News

DDI Technical Committee Meeting Report

The Technical Committee met in Minneapolis, Minnesota, U.S.A. August 1-5, 2022. The focus of this meeting was finalizing the work needed to move DDI-Lifecycle to the COGS production platform.

The COGS production platform, currently used by SDTL, captures the content of DDI-Lifecycle in a set of CSV files and related documentation text which is then transformed into multiple implementation languages (XML, RDF, JSON, UML/XMI, C++, etc.) and a documentation file in Sphinx. The primary goal is to provide a platform that supports intermittent testing, greater access for developers, and generated documentation and implementation structures. This will move DDI-Lifecycle out of being a hand-crafted structure.

In a series of sessions, the members also discussed the focus of the Technical Committee over the next few years given the role of the new Scientific Board and the diversification of the DDI product line.

An executive summary of the meeting is posted on the Technical Committee section of the DDI wiki: https://ddi-alliance.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/DDI4/pages/2847703041/Aug...

Registration for EDDI22 is now open!

EDDI22, the 14th Annual European DDI User Conference, will be held as an in-person event with online participation. Venue: Sciences Po, Rue Saint-Pères, Saint Germain, Paris.

You can register for EDDI22 from 28 September. Early bird rate closes on 28 October 2022. Registration closes on 15 November.

Conference Fees

  • Monday 28 November: Online training – Free
  • Tuesday 29 November: In person Workshops - 60 Euro / per workshop
  • Weds / Thursday: Conference Early Bird Rate: 220 Euro
  • Weds / Thursday: Conference Normal Rate: 275 Euro
  • Weds / Thursday: Conference Online Rate: 50 Euro

Please note that clicking on the registration link will take you to the CNRS site Azur-Colloque, to register and accept payments.

The draft program is now also available. We are offering a Diversity Scholarship, (deadline 15 October 2022). All details are on the Conference Website at: https://eddi22.sciencesconf.org/

Jon Johnson & Mari Kleemola

EDDI 2022 co-chairs

Summary Report: Dagstuhl “Interoperability for Cross-Domain Research: Machine-Actionability & Scalability” Workshop

The “Interoperability for Cross-Domain Research: Machine-Actionability & Scalability” workshop was held at Schloss Dagstuhl from August 28 to September 2, 2022 (https://www.dagstuhl.de/22353). The workshop was the fourth in a series, starting in 2018, exploring the role of metadata standards and the issues around interoperability in the cross-domain sharing and reuse of research data. It was jointly supported by CODATA, the DDI Alliance, Schloss Dagstuhl, the Leibniz Center for Informatics, and the EU-funded WorldFAIR project, of which CODATA is the coordinator. With the current interest in the FAIR principles and their application to interdisciplinary research data, the focus of the workshop was on specific approaches which could be employed within large-scale infrastructures spanning domain boundaries.

The workshop involved 23 participants from 10 countries, and included experts from many disciplines and organisations, including infectious disease, the social, behavioural, and economic sciences, environmental science, disaster risk reduction, geographic information science, and others. The work was divided into three groups, looking at different aspects of interoperability: integration of primary and reference data; access to sensitive data; and common approaches to large-scale oceans and disaster data. Several WorldFAIR case studies contributed to these groups. A fourth group looked at how the findings in each area could be combined in a cross-domain interoperability framework, and a fifth looked at the RDF expression of some core data and metadata models. Further information on the workshop themes and the groups’ activity can be found on the workshop wiki.

The workshop was very successful in meeting its agreed goals. One was the production of an initial draft of a cross-domain interoperability framework (CDIF), which is central to the work of the WorldFAIR project and other fora looking at cross-domain interoperability. CDIF is a proposed set of recommended best practices for using a coordinated set of domain-agnostic standards – most often as specific subsets or profiles of those standards – to support a core set of functions for cross-domain FAIR reuse. The group work on specific topics has resulted in a number of planned publications, and one or more collaborative projects between some of the participating institutions.

The workshop showed that Schloss Dagstuhl’s reputation as a venue for intensive collaborative work is well-deserved. Over the course of this series of workshops, solutions to the problem of cross-domain interoperability have gained a sharper focus, leading to the concrete outputs which will serve as a basis for ongoing work. A fifth workshop in the series, ‘Defining a core metadata framework for cross-domain data sharing and reuse’, is planned for the fall of 2023, as well as a workshop on the application of DDI’s Cross-Domain Integration standard.

DDI Alliance Public Review: DDI-Codebook (Version 2.6)

The DDI Alliance (http://www.ddialliance.org/) is pleased to announce the Public Review of DDI-Codebook (Version 2.6). DDI-Codebook is a more light-weight version of the DDI suite of products, intended primarily to document the content, meaning, provenance, and access for a single data set. DDI-Codebook remains in wide use by social science data repositories and by the International Household Survey Network (IHSN), and continues to be maintained and updated by the DDI Alliance.

This new version of the DDI specification includes important updates and new content, including:

  • Personal identifiers within the Citations section
  • Clearer and more consistent approach to the use of external controlled vocabularies
  • Better support for Structured Data Transformation Language (SDTL)
  • Improved documentation at the element level
  • High-level information for managing identification, controlled vocabularies, geospatial content, and other cross-element usage

Links to the review package and instructions for comment are found at: https://ddi-alliance.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/DDI4/pages/2848718849/Public+Review+-+Codebook+Version+2.6

We are eager to obtain feedback from a broad community on this specification. The comment period is open until October 31, 2022, and we hope to hear from you!

European Statistical System’s vocabularies modelled using XKOS

A first preliminary release of the European Statistical System’s most widely used statistical classifications is available on the EU Vocabularies website as Linked Open Data.  The vocabularies have been modelled using the XKOS ontology, the extension of SKOS for modeling statistical classifications. XKOS is a product of the DDI Alliance.

UNECE task team providing guidance to the official statistics community about DDI

A new task team under the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) High-level Group for the Modernization of Official Statistics is providing guidance to the official statistics community about how to use DDI and SDMX throughout the statistical production process to support standard-based modernisation.

This guidance will include a high-level analysis of where and how DDI and SDMX can enable Generic Statistical Business Process Model (GSBPM) solutions along with recommendations on which concrete DDI and SDMX classes can be used to best describe Generic Statistical Information Model (GSIM) inputs and outputs of each GSBPM sub-process. Together with GSIM, GSBPM provides a conceptual framework describing the information and process viewpoints of statistical production. In that context, DDI and SDMX provide implementation models to facilitate the production, management and exchange of data and its related metadata.

DDI community members on the task team include Flavio Rizzolo (Statistics Canada) and Dan Gillman (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics).

For more information, please visit: https://unece.org/sites/default/files/2021-11/HLG2021_Supporting%20Stand...

EDDI22 Paris - Call for Papers Open

The 2022 European DDI User Conference (EDDI22) is organized jointly by CDSP [https://cdsp.sciences-po.fr/en/], Center for Socio-Political Data, GESIS [http://www.gesis.org/en/home/] - Leibniz Institute for the Social Sciences and IDSC [http://idsc.iza.org/] of IZA - International Data Service Center of the Institute for the Study of Labor.

The EDDI22 Conference website is at: [https://eddi22.sciencesconf.org]

It will be hosted by Sciences Po in their buildings at Rue Saint-Peres, in the Saint Germain district, Paris, from Tuesday 29 November 2022 to Thursday 1 December 2022.

Online participation will also be available for those unable to travel.

The Data Documentation Initiative (DDI)[http://www.ddialliance.org/] is an international standard for describing the data produced by surveys and other observational methods in the social, behavioral, economic, and health sciences.

The meeting will bring together DDI users and professionals from all over Europe and the world. Anyone interested in developing, applying, or using DDI is invited to attend and present.

We are seeking presentations, talks, papers on all things DDI:

  • Case Studies
  • Mature implementations
  • Early Implementations
  • Interplay of DDI with other standards or technologies
  • Projects in early phases in which DDI is under consideration
  • Critiques of DDI

Proposed topics of the conference

=================================

We expect that many presentations will cross over between topic areas but that should not discourage proposals, although you will be asked to nominate one category when submitting. Please also note that the possible topics are not exclusive to those listed:

 

User Needs, Efficient Infrastructures and Improved Quality

----------------------------------------------------------

Rich, standard-based metadata can a) improve the fulfillment of the need for better documentation for researchers and other users; b) improve efficiency by providing infrastructures that drive data collection, data processing and dissemination (e.g. metadata-portals); c) improve quality of our products and processes. There has been increasing interest in metadata in Europe in the context of building EOSC.  Papers describing innovative solutions covering the parts of or the whole life-cycle from collection to dissemination based on metadata are encouraged. Papers focusing on metadata driven production are welcomed as well.

 

Official Statistics

-------------------

National and international statistical organizations share a need for inter-related standards like the Generic Statistical Business Process Model (GSBPM), the Generic Activity Model for Statistical Organizations (GAMSO), the Generic Statistical Information Model (GSIM), the Common Statistical Production Architecture (CSPA), DDI, and SDMX. We welcome papers with a focus on standards in the context of official statistics.

 

Interoperability, Reusing and Sharing Metadata

----------------------------------------------

DDI is strongly focused on the principles of metadata re-use and interoperability. “Enter once and use many times” is a powerful paradigm that can lead to improved fulfilment of user needs, improved quality and improved efficiency. The FAIR principles emphasize the use of formal, accessible, shared and broadly applicable language for knowledge representation and use of vocabularies and references. Papers that demonstrate achieving interoperability using DDI, or innovative ways to reuse, share and harmonize metadata are welcomed.

 

Data Harmonization

------------------

Data harmonization can maximize the value of large scale population research in health and social sciences for both documentation and processing purposes. DDI has rich constructs such as Concept, Comparison and Group, and ConceptualVariable and RepresentedVariable in DDI 3.2. We encourage papers which describe projects utilizing DDI or exploring DDI as a basis for harmonizing data.

 

Incentives to Document Data

---------------------------

The advantage of having good documentation on data is rarely challenged, but it is often left as the last thing (or maybe not even that) to do on a research project. This is because the benefits for researchers come largely from publication and not from the data itself. In this context, changing both the culture and the rewards for documentation and sharing of data might be seen as key motivators. We encourage papers exploring this topic with the focus on DDI.

 

Open Data and Linked Open Data

------------------------------

As the “Open Data” movement – which aims to make data more freely available – gains more and more attention in science and humanities, especially in the area of government data, the value of data that are easy to access and not limited by restrictive licences is acknowledged. By using “Linked Open Data” technologies the ability to create reproducible and transparent research is enabled. For both, high quality metadata that is standardized and machine-actionable, like DDI metadata, is crucial. We encourage papers in the area of Open Data and Linked Open Data with a focus on DDI.

 

Privacy and Access Control

--------------------------

The sharing of data or metadata is sometimes restricted due to privacy issues or property rights. Especially, but not exclusively, in health research there is the need to protect the privacy of persons to whom the data refer. In social sciences and humanities, data can contain copyrighted material like texts and photos. Access rights can be determined by well standardized metadata. Thus good metadata management enables the protection of research participants’ and researchers’ rights and ensures an organization’s investment in data and metadata. We encourage papers in the area of concepts or implementations of privacy and access control issues with a focus on DDI.

 

Metadata versus Data and Related Ethics

---------------------------------------

In the case of surveys, there is usually a clear distinction between data and metadata. However, for example, in the context of qualitative research the boundary between data and metadata is less clear-cut. This issue also arises with big data sources like Facebook and other social media. Ultimately what is perceived to be data and what is perceived to be metadata is defined by research questions. This poses some difficult questions for research ethics when release, use and access to data usually have governance, yet metadata conceivably does not. We encourage papers focusing on this area of tension with the background of DDI.

 

Software / Tools

----------------

The acceptance and adoption of a “standard” depends on the availability of re-usable tools and software to utilize it. Many new tools that leverage DDI are emerging, and they target different parts of the data life cycle. We encourage papers showcasing tools and software which make use of DDI or parts of it.

 

Submissions and Presentation forms

===================================

 

Proposals are welcome for the following presentation forms.

 

Complete Session: Proposals for complete sessions should list the organizer or moderator and possible participants.  The session organizer will be responsible for securing both session participants and a chair.

This is designed for sessions which could be described as a Discussion,  Plenary or Birds of a Feather.

The submission should provide titles, author names, and a brief description for each of the individual presentations and email the details to the Program Committee (eddi22-prog@googlegroups.com).

Submission: abstract (300 words maximum).

 

Full Paper: The presentation will be approx. 20 minutes long, plus 10 minutes for questions at the end.

Accepted papers will be presented at the conference. They can be published in the journal IASSIST Quarterly.

At least one author of each paper is expected to register for the conference and to present the paper.

Submission: abstract (200 words maximum) - Further requirements: see section Author Guideline & Important dates below.

 

Regular Presentation: The presentation will be approx. 20 minutes long, plus 10 minutes for questions at the end.

Submission: abstract (200 words maximum).

 

Short Presentation: The presentations will be approx. 10 minutes long, plus 5 minutes for questions at the end.

Submission: abstract (200 words maximum)

 

Poster: An A1 poster

Submission: abstract (200 words maximum) 

Posters are to be presented in-person

 

Tutorial or Workshop: Half-day or full-day tutorials (introductions) or workshops (more advanced special topics) with respectively 2 and 4 blocks each lasting 90 minutes in length.

These are scheduled to take place on Tuesday, November 29, 2022

The abstract should describe the topic, the perspective (business or technical), the intended audience and possible prerequisites.

Hands-on exercises could rely on the participants using laptop computers.

Submission: abstract (300 words maximum).

 

How to submit

=============

 

If you are interested in submitting a proposal, You will first have to create an account, at [https://eddi22.sciencesconf.org] or just log-in, if you already have one.

 

In the section "My submission" you can start the submission process.

The deadline for submissions is 4 September 2022, 23:59 CEST.

 

  • Please consider indicating your availability as a reviewer as well.
  • Please also indicate whether you will be presenting in-person or on-line.

 

Author Guidelines & Important dates

===================================

 

Deadline for Call for Papers / all proposals due: 4 September 2022, 23:59 CEST.

Notification of acceptance for all proposals: 28 September 2022.

 

For Full papers

 

  • A draft of the paper of 8-12 pages with appendices must be sent in addition to the Program Committee (eddi22-prog@googlegroups.com) for review by 15 September 2022
  • Reviewer comments will be sent to the authors by 17 October  2022.
  • Final version of full papers due: 11 November 2022.

 

Full papers must follow the rules of IASSIST Quarterly [https://iassistquarterly.com/index.php/iassist/about/submissions]. Submissions should use the IQ author template [https://drive.google.com/file/d/14yRUII3ma7e7TIQxjohNU786NUzzEhxU/view].

Please pay attention to the details in the template and submit your contribution in Microsoft Word document file format (or RTF or OpenOffice) and PDF format.

 

Accepted papers have to be submitted in Microsoft Word document file format (or RTF or OpenOffice) and PDF format.

 

General Information

===================

 

The Program Committee [https://www.eddi-conferences.eu/committees] strategically develops, creates and organizes the program.

The Organization Committee [https://www.eddi-conferences.eu/committees] coordinates the onsite work

 

For questions or any other correspondence regarding the Call for Papers of EDDI221, please send an email to eddi22-prog@googlegroups.com.

 

Last year's program is available at the EDDI website [https://www.eddi-conferences.eu/eddi-2021/].

 

More information about the EDDI conference series and details on the previous EDDI conferences can be found at https://www.eddi-conferences.eu/.

DDI Executive Board Election Results

DDI member representatives voted in May 2022 to elect one member to fll Joachim (Achim) Wackerow's vacancy on the DDI Executive Board. Twenty-three of the 28 voting eligible DDI member representatives participated in the election. According to the Alliance Bylaws, the election is decided on the basis of those candidates getting the most votes.

The election results (number of votes are indicated in parentheses):

The Executive Board is composed of seven voting members: six elected by the Designated Member representatives and one member appointed by the Host Institution. Members serve for a term of four years. The Executive Director serves as an ex officio member, without vote. The Executive Board is the policymaking and oversight body of the Alliance.

I want to thank Libby for accepting the nomination and for her willingness to serve on the Board.  Libby's biosketch and position statement are listed below.  I also want to thank Achim Wackerow for his many years of service on the DDI Executive Board.

Sincerely,
Jared

 

Jared Lyle
Executive Director, DDI Alliance
ICPSR, University of Michigan

 

Dr. Libby Bishop

Biosketch

Dr. Libby Bishop is the Coordinator for International Data Infrastructures in the Data Archive for the Social Sciences at GESIS Leibniz-Institute for Social Sciences in Germany. GESIS is a service provider to the Consortium of European Social Science Data Archives (CESSDA). She manages the relationship between GESIS and CESSDA, leads a project that is building a resource for repository staff, and coordinates additional projects between GESIS and other European research data infrastructures on topics such as digital behavioral data. She is also Team Leader of the GESIS Metadata Standards and Interoperability Team. She recently completed a task on developing remote secure access for sensitive data within the European Open Science Cloud initiative via the Social Sciences and Humanities Open Cloud Project. Prior to coming to GESIS in 2017, she worked at the UK Archive for almost 15 years, focusing on expanding reuse of qualitative data. Her research explores the methodological and ethical challenges posed when curating data for sharing and reuse.

Position Statement

In my career with data, I have worked near, but not directly with, DDI. I look forward to deepening my knowledge and leveraging my other experiences to support the strategic goals of the DDI Alliance. One of those goals is engagement with global digital research infrastructures, and I believe my (human) network spanning the US, the UK, Germany, and other European countries will be useful. A second goal concerns integrating new forms of data. I learned lessons (some the hard way) in integrating qualitative data at UKDA, and this learning continues with new forms of non-survey data at GESIS, especially social media data. Finally, perhaps some of my training experiences and knowledge of resources (e.g., a guide for making training videos) will prove relevant for the strategic goals related to training.

2022 DDI Annual Meetings: Registration + Agendas

Dear DDI community,

We look forward to seeing you at our two annual meetings in early June!  Registration information, including meeting agendas, are described below.  We invite anyone who is interested in DDI activities to attend these meetings.  

DDI Alliance Annual Meeting of Members (virtual only)
June 1, 2022 (Wednesday) 16:00-18:00 CEST, 10:00-12:00 EDT

View the agenda

Register in advance for this meeting: https://umich.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJEqfuCpqTwiEtaBNve_ieKJkJH8DxWV2rXY.  After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

The Annual Meeting of Members reviews activities of the Alliance, reviews and approves the activities of the Executive Board, and provides a forum for discussion and feedback.  The annual Meeting of Members is chaired by the Chair of the DDI Executive Board.  This meeting will be virtual.

DDI Alliance Annual Meeting of the Scientific Community (hybrid: in-person at IASSIST meeting & virtual)

Room J335, Göteborgs universitet Humanistiska fakulteten | Humanisten, Renströmsgatan 6, 412 55 Göteborg, Sweden walking map)

June 7, 2022 (Tuesday) 16:15-17:45 CEST, 10:15-11:45 EDT

View the agenda

Register in advance for this meeting: https://umich.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJIqf-6hqzgjGdATpCxuYrMqdmRH_HIW7InG.   After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

The Annual Meeting of the Scientific Community reports on the activities of the Scientific Board to the DDI Scientific Community. The meeting provides a forum for member organization discussion and feedback, reviews and approves the activities of the Scientific Board in the preceding year, and reviews and approves the Scientific Work Plan for the coming year.  The Scientific Board will convene the annual meeting, which will be hybrid -- in-person (TBD location) at the IASSIST meeting in Sweden, with an option for virtual attendance.
 
Past annual meeting materials are available on the DDI web site: https://ddialliance.org/annual-meetings.  If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to reach out.  
 
Sincerely,
Jared

 
 

Jared Lyle
Executive Director, DDI Alliance
ICPSR, University of Michigan
lyle@umich.edu

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Vive les Métadonnées! (Les bases de DDI en français / DDI basics in French)

NOUVEAU webinaire en français: Vive les Métadonnées! (Les bases de DDI en français) // NEW webinar in French: Long live metadata! (DDI basics in French): 13/06/2022, 14.00-15.30 UTC. 

Annonce bilingue FR+EN  //  Bilingual announcement FR+EN

Français:

Le deuxième webinaire de la série de webinaires 2022 de CODATA-DDI Alliance aura lieu le lundi 13 juin 2022 (14.00 – 15.30 UTC) sur le thème 'Vive les Métadonnées ! (Les bases de DDI en français)'.

Les inscriptions sont désormais ouvertes sur : https://codata.org/initiatives/data-skills/ddi-training-webinars/vive-les-metadonnees-les-bases-de-ddi-en-francais-ddi-basics-in-french/

Cet atelier présente les standards et les produits de l’Alliance DDI pour la collecte, la gestion et la diffusion des données. Il s’agit d’un excellent moyen de répondre aux injonctions liées aux données FAIR dans le monde de la recherche d’aujourd’hui. DDI fournit une approche indépendante de toute plateforme, offrant une granularité fine pour la description et valorisation des données provenant des sciences sociales, comportementales et économiques, ainsi que de la santé publique et des statistiques officielles. De plus, DDI cherche à optimiser non seulement  les métadonnées dans ces domaines, mais aussi des ensembles de données composites provenant de tout le spectre des données scientifiques. Les normes et les modèles se situent à la fois au niveau technique et conceptuel.

Cet atelier donnera un aperçu des normes et des produits, et une introduction à leur utilisation. Bien que ces normes et produits soient déjà utilisés au niveau international, ce sera le tout premier atelier organisé par l’Alliance DDI en français.

Les conférenciers seront Alina Danciu (Sciences Po, Centre de Données Socio-Politiques - CDSP), Christophe Dzikowski (Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques - INSEE), Simon Hodson (CODATA), Hilde Orten (SIKT), Nicolas Sauger (Sciences Po, CDSP).

Inscrivez-vous dès maintenant pour nous rejoindre le 13 juin !

 

English:

The second webinar in the 2022 CODATA-DDI Alliance webinar series will take place on Mon 13 June 2022 (14.00 – 15.30 UTC) on the topic, Vive les Métadonnées! (DDI basics in French).  Please note this event will be conducted in French.

Registration is now open at: https://codata.org/initiatives/data-skills/ddi-training-webinars/vive-les-metadonnees-les-bases-de-ddi-en-francais-ddi-basics-in-french/

This workshop introduces the standards and products of the DDI Alliance for data collection, management, and dissemination. It is an excellent way of meeting the demands for FAIR data in modern research. DDI provides a platform-independent, fine-grained approach to metadata and data documentation for data which supports social, behavioural, and economic research, as well as public health and official statistics. Increasingly, it is looking to optimize metadata not only within these domains, but also for integrated data sets drawn from across the scientific data spectrum. The standards and models are at both technical and conceptual levels.

This workshop will give an overview of the standards and products, and an introduction to their use. Although used internationally, this will be the first workshop conducted by the DDI Alliance in the French language.

Presenters will include Alina Danciu (Sciences Po, Centre de Données Socio-Politiques - CDSP), Christophe Dzikowski (Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques - INSEE), Simon Hodson (CODATA), Hilde Orten (SIKT) and Nicolas Sauger (Sciences Po, CDSP).

Register now to join us on 13 June!