTA is developingthese

Connects to services:OGC, ESRI, GMEData loading:URL, Drag and dropData formats:KML, CSV, GeoJSON, etc

HTML5 Canvas supportWebGL support

NICTA Copyright 2013 From imagination to impact 7

NICTA Copyright 2013 From imagination to impact 8

Integration with CKAN (eg data.gov.au)

NICTA Copyright 2013 From imagination to impact 9

Demo

NICTA Copyright 2013 From imagination to impact 10

Results

• Proof of concept delivery – mid-July– Small team – 1-2 dev, 1 ui– 3 months kickoff to delivery

• Successful release at national GovHack– 11,500+ unique visitors to date– 4+ minutes average session

• Signed up for 6 month project to create production Australian National Map– Refactor – csv/wfs/wcs datasource, leaflet vis– Implement unique, compelling features – smart regions– Bring in more gov’ts – especially state gov’ts

• Check out nationalmap.nicta.com.au

NICTA Copyright 2013 From imagination to impact 11

End

NICTA Copyright 2013 From imagination to impact 12

Currently available data services• All now available from their custodian and in National Map• Land (Geoscience Australia)

– Gravity, land cover, magnetic image, surface geology, hillshade

• Water (Bureau of Meteorology’s Geofabric)– Water bodies, streams and rivers, catchments, estuaries, boreholes, waterholes,

river regions, drainage divisions, aquifer contours, water table aquifers

• Infrastructure (Geoscience Australia’s Geotopo 250k)– Roads, railroads, airports, ferry routes, pipelines, power lines

• Boundaries (Australian Bureau of Statistics)– States and territories, local government areas, postal areas, commonwealth

electoral divisions, state electoral divisions, state suburbs, natural resource management regions, Australian drainage divisions, tourism regions, statistical boundaries

• Population (Geoscience Australia)– Cities– Populated places

• Other data sets and services via data.gov.au• More coming!