Open Data – All the Cool orgs are doing it! It was a couple of months ago (June, 2017) when Esri officially announced the ArcGIS Hub – a resource supporting collaboration between government, businesses, citizens and their communities to accomplish data-driven initiatives – think Open Data!
If you’ve ever had to search online for data (for example, flood or elevation data) you know that the experience can be somewhat exhausting. The “Hub” aims to simplify this. The ArcGIS Hub expands on the existing effort, ArcGIS Open Data, which has seen thousands of orgs open a wealth of data.
ArcGIS Open Data – Making GIS Data Accessible to Everyone!
Over 8,000 organizations have enabled ArcGIS Open Data since its launch in 2014 in order to make is easy for orgs to open their data. These governments, universities, NGO and other organizations have shared over 70,000 datasets globally that are freely accessible by the public in easy to use explorable maps, charts, and tables and are downloadable using open formats and developer APIs. With ArcGIS Open Data, users can set up a public-facing website within minutes to share their open data. ArcGIS Open Data is an Esri hosted and managed solution that is included with ArcGIS Online.
Open Data can be searched and explored, find data, then use it freely in your maps, apps and webmaps. Explore thousands of datasets HERE
Of note, ArcGIS Open Data remains a freely included capability of the ArcGIS platform. According to Esri… “ArcGIS Hub provides every resident with a community identity to become a full, named user of ArcGIS with the ability to gather data with surveys, perform spatial and statistical analyses, and create StoryMaps and insights to share with their community and back to the government”
So, the long and short of it is, ArcGIS Open Data is now ArcGIS Hub!
The Next Step – ArcGIS Hub! “Open Data With a Purpose!”
User orgs can take open data even further by giving it purpose and context in relation to the organization’s top priorities and initiatives with ArcGIS Hub. The Hub builds on ArcGIS Open Data, enabling ArcGIS data-driven sites and pages and encourages more citizen participation and interaction. For user orgs and agencies, ArcGIS Hub provides GIS admins with the capability to open their data holdings to the community and for citizens and developers who need data. ArcGIS Hub walks you through launching your first open data site and recommends meaningful open datasets to share that align with commonly used open standard data models. Governments that participate get:
- Tools to create maps, apps, and dashboards
- An engagement platform to support collaboration
- Ways to capture, store and share data
- Apps and tools (templates)
Requirements
To create an open data site within ArcGIS Hub, you must have an ArcGIS organizational account. To create a site with all ArcGIS Hub functionality, you must have an ArcGIS organizational account with a Hub license. You do not need an account to view or download data from sites. ArcGIS Hub supports data from ArcGIS Server 10.1 or later.
Of interest, we caught up with Andrew Turner (@ajturner) of Esri to discuss ArcGIS Open Data, ArcGIS Hub at the 2017 Esri Dev Summit. Andrew is charged with all things”open” at Esri!
Related Weblinks:
- ArcGIS Hub
- ArcGIS Hub help docs
- Search Open Data
- ArcGIS Hub, Community
- Video – ArcGIS Online: Getting Started with Open Data and Initiatives in the ArcGIS Hub
GEO Jobe Helping Clients with OpenData
Here at GEO Jobe we don’t just build on the ArcGIS platform and create awesome tools, like Admin Tools and Mapfolio etc… our team also works with many ArcGIS Enterprise-scale customers, government agencies, and others and supports their ArcGIS-based solutions. Of interest, we’ve worked with Shelby, County, Tennessee to help standup the County’s 911 Open Data Resource. Using ArcGIS Online, the 911 resource makes available to the public and developers a number of useful data products including: emergency zones, road centerlines, address points and more. See http://gis.shelbycounty911.org/
This from Ken Doman, Geo Jobe, Sr Front-End Engineer, “With ArcGIS Open Data sites, you can make datasets like map features, CSV tables, and even file geodatabases available to organizations and the public. You can organize the data you want to share through ArcGIS Online by assigning the data to one or more groups, and make that group accessible to the Open Data site. It provides a great way to share public information with other organizations and citizens. Public information requests are a breeze to fulfill, and the maps, charts, and graphs you can add to the site help citizens, reporters, and agencies make informed decisions.”
We are glad to work with and support Local Government agencies interested in getting involved with OpenData and standing up their own Open Data resource with ArcGIS Online. Contact us for more info on how to get started.
