World Bank Indicator Masher: Government Mashup by Fraunhofer FOKUS

Fraunhofer FOKUS takes part in the Apps4Development contest of the World Bank - http://appsfordevelopment.challengepost.com/

The World Bank data API provides statistical data and metadata for many indicators in select languages. The objective of the WB Indicator Masher by Fraunhofer FOKUS is it to showcase how this rich supply of data can be made accessible for more people as well as visualized and easily costumized to individual needs.

The WB Indicator Masher thus combines the Wold Bank data with the Google Translate API. This enables the presentation of the data descriptions and the user interface in many more languages than the original ones provided by the World Bank itself. Especially having the theme and indicator descriptions available in one¥s own language supports the understanding and usage of the data.

Once the desired language is selected the mashups fetches the data live from the World Bank and has it translated via the Google API. The user of the mashup can then browse or search through the different themes. Through selection of one theme the corresponding indicators are pulled from the World Bank server and presented to the user. By browsing and searching through the list of indicators the user can select one, of which he wishes to see the actual values. The values are first displayed as a plain list of data sorted alphabetically by countries. In the next step, the user can select to have the data visualized. Herefore the data is combinded with the Google Charts API which provides an easy to grasp graphical representation of the selected indicator. The graphics are created on the fly and present the data in a bar chart format and on a world map.

The user can go back to the indicator selection page, where he has the chance to create his own custom indicators. By combining existing indicators via basic mathematical formulas in the provided text editor new indicators can be constructed and than visualized just as the already existing World Bank indicators.

For the future a graphical interface to the indicator editor is planned, which will make the creation of customized indicators even easier. Additionally a late binding function will be implemented which allows the user to bring in different data and visualisation APIs into the showcased mashup.

Information concerning the project at Fraunhofer FOKUS can be found at http://www.fokus.fraunhofer.de/go/govmashups-en

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• World Bank
• Fraunhofer FOKUS
• API
• Indicator Masher
• Apps4Development
• Google Translate
• mashup
• eGov
• eGovernment
• Government Mashup