Interconnected Parliaments

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Collaborative software and content development
Flavio Zeni UN-DESA - Nairobi
Interconnected Parliaments Africa
i-Parliaments Action Plan
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Collaboration is ....

• ... SMART and GOOD
• our presentation assumes that!
• ...after all we are here because in 1889 people
  saw the benefits of an inter-parliamentary
  collaboration and founded IPU ...
• ... UN are about collaboration
• ... ICTs are about collaboration
• Collaboration... SMART and GOOD!

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Please note ...

• I have said that
• collaboration is
• SMART and GOOD
• I have NOT said or implied that
• collaboration is
• EASY, CHEAP or
• without PROBLEMS

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Collaboration about ...

• This presentation try to identify
• the types of collaborations that
• actually do exploit at best
• present technological environment
• Collaboration/sharing might also lead to
  cost-saving and synergies
• but the core rationale to adopt a
  collaborative software and content development is
• quality and sustainability
• for ALL Parliaments

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Context Parliaments have similar...

• similar inputs
• speeches make by people (MPs, experts, etc.)?
• written documents (bill, questions, motions, etc.
• similar macro-processes (with different
  procedures)?
• plenary proceedings
• committees proceedings
• management of the flow of the above documents
• similar output
• verbatim/minute/reports/agenda/etc.

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Context Similar needs but ...
Parliaments use different systems that have
very similar features and functionality, in the
best case. There are affluent parliaments
that are likely (not guaranteed)? to have better
system then less affluent parliaments There
is growing digital divide among do and do-not
parliaments
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Context ICTs uniqueness ...

• ICTs are
• very reusable, very adaptable, very
  accessible and reproducible at very low marginal
  costs
• even more
• ICTs made possible the impossible
• the more information services/systems are
  used, the more diversified are the users
• -the better they become
• but also ...
• very dynamic and in constant evolution

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Why ICTs collaboration is not ...

• We agree that
• collaboration is smart and good
• Parliaments share more then what they
  differentiate them
• ICTs tools and services to get better the more
  they are used/shared
• Still not many parliaments seem to
  appreciate/exploit the opportunity that
  collaboration and sharing of tools and content
  could brings in terms of
• quality - sustainability - bridging the
  Digital Divide
• Why? ... you tell me!

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Collaboration at what level?

• ICTs have brought about technical opportunities
  that are unprecedented in at least two areas
• Access to information
• Collaboration
• removing
• time or geographical location limitations

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PREVALENT approach

• Access
• access documents (HTML/PDF)?
• access to ONLY document as the users were
  local and speaking the very same language
• Collaboration
• Exchange e-mails and documents
• no exploitation of creation of quality and
  sustainability through collaboration and sharing
  of applications

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ICTs opportunities potential

• Access
• structure/semantics
• across countries and languages
• across media
• Collaboration
• Development and maintenance of
• information services
• Information system

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Strategic GAP (needs)?

• .... between
• global/continental needs
• of economic integration and
• harmonisation of legislation
• but
• locally focused solutions
• national/institution focussed

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Strategic GAP (technologies)?

• .... between
• technological opportunities
• semantic web open/shareable solutions
• and
• practical approach
• e-paper paradigm
• no efforts to think global-continental in terms
  of standards, languages, search facilities, etc.
• no exploitation of sustainability through
  collaboration

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Technological opportunities

• Semantic web
• processing information according to its content
  (or meaning), and not only as a pure text by
  embedding computer readable specifications
  (XML/RDF/OWL) to make computer understand
  documents
• Open Source Development Model
• develop once, together, for better and more
  sustainable tools for all parliaments

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How did we in Africa fill the GAP ...

• AKOMA NTOSOParliamentary Document Open Access
  Infrastructure (XML/RDF/OWL)?
• BUNGENIParliamentary and legislative Information
  System (based on Open Source application and
  tools)?

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Strategic choices WHY?

• OPEN and COMMMON standards
• because they are the best way to
• address the political African agenda
• of economic integration of Africa and
• harmonisation of African legislation
• OPEN SOURCE and COMMON application
• because they are the best way to deliver
• high and sustainable quality information system
  and the critical mass to make this happen
• for ALL African Parliaments

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AKOMA NTOSO

• AKOMA NTOSO
• (Architecture for Knowledge-Oriented Management
  of African Normative Texts using Open Standards
  and Ontologies)?
• is a set of common standards to produce, classify
  and share digital Parliamentary and Legislative
  documents

Akoma Ntoso Linked Hearts a symbol used by
the Akan people of West Africa to represent
understanding and agreement
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Document components

• Content
• What exactly was written in the document
  (semantics)?
• Structure
• How the content is organized
• Presentation
• The typographical choices to present a document
  on screen or on paper.

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After HTML ... XML

• HTML helped make the Web a big success .. but
• it is just a publishing medium,
• it is constrained by its own simplicity and few
  rules not even strongly imposed
• A different format is required that provides
• Clear differentiation between visual aspect and
  actual meaning and presentation
• Strong syntactic rules heavily imposed to
  guarantee uniformity, homogeneity, sophisticated
  applications

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XML describes structures ..

• Support for documents generation
• Drafting activities, record keeping, translation
  into national languages, etc.
• Support for workflow
• Management of documents across lifecycle,
  storage, security, timely involvement of relevant
  individuals and offices
• Support for citizens access
• Multi-channel publication (on paper and on the
  web), search, classification, identification
• Further activities
• Consolidation, version comparison, language
  synchronization, etc.

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XML-AKOMA NTOSO understands ..

• HMTL presents
• XML-Akoma Ntoso understands
• Understand ... means to make accessible the
  structures and semantic components of
  parliamentary and legislative documents in a
  machine readable format
• to deliver
• high qualities information service

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AKOMA NTOSO purpose

• Define a common FORMAT for recording
  parliamentary activities
• Define a MODEL for data interchange and open
  access to parliamentary documents
• Define a common African parliamentary DATA schema
• Define a common African parliamentary METADATA
  schema and ontology
• Define a mechanism for citation and CROSS
  REFERENCING of documents between parliaments

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AKOMA NTOSO document types
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(No Transcript)
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AKOMA NTOSO naming convention

• http//www.parliament.za/za/act/2003-03-12/3/eng_at_
• http//www.parliament.za/za/act/2003-03-12/3/eng_at_2
  005-07-13
• http//www.parliament.za/za/act/2003-03-12/3/eng_at_2
  007-05-03
• http//www.parliament.za/za/act/2003-03-12/3/eng
• RSA Act n. 3 of the 12 April 2003
• Original version
• Amended version (expression) of 13 July 2005
• Amended version (expression) of 3 May 2007
• Current consolidated version (expression)
• URI NOT URL ... IDENTIFICATION vs LOCATION

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BUNGENI Parliamentary and legislative
Information System
Bungeni is an integrated suite of multi-platform
architecture software applications, based
on Open Source Software and Open Standards that
automates the lifecycle of parliamentary
documents
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BUNGENI features

• Bill Process
• Motions and Questions
• Debate Records
• Parliamentary Business
• Votes and Proceedings
• Virtual Workspace
• Citizens' interactivity and participation

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The rationale for ...

• The rationale for developing and distributing
  Bungeni under a Free/Libre/Open Source Software
  (FLOSS) licence is
• to optimise its functionalities
• as far as possible as well as the
• geographical spread
• Please note that
• Regional, Provincial and also municipal
  assemblies are ... parliament-like
  organisations
• that have very similar information
  needs/requirements

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Development option optimisation

• The optimization strategy consists of
• using a commoditised software
• (e.g. the Plone/Zope, OpenOffice.org)?
• as a basis for the developments and make the
  public sector solution on top of that
  commoditised software and limit the development
  to what is absolutely necessary
• This approach
• contains investments,
• leverages the existing community
• creates fruitful synergies between public sector
  initiatives and communities increasing
  sustainability

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EC Study benefits

• Impact and return on investment of a FLOSS
  development project
• scaling effect (dividing the investment and
  maintenance between a number of partners)?
• independence (avoiding long term vendor lock-in
  and proprietary formats)?
• better response to specific public sector needs
• developing local innovation spirit, employment
  and knowledge
• Study on the effect on the development of the
  information society of European public bodies
  making their own software available as Open
  Source (2007)?

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Synergies

• PloneGov aims to create a common platform of
• Plone-based e-Government initiatives
• in order to promote information and best
  practices benchmarking and software sharing
• www.plonegov.org

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6 projects merged into PloneGov

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In summary ...

• XML technologies and collaboration are
• SMART and GOOD
• if you are not using or thinking to use
• XML family of technologies
• collaborative modalities (many forms and ways)?
• ... you SHOULD!

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Please note ...

• I have NEVER said or implied that
• XML-technologies/collaboration are
• EASY, CHEAP
• or without PROBLEMES
• ... we are NOT in the business
• of the easy things but the RIGHT things
• advanced information systems and services
• for ALL
• affluent and so so affluent parliaments

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A quote from ...
The Mythical Man-Month of Fred Brooks,
a classic in the software engineering
field "How does a project get to be a year
late? ...one day at a time"
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Thank you
Africa i-Parliaments Action Plan

• i-nterconnect Parliaments to make them
• to strengthen the role of African Parliaments in
  fostering Democracy and Good Governance in Africa