"Interoperable Europe Newsletter" Newsletter Issues

ISA² has a new member - North Macedonia (24/04/2020)

The European Commission and North Macedonia have signed an agreement, granting the country access to the EU programme to develop and share solutions for digital public administrations.

New collection on Joinup helps tackle the coronavirus (24/04/2020)

The coronavirus affects our society and brings along many challenges to everyone's professional and personal lives. The new Joinup collection Digital Response to COVID-19 is a database of solutions and initiatives that help fight against the coronavirus.

New study on The Role of Digital Government in the European Semester process published (24/04/2020)

A new study "The Role of Digital Government in the European Semester process 2019" is now available. The report was published on 16 April within the framework of the “National Interoperability Framework Observatory" Action of the ISA² Programme.

Report: Recommendations for organising and governing integrated public services (24/04/2020)

The European Interoperability Framework government report on Interoperability Solutions for Public Administrations, Businesses and Citizens is now published. The study was carried out to support the development of digital solutions for public administrations.

Coronavirus crisis: TESTA enables secure and reliable production of statistical data on Europe (24/04/2020)

During the Covid-19 pandemic, Eurostat and the National Statistical Institutes are doing their best to continue publishing relevant statistics of the highest quality. All efforts are focused on providing European statistics on the outbreak that show the changing situation from March 2020 onwards.

IMAPS User Stories – The Czech Ministry of the Interior in the Spotlight (24/04/2020)

Tomáš Šedivec has used IMAPS for assessing a number of digital public services provided by public administrations in the Czech Republic, such as the Czech Ministry of Health.

Solution spotlight: LEOS Pilot 3.0.0 (24/04/2020)

A new version of LEOS, the open source software for legislation drafting, is available on Joinup. This third major release brings new features and improvements concerning version management, comparison view, and more.

Working group meeting: Access to Base Registeries (24/04/2020)

On 28 April 2020, 12:00 CEST, the Access to Base Registeries Action of the ISA² Programme is organising an online meeting to present the foreseen activities and discuss the proposal of the reusable tools.

Webinar: Location Intelligence and Partnerships to support the Sustainable Development Goals (24/04/2020)

On 30 April 2020, 14:00 CEST, the ELISE Action of the ISA² Programme is organising a webinar "Location Intelligence and Partnerships to support the Sustainable Development Goals".

ISA² Work Programme for 2020 adopted (30/03/2020)

The European Commission has adopted the 2020 revision of the ISA² rolling work programme on 4 March 2020. The new work programme includes 54 actions, all of them are ongoing from previous years. For 17 actions, no additional funding is necessary to ensure their completion. The budget for 2020 is €27.8 million.

TESTA helps the EU Civil Protection Mechanism in aid to countries in crisis (30/03/2020)

Crisis response coordination at European level is enhanced as the outbreak of the novel Coronavirus intensifies. TESTA supports real time exchange of information between the Emergency Response Coordination Centre and the contact points of the Member States through the Common Emergency Communication and Information System.

Emerging technologies in public procurement: Study results (30/03/2020)

In 2019, the Directorate-General for Internal Market, Industry, Entrepreneurship and SMEs commissioned a study on the uptake of emerging technologies in public procurement. This study explored how public authorities around the globe are using new technologies when procuring goods and services. The results of the Digital Transformation of Public Procurement study are now publicly available online.

PM² Essentials: course material available online (30/03/2020)

The European Commission is now releasing the presentation with training material from the one-day course called Project Management Methodology Essentials to further support institutions, organizations and European citizens in understanding the methodology and use it as appropriate.

New version of Cartography of Reusable Solutions for Base Registries Interconnection on Joinup (30/03/2020)

The Cartography of Reusable Solutions for Base Registries Interconnection provides information on more than 120 solutions from EU institutions and other organisations, EU Member States and other countries, aiming to inspire people working on base registries and to facilitate re-use of suitable solutions.

Guidelines for assessing archives management systems and new LOD report published (30/03/2020)

Archival institutions searching for IT solutions to support their business activities often consider the organisation of proofs of concepts to identify the best tools. Within the Standards-based archival data management action supported by the ISA² programme, a methodology has been identified to guide institutions through this complex process.

Open PM²: Interview with Elias Michelioudakis (30/03/2020)

Open PM² is an Open Project Management methodology developed by the European Commission and used by many other institutions. The methodology was created to make project management easier and reduce costs.

Interoperability is at the heart of the new EU digital strategy (24/02/2020)

Last week, the European Commission unveiled its new digital package with ideas and actions for a digital transformation in Europe. This package includes the strategic document Shaping Europe's digital future, European strategy for data and White Paper on Artificial Intelligence. Interoperability is mentioned as one of the key aspects.

The Single Interoperability Assessment Gateway - Assess the interoperability of your digital public service in one click (21/02/2020)

The Single Interoperability Assessment Gateway (SIAG) provides a single point of access to all ISA² interoperability assessment solutions. These solutions help public administrations to design, develop, implement, evaluate and improve the interoperability of their digital public services and their various components.

TESTA enables exchange of health data in a secure, efficient and interoperable way (21/02/2020)

TESTA, a data communication network service supported by ISA², facilitates the cross-border exchange of health data between EU countries. Thanks to TESTA, Europeans can get their medication in another EU country, and in case of emergency while travelling abroad, doctors can give better care by accessing the patient's past health records.

Gertrud Ingestad presented the ISA² Programme at the European Parliament (21/02/2020)

Gertrud Ingestad, Director-General of DG Informatics at the European Commission, presented ISA² at the European Parliament in Brussels on 18 February. First, she presented the programme interim evaluation results to the ITRE Committee and then discussed the digital transformation of European public administrations with members of the IMCO Committee.

EU Datathon 2020: innovating for Europe with EU Open Data (21/02/2020)

The fourth edition of EU Datathon, the open data competition, has been launched on 19 February. This is your chance to demonstrate the potential that open data presents in today’s society and, of course, your creativity and talent! It is also your chance to claim your share of the total prize fund amounting to €100 000. The event is supported by ISA².

User from Spain: LEOS will help us make the drafting of legal texts more efficient (21/02/2020)

LEOS is a software tool helping those involved in drafting legislation, which is usually a complex process requiring efficient online collaboration. Comments, suggestions, version control, co-edition, everything is possible with LEOS. The software was released as open source and has developed a growing community around.

ELISE Seminar - Driving Co-Innovation the Geospatial Way with Public and Private Sector Data (08/04/2020)

ELISE is organising a seminar “Driving Co-Innovation the Geospatial Way with Public and Private Sector Data” on 8 April 2020 at Geospatial World Forum in Amsterdam. The aim is to develop a mandate for collaboration between the public and private sector in the ‘the geospatial way’.

Catalogue of Services webinar on the Single Digital Gateway data model (21/02/2020)

Catalogue of Services is an ISA² action that aims to analyse obstacles, benefits and feasibility of developing a catalogue of public services at the national and European level. This webinar was organised to support EU countries by proposing a common data model that complies with the Single Digital Gateway Regulation.

Semantic Interoperability, a facilitator of the GDPR right to access (22/01/2020)

The International Data Protection Day is celebrated on 28 January to raise awareness on the rights in relation to personal data protection. The General Data Protection Regulation added new rights and reinforced the existing ones. Semantic interoperability can facilitate enforcement of some of these rights, for example the right to access your data.

One month left to participate in the Digital Innovation Challenge for Europe’s SMEs and startups (23/01/2020)

There is only one month left to take part in the Digital Innovation Challenge! SMEs and startups are invited to propose innovative services and solutions based on European Commission's ISA² Programme and open and reusable Connecting Europe Facility Building Blocks.

Bring the interoperability of your digital public service to the next level with IMAPS (24/01/2020)

Today, the interoperability maturity of digital public services of public administrations in the EU scores on average at “essential” level. This means that the services implement the key interoperability aspects only in a basic way. Read the blog post by Raul Abril to learn how the IMAPS solution helps public service owners to upgrade their digital public service.

Workshop: Open Source Software sustainability (23/01/2020)

The European Commission’s Open Source Observatory will be running an Open Source Software sustainability workshop at FOSDEM20 conference. The workshop will present the preliminary findings related to the guidelines on the sustainability of open source communities in the public sector.

Webinar: Introduction to the new OSOR and its Knowledge Centre (27/01/2020)

The Open Source Observatory (OSOR), part of the ISA² Sharing and reuse action, will present the new structure of the OSOR collection and introduce the Knowledge Centre. The centre has already started producing country intelligence reports, guidelines for creating sustainable open source communities, case studies and other materials.

Recommendations for Organisational Interoperability and Integrated Public Service Governance (23/01/2020)

To support European public administrations in building interoperable public services, ISA² carried out a study to identify good practices and develop recommendations linked to organisational interoperability and integrated public service governance. While the study itself will be published soon, you can already watch a video summarising the recommendations!

Sessions from Interoperability Academy Winter School (23/01/2020)

Couldn't you make it to our first-ever Winter School on interoperability, organised together with KU Leuven? Watch the plenary sessions covering a range of topics such as European interoperability and the European Interoperability Framework, public sector innovation or the future of digital transformation.

Update of ISA² Newsletter Privacy Policy (10/01/2020)

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year! (20/12/2019)

Check out presentations and photos from Interoperability Academy Winter School (18/12/2019)

Almost 150 participants joined the first-ever Interoperability Academy Winter School, organised last week by the ISA² Programme and the KU Leuven Public Governance Institute. The three-day event provided attendees from public administrations, academia, as well as the private sector with insights on interoperability, public sector innovation and digital transformation. Presentations and photos are now available.

How was 2019 for the ISA² Programme? (18/12/2019)

365 days give many opportunities to do things. When you have an enthusiastic group of people working on digitalisation of public administrations, numerous planes, trains, nights without sleep and a lot of work, 365 days may even seem like 730! This is precisely what has happened to the ISA² team in 2019.

New report on digital government transformation in the EU published (18/12/2019)

A new report on "Exploring Digital Government transformation in the EU - Analysis of the state of the art and review of literature" is now available. The results of the review of literature, based on almost 500 sources, as well as the analysis of digital government policies in the EU countries, provide an overview of the main themes and topics of the digital government discourse. The report was published within the ISA² ELISE Action.

Canadian startup used Re3gistry to win Inspire Helsinki 2019 Data Challenge (18/12/2019)

“Let’s make the most out of INSPIRE!” – That was the title of the Data Challenge hosted at this year’s Inspire Conference in Helsinki. Minerva Intelligence, a Canadian company, took that challenge up and won the competition while using Re3gistry supported by ISA². Their challenge submission showed Landslide Susceptibility for different landslide types in the Veneto Region of Italy.

Interested in semantic interoperability? Learn about SEMIC highlights in 2019 (18/12/2019)

In 2019, the SEMIC team was involved in and led a multitude of activities to promote semantic interoperability in Europe, notably by raising awareness, providing expertise for pilot projects, keeping up-to-date the data specifications and providing in-depth studies on topics of interest. Check out our brief overview of SEMIC activities.

Check out reports on automating data exchange through APIs, architecture of public service chatbots and European taxonomy of public services (18/12/2019)

The Catalogue of Services action has explored how administrations can use new technologies together with structured data thanks to a common metadata model. A common metadata model enables administrations to describe their data on public services in a harmonised way, thus creating an environment where public service information can flow from one organisation to another. In this context, the action published three reports.

Discover EUSurvey – A free online survey tool for civil servants and citizens in the EU (18/12/2019)

EUSurvey is a secured platform for designing and conducting small to large online surveys. The service is multilingual, flexible and widely accessible for consulting stakeholders on a specific issue, conducting satisfaction surveys or collecting event registrations. It is also the platform used for public consultations organised by the European Commission. Learn more in the blog post by Benoît Origas.

User testimonial: EUSurvey helps prevent toxic fires and fight against violence on women (18/12/2019)

The Campania Region in Italy uses EUSurvey in two projects: Land of fires aims at preventing toxic fires, while the Observatory of violence on women helps public administration better assist the victims of violence. Watch a video interview with Giuseppe Ferretti and Gianluigi Renzi from the Campania Regional Council.

2nd Catalogue of Services Webinar on single digital gateway data model (18/12/2019)

The European Commission is organising several webinars to support the development of a common data model for the EU single digital gateway. During the second webinar, the Catalogue of Services team that drives the activities will talk about tools and data models in support of the gateway.

Digital Innovation Challenge - 2nd information session (18/12/2019)

The Digital Innovation Challenge invites SMEs and startups, providers of digital services across Europe, to propose innovative services and solutions based on the European Commission open and reusable solutions. The info session is an opportunity to understand the Challenge in more details, ask questions and connect with the organisation team and participants.

New major release of DCAT-AP is now available (25/11/2019)

A new major release of the DCAT Application Profile for data portals in Europe (DCAT-AP) 2.0.0 has been published. This version implements main change requests to the DCAT-AP version 1.2.1 and introduces a range of updates to align with the World Wide Web Consortium standards. DCAT-AP is a specification for describing public sector datasets to enable the exchange of dataset descriptions between data portals.

Take part in Digital Innovation Challenge for Europe’s SMEs and startups! (25/11/2019)

The Digital Innovation Challenge invites SMEs and startups to propose innovative services and solutions based on European Commission's open and reusable solutions, for example those developed under the ISA² Programme. The prize for the winner is EUR 50.000.

Assess semantic interoperability of your public service with SIMAPS (25/11/2019)

The European Commission launched a new self-assessment tool to evaluate and improve semantic interoperability of any public service. The so-called SIMAPS (Semantic Interoperability Maturity Assessment for Public Services) is now available in its beta version.

New study on spatial data infrastructures in digital transformation of administrations (25/11/2019)

The Joint Research Centre published a new study "The role of Spatial Data Infrastructures in the Digital Government Transformation of Public Administrations". It is a first attempt examining the role spatial data infrastructures play in digital government transformation and what could be their role in the future. The study was published under the ISA² ELISE action.

Get in contact for exchange of best practices around legislation and interoperability! (25/11/2019)

Are you willing to share your experience and good practices around ‘legislation and interoperability’? Contact us! We look forward to getting in touch with you and have a wider exchange on topics such as legislation-as-code or legislation screening for ICT impacts and digital-readiness.

Presentations, videos and photos from EU DataViz 2019 are now available (25/11/2019)

Black holes, histograms, ethics and storytelling - what do they all have in common? They were all part of mind-blowing presentations that took place in the EU DataViz 2019. It was the first conference in Europe on data visualisation for the public sector. The goal? ‘Serving citizens through better data visualisation’.

Video: CPSV-AP in a nutshell (25/11/2019)

The Core Public Service Vocabulary Application Profile (CPSV-AP) is a common data model for describing public services offered by a public administration. Learn more in the video interview with Miguel Alvarez Rodriguez, responsible for the ISA² work on the data model.

Helping EU countries catalogue and describe public services (25/11/2019)

Citizens and businesses need to interact with administrations in various personal or business situations. To enable these interactions online, public authorities often develop portals or digital government information systems. In context of international exchange of information, such models create interoperability issues. Read how CPSV-AP helps solving these issues, more about the current work and what the next steps are in our blog post.

Watch webinar on Single Digital Gateway common data model (25/11/2019)

Together with EU Member States and semantic experts, ISA² is developing a voluntary common metadata model for the Single Digital Gateway Regulation. On 12 November, a webinar on this model and relevant classifications took place with 70+ participants. Check out the video recording, presentation and other relevant information.

Interoperability Academy Winter School (25/11/2019)

The ISA² Programme, together with the KU Leuven Public Governance Institute, is organising the first-ever Interoperability Academy Winter School. The event will provide participants with practical and theoretical insights on how to develop and implement interoperability solutions for digital public services. The programme will also focus on public sector innovations and the future of digital transformation.

Check out videos from SEMIC 2019 (25/11/2019)

Did you miss the 9th edition of the SEMIC Conference that took place in Helsinki on 21 October? You can now watch all recordings from the plenary room! The videos include the presentations on the digitalisation of the City of Helsinki, Linked Data Showcase pilot or the perspective of the OECD and the European Court of Auditors on data management in the public sector.

Check out presentations and photos from SEMIC 2019 (25/10/2019)

Nearly 200 participants attended the SEMIC 2019 Conference on "Linking data spaces for citizens" that took place on 21 October in Helsinki, Finland. An additional 186 people from all over the world followed the event via live stream. The presentations of all speakers and the photos from the conference are now available.

Programme of Interoperability Academy Winter School published (28/10/2019)

Discover the programme and speakers of the first-ever Interoperability Academy Winter School! The event is organised by the ISA² Programme together with the KU Leuven Public Governance Institute in Leuven, Belgium on 11-13 December 2019. The deadline for applications is 4 November.

Highlights of Access to Base Registries webinar are available (28/10/2019)

The Access to Base Registries Action organised a webinar on 9 October 2019. The aim was to share the progress on a data model/specification (BReg-DCAT-AP) and to open an interactive discussion on data management topics related to the framework on base registries access and interconnection (BRAIF). You can learn more through highlights, recording and presentations.

Web Summit (25/10/2019)

The ISA² Programme is organising a session at Web Summit, one of the top technology conferences in the world. It will give the participants an opportunity to learn how to use interoperable solutions to boost sales. The programme representatives will also be present at the common booth of the European Commission.

The GovTech Summit (28/10/2019)

A fast emerging sector, built by innovative startups leveraging both technological advances and recent reforms to government platforms and registers, GovTech aims to build better services for citizens and better tools for public servants. During the event, visit the ISA² stand in the expo area.

EU DataViz 2019 (25/10/2019)

EU DataViz 2019 addresses for the first time the specific needs of the community engaged in data visualisation for the public sector in Europe, bringing together experts, practitioners and solution seekers. You can visit the ISA² stand to learn about interoperability solutions!

LEOS Community webinar (28/10/2019)

LEOS is Legislation Editing Open Software developed under the ISA² Programme. The purpose of this webinar is to learn about the latest progress made by the LEOS team, present the roadmap for future work and get to know the community members. Register by 14 November.

Core Public Event Vocabulary: Are we talking about the same event? (28/10/2019)

Open government data are a valuable source of information that is available to anyone for analysis and reuse. However, even though governmental data are open, they are often published in an unstructured way without following any specific guidelines. ISA² has developed a solution, e-Government Core Vocabularies, to help public administrations bring structure in their data. One of them is the Core Public Event Vocabulary that is a common data model for describing public events.

Follow SEMIC 2019 via live stream (17/10/2019)