use cases for a standard to describe organizations

26 Feb 2007 GFAR - Global Forum on Agricultural Research 1

Day 2 - Theme: Integrated Systems

AgrisContent Taskforce MeetingWageningen, 1-2 March 2007

Use Cases for a Standard to describe Organizations GFAR in this context Why a standard: possible use cases Proposed Application Profile Open issues

A proposal from FAO and GFAR


AgrisContent Taskforce Meeting, 1-2 March 2007 – INTEGRATED SYSTEMS

Use Cases for a Standard to describe Organizations

GFAR in this context (1)

1) The fourth pillar of GFAR's business plan is Management Information Systems

2) The second general objective identified for EGFAR is:

“to identify information resources relevant to agricultural research for development and to enhance access to them by the GFAR stakeholders”




GFAR in this context (2)

The second specific objective is the development of gateway functions:

“a multi-host database search engine allowing transparent access to decentralised resources managed at a regional or national level”

“EGFAR will have to promote standards to be shared by the various stakeholders”




Why a Standard for describing Organizations? The ARD community is asking for reliable and comprehensive

information on Organizations in the ARD field, especially in correlation to information about projects and eperts

Partial geographical coverageNot up to date

Data provider 1

Data and service provider

Data provider 2Full coverage of a certain type

Partial geographical coverageRegularly updated

Service providers

harmonization

mapping of vocabularies

data processing

Specialised service 1


ARD

COMMUNITY

?

DATA INFORMATION KNOWLEDGE




Why a Standard for describing Organizations? (2)

There is the need for advanced integrated services that are capable of extracting coherent and reliable / updated information from the different resources available

The basic instrument and starting point for any such information service is an agreed standard for describing the object of the information service: organizations

The Expert Consultation identified the mandate for organizations at the international level to develop normative standards / tools




Possible Use Cases (1) Exposing / exchanging data

Two or more organizations making their data available to each other

Data provider 1

Data provider 2

XML

XMLSame standard to describe the data

Standard description: necessary - Controlled vocabularies: recommendedUnique identifier: not necessary - Meta-metadata on the data provider: not necessary

Available records

Database

Available records

Database




Possible Use Cases (2) Integrating existing data sources

Two or more organizations merging data

Data provider 1

Data provider 2

XML XML

Available records

FinalDatabase

Available records

DatabaseDatabase

XML?XML?

Standard description: necessary - Controlled vocabularies: necessaryUnique identifier: not necessary - Meta-metadata on the data provider: not necessary




Possible Use Cases (3) Integration with other information types

- Responsible Organization - Funding Organization

Project database

Bibliographic database

Expert database- Organization

- Corporate Author- Publisher

Data provider 1

Service provider

XML

XML

Registry file?

Standard description: necessary - Controlled vocabularies: not necessaryIF Registry: Unique identifier: necessary - Meta-metadata on the data provider: necessary




Possible Use Cases (4)

A globally integrated information systemData provider 1

Data provider 4Gateway

Data provider 2


Service providers

XML

XML

Registry file?

Data provider 3


IdealEach organization exposes the record describing itself

XMLHarvesting

Data maintenance Harmonization and tools Specialised services




Proposed Application Profile (1) The identification of the elements necessary to describe an

organization was based on: - existing DTDs: only CERIF uses a DTD for organizations, quite complex - fields used in existing databases: Infosys, Wisard, AROW...




Proposed Application Profile (2)<organization><ags:organizationname xml:lang="eng"><ags:fullorganizationname> United Nations </ags:fullorganizationname><ags:organizationacronym>UN</ags:organizationacronym></ags:organizationname><ags:address><ags:street>United Nations Plaza, New York, New York, 10017</ags:street><ags:country scheme="dcterms:ISO3166">US</ags:country></ags:address><ags:telephone>+ 1 212 123 4567 </ags:telephone><ags:fax>+ 1 212 123 45678 </ags:fax><ags:telex> 0845-66160 </ags:telex><ags:email> [email protected] </ags:email><dc:identifier scheme="dcterms:URI"> http://www.un.org/ </dc:identifier><dc:description xml:lang="eng"> The United Nations (UN) is an international organization ... </dc:description><dc:subject><ags:subjectThesaurus xml:lang="eng" scheme="ags:AGROVOC"> Forestry </ags:subjectThesaurus><ags:subjectThesaurus xml:lang="eng" scheme="ags:AGROVOC"> Fisheries </ags:subjectThesaurus></dc:subject><ags:organizationtype scheme="ags:AGROVOC" xml:lang="eng">International organizations</ags:organizationtype><dc:relation><dcterms:isReplacedBy>Bioversity</dcterms:isReplacedBy></dc:relation></organization>




Open Issues Description:

Mandatory fields Controlled vocabulary

Identification / context: Unique Identifier Relations Submitting Organization



Use Cases for a Standard to describe OrganizationsBenefits for each participant in the cooperative effort

Maintenance of the data: with the data owner

Data updated only in one place

Visibility

Data ownership is acknowledged

Information Service implementation by service providers

Focus on service, not data maintenance

Information service source is acknowledged

Services targeted for groups of end-users / specialized niche services.

Focus on tailoring information

ARD CommunityFundsDATA INFORMATION

KNOWLEDGE


Day 2 - Theme: Integrated Systems

AgrisContent Taskforce MeetingWageningen, 1-2 March 2007

Use Cases for a Standardto describe Organizations

Thank you

Global Forum on Agricultural Research (GFAR)c/o FAO

Viale delle Terme di Caracalla, 00153 Roma (Italy)

[email protected]

www.egfar.org

use cases for a standard to describe organizations

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