Per my MashTheState post on the Newswire@:
http://groups.dowire.org/r/post/50mGGeIdgh6AoDFHSXIe6y
What basic web feeds (RSS/ATOM) should government web sites provide?
Here is my short list:
1. What's New - Comprehensive feed of all new pages/documents across
the site/agency posted/updated online.
2. Upcoming Public Meetings - Meetings coming up with links to
available meeting documents
3. Press Releases
What is on your list?
Steven Clift - http://stevenclift.com
Executive Director - http://E-Democracy.Org
Donate today: http://e-democracy.org/donate
Would definitely add government consultations to that list.
JEREMY GOULD
http://www.google.com/profiles/jeremygould
On Tue, Sep 29, 2009 at 9:27 AM, Steven Clift <email obscured>> wrote:
> Per my MashTheState post on the Newswire@:
> http://groups.dowire.org/r/post/50mGGeIdgh6AoDFHSXIe6y
>
> What basic web feeds (RSS/ATOM) should government web sites provide?
The site should have a search engine with up to the second content.
The content should be keyworded, so that it is easy to search just for
upcoming meetings, for what's new, for press releases, etc. E.g. "show me
recent press releases on Recovery Act spending", or "when is the next
meeting on neighborhood traffic calming?".
It should be possible to save any particular search as an RSS feed, and thus
subscribe to updates, e.g. this example hacked up via bing.com and its RSS
feed capability - http://bit.ly/nycTrafficMeet
There should of course be "pre-defined" feeds, such as press releases and
all upcoming meetings.
People should be guided to customize feeds (an "RSS construction wizard").
It also strikes me that, with some thought given to tags, keywords, and
urls, agencies could focus their ateention just on content and delegate the
search engine and feed construction details to one or more public search
engines...
Totally agree (and have been actively doing so to anyone who'll listen
for for 6 years now!), but it's happening I think.
Certainly we're doing what we can with custom RSS in consultation
databases at the moment, turning search results into custom feeds -
http://www.opinionsuite.com/bristol/advanced_consultation_finder
. Have heard talk of more being done in this area reasonably soon too.
_________________________________
Gez Smith
Senior Consultant
Delib, 35 King Street, Bristol, BS1 4DZ
T:+44 (0)845 638 1848
W: www.delib.co.uk
:: Catch all the latest participation advice and news: www.delib.co.uk/dblog
Delib Ltd. is a company registered in England at 35 King Street,
Bristol, BS1 4DZ. Company number: 5158056
On 29 Sep 2009, at 14:42, Jeremy Gould wrote:
> Would definitely add government consultations to that list.
>
>
> JEREMY GOULD
> http://www.google.com/profiles/jeremygould
>
>
>
>
> On 29 Sep 2009, at 14:27, Steven Clift wrote:
>
>> Per my MashTheState post on the Newswire@:
>> http://groups.dowire.org/r/post/50mGGeIdgh6AoDFHSXIe6y
>>
>> What basic web feeds (RSS/ATOM) should government web sites provide?
>>
>> Here is my short list:
>>
>> 1. What's New - Comprehensive feed of all new pages/documents across
>> the site/agency posted/updated online.
>> 2. Upcoming Public Meetings - Meetings coming up with links to
>> available meeting documents
>> 3. Press Releases
>>
>> What is on your list?
>>
>> Steven Clift - http://stevenclift.com
>> Executive Director - http://E-Democracy.Org
>> Donate today: http://e-democracy.org/donate
>>
>> -----------------------------------------
>> Group home for Democracies Online Exchange:
>> http://groups.dowire.org/groups/exchange
>>
>> Replies go to members of Democracies Online Exchange with all posts
>> on this topic here:
>> http://groups.dowire.org/r/topic/2eT9zPKYYsCVIlhCHYrEMo
>>
>> For digest version or to leave Democracies Online Exchange,
>> email <email obscured>
>> with "digest on" or "unsubscribe" in the *subject*.
>>
>> Democracies Online Exchange is hosted by Democracies Online -
http://dowire.org
>> .
>
>
> -----------------------------------------
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http://dowire.org
> .
Steve,
Thanks for sparking discussion on this topic. Clearly, we could go in
different directions, but from the perspective of urban planning, some
logical ones are:
- 311 service requests (See DC)
- Geocoded feed with project proposals at various stages of the development
review process (site plan review, zoning variance, etc)
- Feeds specific to the process of creating certain plans or policy
documents (feed for comprehensive plan, or downtown revitalization plan,
etc)
- Feed of recently issued permits, by type (building or construction
permits, parade or public space use permits, liquor licenses, etc)
- As is appropriate, if the government has real-time data on urban systems
it should be reported - IE, traffic alerts or public transit service alerts.
However, if they don't collect it, it could be privately provided.
What's interesting is some of these cross-cut Steve's: the development
review and policy feeds could have public meetings in them. Conceptually, on
the backend different flavors could be baked out of a common database.
Rob
--
Robert Goodspeed
PhD Student | Urban Information Systems
M.I.T. Department of Urban Studies and Planning
<email obscured> | +1 (202) 321-2743
www.goodspeedupdate.com
On Tue, Sep 29, 2009 at 9:27 AM, Steven Clift <email obscured>> wrote:
> Per my MashTheState post on the Newswire@:
> http://groups.dowire.org/r/post/50mGGeIdgh6AoDFHSXIe6y
>
> What basic web feeds (RSS/ATOM) should government web sites provide?
>
> Here is my short list:
>
> 1. What's New - Comprehensive feed of all new pages/documents across
> the site/agency posted/updated online.
> 2. Upcoming Public Meetings - Meetings coming up with links to
> available meeting documents
> 3. Press Releases
>
> What is on your list?
>
> Steven Clift - http://stevenclift.com
> Executive Director - http://E-Democracy.Org
> Donate today: http://e-democracy.org/donate
>
> -----------------------------------------
> Group home for Democracies Online Exchange:
> http://groups.dowire.org/groups/exchange
>
> Replies go to members of Democracies Online Exchange with all posts on this
> topic here:
> http://groups.dowire.org/r/topic/2eT9zPKYYsCVIlhCHYrEMo
>
> For digest version or to leave Democracies Online Exchange,
> email <email obscured>
> with "digest on" or "unsubscribe" in the *subject*.
>
> Democracies Online Exchange is hosted by Democracies Online -
> http://dowire.org.
>
The question is a little off-base. What is needed is a querying syntax like
Apache's Lucene with output options in a number of different XML schemas. Then
you can pull whatever you want from a database in any format that's provided.
Here's an example:
http://www.nwscdc.org/community/maps/
Since in Milwaukee a ton of data is not publicly accessible by API or feeds
from the database sources--you can only get it as individual email notices--
this mapping application was built to receive a bunch of those emails. It
parses them, puts them in its own database, and then allows queries (simply
modify the URL) with output in ical, atom, or kml.
Cost and time for that is negligible, and it's superior the the City's legacy
systems which aren’t to be upgraded for quite some time. Generally government
entities don’t think about how cheap and easy it is to just open up their data
and provided structured output. They have to go and built a whole interface
that rots and costs millions.
Dan Knauss
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/danknauss
New Local Media :: www.newlocalmedia.com
Twitter: www.twitter.com/newlocalmedia
> -----Original Message-----
> From: <email obscured>
> <email obscured>] On Behalf Of Christoph Berendes
> Sent: Tuesday, September 29, 2009 10:44 AM
> To: <email obscured>
> Subject: Re: [DW-X] What web feeds should government web
> sites provide?
>
>
> On Tue, Sep 29, 2009 at 9:27 AM, Steven Clift
> <email obscured>> wrote:
>
> > Per my MashTheState post on the Newswire@:
> > http://groups.dowire.org/r/post/50mGGeIdgh6AoDFHSXIe6y
> >
> > What basic web feeds (RSS/ATOM) should government web sites provide?
>
>
> The site should have a search engine with up to the second content.
>
> The content should be keyworded, so that it is easy to search just for
> upcoming meetings, for what's new, for press releases, etc.
> E.g. "show me
> recent press releases on Recovery Act spending", or "when is the next
> meeting on neighborhood traffic calming?".
>
> It should be possible to save any particular search as an RSS
> feed, and thus
> subscribe to updates, e.g. this example hacked up via
> bing.com and its RSS
> feed capability - http://bit.ly/nycTrafficMeet
>
> There should of course be "pre-defined" feeds, such as press
> releases and
> all upcoming meetings.
>
> People should be guided to customize feeds (an "RSS
> construction wizard").
>
> It also strikes me that, with some thought given to tags,
> keywords, and
> urls, agencies could focus their ateention just on content
> and delegate the
> search engine and feed construction details to one or more
> public search
> engines...
>
> Chris
>
> -----------------------------------------
> Group home for Democracies Online Exchange:
> http://groups.dowire.org/groups/exchange
>
> Replies go to members of Democracies Online Exchange with all
> posts on this topic here:
> http://groups.dowire.org/r/topic/7uin2woh50RAmq3sp4gl3m
>
> For digest version or to leave Democracies Online Exchange,
> email <email obscured>
> with "digest on" or "unsubscribe" in the *subject*.
>
> Democracies Online Exchange is hosted by Democracies Online -
> http://dowire.org.
>
The following file was added to this topic:
I had a proposal knocking around Whitehall about two years ago when I
was still a civil servant proposing exactly this. Essentially it was a
government branded delicious service that could serve two purposes: 1.
allow organisations with bad IT suppliers and/or CMS restrictions to
easily create RSS feeds (and email subscription services) and embed
them on their site, 2. support a standalone front end that would allow
anyone to create custom feeds based on categories / tags. Like most of
my cross-government ideas, it was filed under 'ignore'...
JEREMY GOULD
http://www.google.com/profiles/jeremygould
On 29 Sep 2009, at 16:43, Christoph Berendes wrote:
> On Tue, Sep 29, 2009 at 9:27 AM, Steven Clift <clift@e-
> democracy.org> wrote:
>
>> Per my MashTheState post on the Newswire@:
>> http://groups.dowire.org/r/post/50mGGeIdgh6AoDFHSXIe6y
>>
>> What basic web feeds (RSS/ATOM) should government web sites provide?
>
>
> The site should have a search engine with up to the second content.
>
> The content should be keyworded, so that it is easy to search just for
> upcoming meetings, for what's new, for press releases, etc. E.g.
> "show me
> recent press releases on Recovery Act spending", or "when is the next
> meeting on neighborhood traffic calming?".
>
> It should be possible to save any particular search as an RSS feed,
> and thus
> subscribe to updates, e.g. this example hacked up via bing.com and
> its RSS
> feed capability - http://bit.ly/nycTrafficMeet
>
> There should of course be "pre-defined" feeds, such as press
> releases and
> all upcoming meetings.
>
> People should be guided to customize feeds (an "RSS construction
> wizard").
>
> It also strikes me that, with some thought given to tags, keywords,
> and
> urls, agencies could focus their ateention just on content and
> delegate the
> search engine and feed construction details to one or more public
> search
> engines...
>
> Chris
>
> -----------------------------------------
> Group home for Democracies Online Exchange:
> http://groups.dowire.org/groups/exchange
>
> Replies go to members of Democracies Online Exchange with all posts
> on this topic here:
> http://groups.dowire.org/r/topic/7uin2woh50RAmq3sp4gl3m
>
> For digest version or to leave Democracies Online Exchange,
> email <email obscured>
> with "digest on" or "unsubscribe" in the *subject*.
>
> Democracies Online Exchange is hosted by Democracies Online -
http://dowire.org
> .