The research data in SND's research data catalogue have gained a wider reach and visibility through a collaboration with Digg (the Agency for Digital Government).
“It’s exciting that we have now included research data on Sveriges dataportal, which allows us to connect data from many types of organizations,” says Ulrika Domellöf Mattsson, Data Specialist at Digg.
Sveriges dataportal (dataportal.se), makes it possible to search data from public and private organizations across Sweden. The purpose of this national data portal is to elevate data as a strategic resource and make data more accessible for a wider audience, including the general public, industry, and the public sector.
Innovation and transparency
Ulrika Domellöf Mattsson particularly emphasizes two aspects of the benefits of increasing the accessibility of data:
“The first aspect is related to innovation. Building on existing data can help to create new products and increase societal benefits. It can, for example, involve streamlining government processes to avoid having to reinvent the wheel. The second aspect concerns transparency. We have a right to know what is done with our public spending.”
Sweden's national data portal doesn’t contain any datasets, only metadata, which is information that describes data. The actual datasets are retrieved either through download links or by requesting them from the organization responsible for them.
“It's a definite advantage to be able to search for different types of data in one place. On dataportal.se, you can find datasets from union catalogues, such as the SND research data catalogue, and from individual agencies, like a municipality,” says Ulrika Domellöf Mattsson.
Lowering the barriers
A current project for dataportal.se that Ulrika highlights concerns lowering barriers for data sharing. The project's purpose is to make it easier for organizations to describe their data. This is done by, among other things, a common metadata catalogue where smaller organizations, such as small municipalities, can share metadata via a specially developed manual form within the governance-shared digital infrastructure established by Digg.
“It's important to work as simply as possible and to highlight the collaborations that exist. We need to join forces and assist each other with descriptions so that data can be easily found and reused,” she concludes.
Enriching data in different ways
Olof Olsson, IT architect at SND, is also pleased that the SND research data catalogue is now searchable via dataportal.se. The portal retrieves metadata directly from SND's catalogue and links to the landing pages of each dataset through DOIs (permanent identifiers for digital objects).
“It's important to work on increasing the exposure of research data on other platforms than SND's and the university-owned ones. Dataportal.se also offers opportunities to find other types of data that could be used to enrich existing datasets,” says Olof Olsson.