The Open Data Manual

This report discusses legal, social and technical aspects of open data. The manual can be used by anyone but is especially designed for those seeking to open up data. It discusses the why, what and how of open data – why to go open, what open is, and the how to ‘open’ data.

To get started, you may wish to look at the Introduction. You can navigate through the report using the Table of Contents (see sidebar or below).

We warmly welcome comments on the text and will incorporate feedback as we go forward. We also welcome contributors or suggestions for additional sections and areas to examine.

Table of Contents

• Introduction
  • Target Audience
  • Credits
    • Credits and Copyright
• Why Open Data?
• What is Open Data?
  • What is Open?
  • What Data are You Talking About?
• How to Open up Data
  • Choose Dataset(s)
    • Asking the community
    • Cost basis
    • Ease of release
    • Observe peers
  • Apply an Open License (Legal Openness)
  • Make Data Available (Technical Openness)
    • Online methods
    • Offline methods
  • Make data discoverable
    • Existing tools
    • For government
• So I’ve Opened Up Some Data, Now What?
  • Tell the world!
    • Understanding your audience
    • Post your material on third-party sites
    • Making your communications more social-media friendly
    • Social media
  • Getting folks in a room: Unconferences, Meetups and Barcamps
  • Making things! Hackdays, prizes and prototypes
    • Examples for Competitions
    • Conferences, Barcamps, Hackdays
• Glossary
• Appendices
  • File Formats
    • An Overview of File Formats
    • Open File Formats
    • How do I use a given format?
  • What Legal (IP) Rights Are There in Data(bases)
  • Making Personal Data Anonymous
    • Defining personal information
    • Strategies for making data anonymous
    • References
  • Barriers and Solutions to Open Data
    • Introduction
    • Licensing
    • Privacy
    • Access
    • From access to new business
    • Finding viable business models
    • Disruption of existing business
    • Linked and Federated Data
    • Transition Process for Government

Indices and tables

• Index
• Module Index
• Search Page