From the blog
The Open311 specification and implementations have developed rapidly in recent months and several developers and service providers have already integrated the first version of the specification into their technology. San Francisco has also moved their API from just being available for testing to being deployed as a live, in-production web service. A full list of services and applications using this version of the API will be made available shortly.
From the outset, the API development has been versioned so that new specifications can be advanced while coexisting with older ones. With this in mind, the developer community, cities, and companies have been moving the conversation forward to evolve and improve the first specification so that it can be used by a wider audience. The mailing list has come alive with feedback on a wide variety of issues and the two cities currently driving this forward the most, San Francisco and Washington D.C., have come together to agree on and fully interoperate with a new Open311 GeoReport v2 specification. Both of these cities are accepting requests for API keys (San Francisco, Washington D.C.) to develop with the new specification. A full run down of the changes and advancements will be made available shortly, but one of the first things you might notice is that we are now referring to this specification as the Open311 GeoReport API. The reason for this name is to clarify the specific functionality provided within the umbrella of all things that 311 services provide. It’s also meant to make it more obvious that the specification applies to those who do not associate these services with the “311″ name or shortcode.
We look forward to hearing your feedback so that we can better clarify the Open311 GeoReport v2 specification and give everyone a better sense of the current state of the Open311 effort. Please speak up here in the comments or on the mailing list. Also feel free to contact me directly. We hope to hear from anyone interested in innovating around this common foundation to help improve our cities and all communities.
Here’s the announcement from SFgov.org:
We are pleased to announce the release of our Open311 API. The design is a result of a collaborative effort between cities, non-profits and developers. We look forward to seeing what you produce.
You can request an API key from their website and read-up on the Open311 API spec and developer resources here on this website. If you have any questions or comments, please leave them here or on the mailing list. We look forward to working with the developer community and seeing some amazing Open311 apps!
As White House CIO Vivek Kundra joined San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, CIO Chris Vein, and Tim O’Reilly to signal the launch of the Open311 API in San Francisco the work towards spreading an open standard gained huge momentum. Yet we still need continued coordination and collaboration to deliver the vision of a distributed open platform that can be used in communities everywhere.
Both San Francisco and Washington D.C. are preparing to deploy their Open311 APIs within the next week and we will continue to provide updated information on API methods, registering API keys, and the distinction between using the API as a sandbox for testing and using it for full deployment. We will also be sure to clarify any nuances regarding the API implementation in these different cities - such as XML versus JSON output.
This is also a good opportunity to provide more background on the development of Open311. First, the history of the open model:
FixMyStreet was launched in the UK by MySociety almost exactly 3 years ago. This was followed by similar projects in other countries like Verbeter De Buurt in The Netherlands and SeeClickFix in the U.S.. About a year ago John Geraci started a dialog on DIYCity about providing this capability for the 311 system in NYC. This conversation caught the attention of The Open Planning Project which had been developing the idea too. The conversation also caught the attention of Dmitry Kachaev in Washington D.C. who was preparing to launch the second round of the Apps for Democracy contest. As D.C. prepared to open their 311 API, The Open Planning Project began to coordinate this as something that could be made into an open standard and created Open311.org to facilitate this.
Working towards an open standard: In mid 2009 D.C. developed their initial 311 API spec and SeeClickFix also released a draft spec. D.C. launched their API in the summer of 2009 and had many apps developed around it as part of their Apps for Democracy contest. In October of 2009, we held the Open311 DevCamp to help coordinate the development of this standard and related technologies with many different cities and companies. This also signaled the initial development of the Open311 API spec in San Francisco. The team in San Francisco led by Alissa Black and Jay Nath continued to facilitate development of the spec over several months with the input of many people involved in this effort like Dmitry in D.C., Kam Lasater at SeeClickFix, and myself. The current spec in San Francisco reflects this collaboration and their leadership to convene others. The D.C. API spec has also been undergoing a revision to bring it more inline with the spec that has been developed in San Francisco. The specification will continue to evolve through incremental iterations to allow greater interoperability and a better experience for developers and citizens using Open311 services.
The Open311 API spec coordinated by San Francisco is available on the wiki. Despite the fact that the APIs have not quite yet been deployed and some details of the spec have yet to be fully documented, we can already see some examples of the developer community preparing to work with it.
We look forward to working with other cities in support of this standard. Some cities like Boston and Edmonton are set to open their APIs in the near future and other cities like Seattle and Portland do not yet have a call center and should stand to gain a lot by being involved with this initiative from a fresh start. We also look forward to closer involvement with international efforts like Ushahidi. Ushahidi is a collaborative issue tracker which played a crucial role in the response to the earthquake in Haiti.
Stay tuned for more details about the deployment of the APIs, the release of reference implementations, and code libraries that can help provide integration with existing 311 systems.
Please leave us with your questions and comments and let’s continue to work together.
As San Francisco and Washington D.C. prepare to launch their new APIs we’d like to have other cities and managers of 311 services show their support for implementing an interoperable standard for these APIs. The more cities get behind this effort, the better for developers, for city budgets, and for citizens. Showing a critical mass of support for using this standard will help encourage developers, other cities, and existing 311 services to become more invested in the potential of an interoperable system.
A standard means that people can use their favorite app in every city and developers can focus on new features rather than different requirements for each city. Everyone can then benefit from new innovations built from a common foundation. Additionally, interoperability is helpful not only to simplify the offering of citizen interfaces, but also to help unify and better facilitate inter-agency coordination for city managers.
To date, the people who have joined San Francisco and Washington D.C. by showing their support for implementing a standard API include directors of these services and CIO or CTOs in cities like Boston, Portland, Edmonton, Seattle, and Los Angeles as well as those from services like SeeClickFix and Ushahidi.
Please take the pledge and show your support.
Both San Francisco and Washington D.C.are preparing to release their Open311 APIs next month.
Over the past several months, Alissa Black and Jay Nath having been working within the technology team in San Francisco to incorporate public feedback for the development of the Open311 API. The current proposal can be seen on the wiki.
Dmitry Kachaev in Washington D.C. is also preparing to relaunch the D.C. API incorporating the changes of their v2 draft while paying attention to the API spec that San Francisco has worked on in an attempt to start working out interoperability between cities.
Progress has also been made on ways to provide integration between geographically disparate APIs. The current proposal is an approach modeled after DNS and reverse-geocoding called GeoWeb DNS. The way this fits in with the Open311 API is illustrated in this system architecture diagram. There’s a description of the GeoWeb DNS service on the wiki and a reference implementation is available at: http://geodns.open311.org
The San Francisco team is holding their final public conference call before they launch their Open311 API. The call is open for all to join and provide feedback, comments, and ideas as they move from their development phase to the actual launch. The invitation for the call as posted on the sfgov.org website:
Public Conf Call 2/25 @ 10AM PST
Please join our public conference call this Thursday @ 10AM Pacific.
Dial in: 641.715.3625
Pin: 813951#The topics to be discussed are:
- design spec
- other cities pledge to use standard Open311 protocol
- feedback on a few modifications we may make to spec (addition of metadata call)
- open questions
- mailing list Please join!
Please join the conversation and help ensure that the APIs are well equipped to serve these cities and the developers working with them.
About Open311.org
This website is meant to facilitate an international effort to build open interoperable systems that allow citizens to more directly interact with their cities. Learn more →
Open311.org is managed and supported by OpenPlans, a NYC-based non-profit technology organization dedicated to making cities work better.
