The Open4Citizens Platform: A digital child of many small steps and collaboration experiences!
A conversation about incorporating new responsive technologies and developing a platform able to serve a “five-headed beast” of 5 different project contexts across Europe.
Just now in early October, the release of the 2nd version of the Open4Citizens platform is due! This will be a platform to be used for 5 upcoming Hackathons. The first will be held in Aalborg (DK) — the rest in Milano (I), Rotterdam (NL), Karlstad (SE) & Barcelona (S).
Sharing a glimpse ‘behind the scenes’, I convinced two of the hardworking programmers at the Danish company Dataproces to take time for an informal talk about insights and challenges as they construct the platform and prepare the code!
Louise: Hi Mehdi and Niki! — I know you are busy getting the platform all ready and set, so let’s dive straight into it. First of all, can you tell us, what concrete tasks you are working on just now?
Mehdi: Well, quite a few actually. We left tasks about setting up the platform for participants and their projects. Basically; how can we make participants link to a group — and make each group have only one project. In fact, we’re making it so, that the project is accessible only to the members of the group. Well, that’s where we’re at…
Niki: I just finished moving over and having the “data-introductions” part of the website from the 1st version and onto the upgraded platform. And right now, I’m working on the part of the platform that will have the projects themselves (the projects of the participants as they work in teams during each hackathon). Question is: How we best display it during the hackathon.
Louise: Is the Open4Citizens related work different from your usual tasks at Dataproces — and in what way?
Mehdi: As a team, we work on several projects all the same time — but yes: What we do in the Open4Citizens is different from what we’re usually doing. We’re using different technologies compared to what we’re using in other projects at Dataproces. In O4C we want and we need something more responsive from the design-side — and also server-wise; to follow the requests made by our participants. Well, let me put it like this; it’s not different technologies altogether, but it is a different language. We work with extracting data and automatization of manual solutions. It is a platform where you will have access to data, where you can manipulate data and where you can learn all that is needed to facilitate a hackathon.
Louise: How do you explain to your grandparents — or let’s say an old uncle over a family dinner, what it is that you’re working on?
Mehdi: Theoretically speaking of course — (laughing) — I don’t know.
I would say it’s a virtual place where you can gather around with friends or strangers and try to analyse data and try to understand data in order for you to unlock ideas from that data. In other words; you will be trying to come up with new solutions; project ideas, or some success stories for the municipality…
Niki: I just say I code things…I’m not very specific.
Louise: — and when you say you “code things” you don’t get any further questions?
Niki: Usually — I think most of the time — they almost give up when I say I code things. I can say sometimes; I build programmes, you know webpages and stuff — that’s about how far I get.
Louise: What is the biggest difference between the old and the new platform?
Mehdi: Well, we’re using a programming language and a framework that is totally different from the 1st one. We’ve been going forward with the vision of making the platform open source. We would like to make it easy for others to contribute in the future at a later stage of this project. This means that we’re breaking down the platform in multiple components that is easy to understand and easy to read through the code. If someone in the future wants to join the project it will be much easier to contribute.
— And, it’s definitely much faster and much more secure.
Louise: What frameworks and languages are at play?
Mehdi: Specifically, we’re using Django to build up our web service and the back-end communication — this is based on Python. Also, we’re using Angular as our front-end framework — and this is based on Typescript.
Louise: What music have you been listening to when you build the platform?
Niki: — laughing — that’s a crazy question… But okay, I listen to ‘metal’ and ‘trance’ all the time. I like having music when I code. It helps me focus in on things, it helps my concentration — I mean; I can’t live without my music.
Louise: In your opinion, what is the coolest feature of the platform?
Mehdi: Now, that’s a good question. I have no preferred parts actually. It’s all cool to me!
Louise: What was the hardest part to overcome of building this platform? — What have been your greatest victory?
Mehdi: I would say the solution in itself — that we have been able come up with a solution that will satisfy all of the partners in the project. This is probably our main success. I hope that we have been successful — but we will see during the upcoming hackathons! … If we succeed accommodating all the differences between the 5 different pilot locations and teams — that would really be the victory!!
Louise: Aha, you’re sort of ‘taming a five-headed beast’ — laughing — as you’re dealing with all these many partners?
Mehdi: Yeah. Exactly. Yes.
Louise: In your opinion, what will make this platform stand out?
Mehdi: The possibility to facilitate events inside this platform, this is what I would say is the main selling point.
— Other platforms don’t offer this possibility. They offer specific things such as either visualization of data, cleaning data or simply storage of data. They don’t offer the experience of getting raw files and then having them visualized.
Louise: How many hackathons do you “have on your CV”?
Mehdi: I don’t know. It’s not something I would put on my CV. I go to collect knowledge or participate. — Or simply because my friends are going. But I’ve been to quite a few hackathons in different fields, actually. More technical ones…
Louise: What was the most surprising moment as you’ve build the platform?
Mehdi: I would say the 1st round of hackathons in the O4C. This was a big knowledge door for us. We participated in the different hackathons — and we saw how people worked with each other, organised things… We could see how it’s very different from partner to partner! This allowed for us to do brainstorms back here; to come up with solutions that would satisfy all partners. I would say that this was key: the platform is a child of all these small experiences.
Niki: …I came in later in the process, I didn’t join these actual hackathons. I’m basically here to help get the platform done. I have had to ask a lot of questions — like; why do we have this? What’s going on? What’s the process? — I’m definitely the interrogator! Putting them (my colleagues) through nice long painful interrogations (laugher)
Louise: Okay, time will soon be up. But can you pin down the most important step in the process?
Mehdi: I think it was all important steps that we had to go through in order to get to where we are at now. To me all the little bits and things are of importance. Without the proceeding steps we wouldn’t be where we are today.
Louise: Thank you so much for taking your time with me!
As the interview comes to an end, we’re all caught up in laughter: I’m curious to know the favorite website of these epic platform builders. Expecting something secretive and Matrix-like, I ask Mehdi to repeat and spell his answer; “the wollyportal, what is that?”
It turns out I have actually misunderstood him refering to the “Boligportal.dk” as he’s just now looking for a new flat…
It’s an embarrassing confusion — but luckily we all laugh. It does however work as a reminder of how easy it is for misunderstandings to pop up as we collaborate in the bigger Open4Citizens project between competences and organisational contexts. I’m reminded how important it is with humour, dedication and an active continued translation between diverse perspectives — also when it comes to building a digital platform for a large project entity as the Open4Citizens.
I’m looking much forward to try out the platform — and so should you:
https:\\opendatalab.eu
(OBS: remember to disable e.g. add blocker or similar to access it!)
