Thursday, 05 of March 2020, 10:00-12:30 CEST

Connection details:

Agenda

TimeAgenda itemDocument(s)
10:00-10:05Welcome and approval of the agenda
10:05-10:10Minutes of the previous meetings (for discussion and agreement)
10:10-10:30

MIWP actions status reports (ongoing activities only; max. 5 min. per action):

  • 2016.4 Theme-specific issues / Thematic Clusters
  • 2016.5 Priority data sets / Thematic Viewer (DG ENV/EEA)
  • 2019.2 Improving availability of INSPIRE data
  • Registry and register federation


10:30-11:00

Monitoring & reporting 2019 (MIWP Action 2018.1)

  • Status update
  • Country fiches - deadline, practical instructions
  • Commission and MS experiences with monitoring 2019
11:00-11:10INSPIRE Geoportal version 1.3 (status update)
11:10-11:20

Validation and conformity through the INSPIRE reference validator (MIWP Action 2017.4)

11:20 - 12:10

Topic proposed by MIG-T members


12:10 - 12:30

AOB / Information points

  • Ongoing studies (JRC)
    • API4INSPIRE
    • Study on Geospatial Data ecosystems
  • INSPIRE conference 2020 - status update



Draft Minutes

The minutes summarise the main conclusions and actions from the meeting. Actions are indicated in the minutes using checkboxes and are tracked in the "Open actions" section below.

The meeting was chaired by JRC (M. Lutz, R. Tomas) and attended by experts from BE, CZ, DE, DK, EE, ES, FI, FR, IE, LU, NL, NO, PL, PT, SE, SI, SK, EEA, DG ENV and JRC.

Agenda itemNotes / Actions
Welcome and approval of the agenda & previous meeting minutes
  • Michael Lutz (MIG-T Chair) informs that due to his new managerial role (Acting Head of JRC B.6 Unit) he is not able to dedicate much time to INSPIRE (at least until summer 2020).  As a consequence the meeting was chaired by R. Tomas.
  • The minutes of the previous meeting were approved without any proposals for changes.

2016.4 Theme-specific issues / Thematic Clusters

  • Activity in the new Community Forum is positively progressing;
  • JRC highlighted to the MIG-T the necessity for registered Forum users to setup their new notification preferences (instructions show up just after the login).
  • TASK to all: communicate to national INSPIRE stakeholders this important aspect that currently limits the Forum activity.
  • A new Community Forum newsletter is being prepared and will be available soon to highlight the major contributions to the Forum.
  • Based on request (SK) regarding where to discuss / share experiences with identifying and publishing PDS, env-Inspire pilots, it was recommended that exactly for this purpose a new Forum section on INSPIRE & Environmental Policy (facilitated by Stefania Morrone) has been created. It is also a collaborative place for reporting communities to share their relevant good practices.  

2016.5 Priority data sets / Thematic Viewer

  • The joint meeting of Eionet National Reference Centres on Environmental Information Systems (NRC-EIS) and 2016.5 sub-group was held on 6-7 February 2020. The meeting presentations and draft minutes (including the part on 2016.5) are available in the meeting page. The discussion on INSPIRE PDS was focused on restructuring the current table, clarification of scope of certain data sets, mapping to INSPIRE themes and possibility to disseminate information on harmonised European data models for e-Reporting as INSPIRE good practice documents.
  • The Priority Data Sets Viewer in the INSPIRE Geoportal has been improved as a part of the new 1.3 Geoportal version. New functionality provides better filtering functions e.g. the individual PDS from the list of 87 PDS or use of new national/regional data set keywords.

2019.2 Improving availability of INSPIRE data

  • The JRC activity on simplification of data-service linking was temporarily paused due to the effort required by the Monitoring & Reporting 2019 process, and will start again when this will be completed.

Registry and register federation

  • A public testbed for the Re3gistry v.2.0 is open until end of March; feedback can be provided using this GitHub issue tracker. After this period is over, the software will be finalized (taking into account the feedback received) and published before June 2020.

Monitoring & reporting 2019 (MIWP Action 2018.1)

  • Status update
  • Country fiches - deadline, practical instructions
  • Commission and MS experiences with monitoring 2019
  • Geoportal/Validator joint pre-Conference Workshop 2020 Dubrovnik.

Status update

  • Overall, the activity generated a positive push to improve accessibility of INSPIRE resources from MS at the same time allowed the JRC team to fine-tune the both systems (Harvesting, Indicator generation) and also better understand the global picture. The JRC is addressing this work with limited resources which created some helpdesk response delays as well as bugs.
  • Results are published on this page:
    • almost all countries have been processed; some (DE, FR, UK) are only missing the indicators (MDi1.1-1.2) coming from the INSPIRE Reference Validator;
    • the Validator is used to check the conformity of metadata (data sets/services), while the conformity of spatial datasets and network services are done by self-declaration expressed in the metadata;
    • the rules for acknowledging data sets viewability and downloadability were relaxed, which is reflected in slightly higher numbers: the check does not access the service to look whether something is returned, but only checks correctly established links between resources;
    • as a results the Monitoring 2019 results do not match fully with the Geoportal front-end as well as Harvesting sandbox environment;
    • the JRC received many requests to re-calculate the indicators after some improvements were made, but this is not possible; instead, results have to be considered as a snapshot of 2019 + a transition period, the indicators will be calculated every time the successful MS harvest is performed. Therefore the likely MS improvement will be visible in the Geoportal.  
    • JRC is looking into the validation issues provided by NL and assessing the possible impacts.
    • the processing issues with voluminous MD record catalogs (FR, DE, PL, IT, UK) with their harvests and follow up processing led to the change of the harvesting workflow. These MSs are now requested not to use the harvesting console to initiate harvesting. Instead inform the JRC to make the harvest (using the Geoportal helpdesk) on their behalf. Once the harvest and data processing finish successfully the MS will be notified and the results will be available in the Harvesting sandbox for their inspection and publishing;
    • the JRC is currently preparing an aggregated EU-wide charts of all indicators and some combinations. The draft Monitoring 2019 results will be presented at the MIG meeting in March.
  • As already clarified in the past, the Geoportal should not be used as a Validator: resources have first to be checked and improved using the Validator, and only then they should be harvested.
  • Due to the effort put into the Monitoring process, not all the requests in the Geoportal helpdesk were addressed; the JRC team will come back to these after the end of the process. For questions on the Validator, the Validator helpdesk should be used instead.

Country fiches

  • The system for the online update of MS country fiches is open for updates.
  • Commission DG ENV and JRC will look into the possibility to commonly update some initial sections of country fiches. 

Experience in using the INSPIRE Validator in the 2019 Monitoring process (see presentation)

  • The INSPIRE Reference Validator is used to calculate indicators MDi1.1 and MDi1.2.
  • The workflow for identifying the TG version of metadata (1.3 or 2.0) and performing validation is explained. The identified version of metadata is an estimation, but this does not impact the calculation of indicators.
  • Common validation errors detected included: schema validation errors, multiple occurrences of the same thesaurus, missing/wrong declaration of conformity of the described resource, and incorrect date and/or date type of the vocabularies and specifications.
  • Test reports for the failed metadata are provided in the results page. These should be used to identify the corresponding metadata records and fix them based on the errors reported.
  • Monitoring & Reporting results show that:
    • there is still a large use of MD TG 1.3, although the transition period ended in 2019;
    • more than 50% of the countries have a total percentage of conformant metadata less than 50%.

Geoportal/Validator joint INSPIRE 2020 pre-Conference Workshop 11.5.2020 Dubrovnik

  • JRC is organising a Geoportal Workshop on 11.5. from 14.00 - 18.00 in the Conference Hotel (Valamar) - it is the official Conference side event.
  • The main objective for the WS is to share and discuss our experiences from the Monitoring 2019 activity as well as present a status of the Geoportal / harvesting / validation process alignment. Based on your feedback (via new Geoportal/Validation on-line survey) the discussion on possible future developments will also take place.
  • The Workshop is primarily for the same technical /managerial experts from MS that attended the 1st Geoportal WS in 2019 extended by validation / monitoring MS responsible experts. 
  • Please, confirm you participation or nominate proxy by 31.3. to the following e-mail: JRC-INSPIRE-SUPPORT@ec.europa.eu
INSPIRE Geoportal version 1.3 (2020-02-20)
  • The update covers:
    Geoportal backend:
     - Added the support for spatial scope (national/regional data sets)
    Geoportal Priority Data Sets Viewer:
     - New functionalities for directly monitoring and accessing Priority Data Sets (Environmental Domains, individual Priority Data Sets)
     - Improved Overview page
     - Improved filters in the Results page
  • Future planned developments include:
    • show the distinction between protected and non protected data sets/services
    • filter datasets by content (i.e. feature types) and not only by metadata (Feature type viewer)
  • An external ICT assessment of the current infrastructure will be launched soon, to see whether the Geoportal backend system can be replaced/better integrated with a GeoNetwork-based system.
Validation and conformity through the INSPIRE reference validator (MIWP Action 2017.4)

Current and future work on the INSPIRE Reference Validator include (see presentation):

  • the finalization of a release planning strategy to inform about the next releases of the Validator (scheduled dates and content)
  • management of the helpdesk issues through labels and a project board
  • new tests on the Spatial Scope code list and Priority Data Set keywords are under finalization and will be available soon in the staging instance
  • new tests on Annex II/III Data Specifications and OGC API - Features are expected for the second half of the year
  • a long-standing bug in GML geometry validation caused by the deegree library (see e.g. here) is currently addressed (more info here)
  • a simplified INSPIRE-specific UI of the Validator is under development and will be ready in some months
  • the JRC will ask MIG to close Action 2017.4 and replace it with a network of National Contact Points on validation

OGC-API Features as INSPIRE download service

  • The proposed technical approach was prepared in an agile manner and received good feedback from implementers. It is now ready for data providers to start testing the proposed approach for accommodating the INSPIRE requirements.
  • The draft mandate for a short-term MIWP Action (tentatively until November 2020) was prepared for endorsement by the MIG:
    • tasks will include: review of the guidelines, test of the approach, organisation of a webinar/meeting to discuss lessons learnt, submission of an INSPIRE good practice, and identification of possible issues for update the NS Regulation.
    • data encoding is out of scope for this Action, and ETS will be developed within the INSPIRE Validator work (see above).
  • MIG-T members are strongly encouraged to test the proposed approach and share this work with stakeholders on the national level.

Selected topic for the meeting:

FAIR principles and their implication on INSPIRE

The topic was introduced by Arvid Lillethun (NO):

  • There is an increasing interest in the application of FAIR principles to data sharing (not only in research community); there are also sub-principles to test the FAIRness of data.
  • There are multiple links between the FAIR dimensions and INSPIRE (see presentation); FAIR data are also mentioned in the new Open Data Directive.
  • As a follow-up action, it would be interesting to develop a mapping document between FAIR and INSPIRE (and then see if the best outlet is a scientific paper or a good practice document). Since the JRC has no resources to lead this effort but to contribute, a call for interested MIG-T members is launched to contribute to this document by sharing knowledge and experiences.
  • Everyone to provide feedback about their experience with FAIR and INSPIRE.

Identification of Open data in the INSPIRE Geoportal (JRC, Slovakia)

Data distributions for harmonised and non-harmonised datasets (JRC, Slovakia)

Due to lack of time, these topics are moved to the next MIG-T meeting.

API4INSPIRE

  • Contractor is Fraunhofer (supported by DataCove and GeoSolutions). The study, funded by the ELISE ISA2 action, will end in November 2020.
  • The objective of the study is to evaluate the benefits for INSPIRE data providers to switch to API-based standards (OGC API - Features and OGC SensorThings API) by measuring the effort involved in the API implementation and the usefulness for users and providers.
  • The methodology has been defined; APIs are being implemented for serve datasets in partnerships with 6 volunteer data providers from 3 MS (DE, AT, FR); experiences will be captured and documented in a recommendation document to be finally distributed to MS data providers.
  • Workshops are planned at the INSPIRE Conference 2020 and the FOSS4G - Europe 2020 conference.

Study on Geospatial Data ecosystems

  • Contractor is LIST (Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology); the study is funded by the ELISE ISA2 action.
  • The objective is to study how SDIs can evolve into more sustainable data ecosystems;
  • The 2 level methodology for assessing/describing selected data ecosystems is currently under development.
  • 15 data ecosystems will be soon identified, 5 of which will be assessed in detail (2nd level) and provide the basis for the final recommendations.
  • A workshop (15.5. 09.00) is planned during the INSPIRE Conference 2020

INSPIRE conference 2020 - status update

  • The program was published and will consist of: pre-conference workshop on Monday, plenaries on Tuesday, and parallel sessions on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.
  • Situation is under monitoring due to the coronavirus outbreak, information will follow on whether the conference will be cancelled or postponed. Early-bird registration might be extended until the end of March. Everyone is invited to wait before booking travel/accommodation.
Upcoming MIG meeting (March 19-20) and face-to-face MIG-T meeting (April 22-23)
  • The MIG meeting is cancelled and postponed to June.
  • The MIG-T meeting might be cancelled or postponed as well; those who have still to plan the travel are recommended to wait until the situation becomes more clear.