Projects Using the DDI
Projects Using the DDI
Many projects across a wide variety of substantive fields use and support the DDI including the following:
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Administrative Data of the German Federal Employment Agency
The Institute for Employment Research (IAB) in Germany is making the documentation developed for administrative data of the Federal Employment Agency compliant with DDI 3 to allow for import and export. The DDI 3.0 information will be used to present documentation in many different ways in the new knowledge management system.
This facility, which uses Nesstar, provides online access to approximately 2,000 datasets archived with the Australian Social Science Data Archive between 1975 and the present. Areas covered include economics, demography, politics, sociology, psychology, health, law and education. The facility allows browsing, download and online analysis of data.
The initiative provides a single interface that facilitates access to a wide range of social and economic data on California. Documentation underlying "Counting California" was tagged using Version 1 of the DDI specification.
The threefold aim of this project is (1) to provide specialist support for members of the academic community wishing to work with secondary, comparative European survey data sets; (2) to develop information systems designed to improve the accessibility of comparative survey data; and (3) to carry out methodological research to improve the conceptualisation and operationalisation of inter-national and inter-cultural analyses. Users are able to obtain custom output from the CCESD system in three formats, including XML DDI, SPSS files,MS Excel, and CSV.
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Canadian Research Data Centres (RDCs)
The Research Data Centres (RDC) Program is part of an initiative by Statistics Canada, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) and university consortia to help strengthen Canada's social research capacity and to support the policy research community. The program is supported by the Canadian Foundation for Innovation (CFI) and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR). RDCs provide researchers with access, in a secure university setting, to microdata from population and household surveys.
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Census Aggregate Information Resource Demonstrator (CAIRD) Project
This project of the Census Dissemination Unit (CDU) of Mimas at the University of Manchester is a Web service that creates a gateway for users to access aggregate Census data or customize their access to it. The project uses an SDMX/DDI system to document a large data cube.
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DataFerrett is the browser for the DataWeb, an organization of databases located across the Web. DataFerrett supports metadata searches across surveys, on-the-fly variable recoding, complex tabulations, and graphics. DataFerrett is working to promote interoperability with the DDI format.
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Centers for Medicare/Medicaid Services (CMS) Denominator File Project
The purpose of this project, which is being conducted by the Research Data Assistance Center at the University of Minnesota, is to compile, organize, and structure the documentation for the Medicare beneficiary demographic and enrollment data so the documentation is suitable for research and statistical use. To accomplish this goal, the project is employing the DDI.
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The CESSDA Portal provides access to a portal of European quantitative social science datasets using an easy-to-use Web interface. It harvests statistical datasets and variables published on the Web from the European social science data archives and organizes them using a set of multilingual thesauri and taxonomies, with Nesstar for online analysis.
The following archive collections are available through the Portal:
- Slovenia Social Science Data Archive (ADP)
- Italian Social Science Data Archive (ADPSS-Sociodata)
- Danish Data Archives
- Finnish Social Science Data Archive
- GESIS-ZA (German Social Science Infrastructure Services, Central Archive for Empirical Social Research) ZACAT
- National Center for Social Research (EKKE), Greek Social Data Bank (GSDB)
- Norwegian Social Science Data Service
- Swiss Information and Data Archive Service for the Social Sciences (SIDOS)
- United Kingdom Data Archive (UKDA)
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CIVICACTIVE is a project pertaining to elections and referendums in Europe, and this site, which uses Nesstar, is part of the dissemination strategy of the CIVICACTIVE project. It provides an online database of aggregated election statistics from European Parliament elections: national parliamentary and presidential elections as well as EU-related referendums held in EU member countries during the period 1990-2007.
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Cultural Policy and the Arts National Data Archive (CPANDA)
CPANDA, an interactive digital archive of data on the arts and cultural policy in the U.S., uses the DDI extensively on their site.
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DAIS Nesstar System at Health Canada
This is a project, undertaken in partnership with Nesstar, to develop a Web-based data analysis system for use by Health Canada. DDI markup undelies the system.
DAMES is an ESRC research node in e-Social Science based at the Universities of Stirling and Glasgow. DAMES supports data management activities undertaken by social scientists, including preparing and enhancing data for analysis (e.g., recoding and constructing variables, linking datasets, cleaning data, and data manipulation.
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The Data Liberation Initiative Metadata Collection:
English | FrenchThe Data Liberation Initiative (DLI) is an excellent example of a cost effective method for improving data resources for Canadian post secondary institutions. With this program, participating institutions pay an annual subscription fee that allows their faculty and students unlimited access to numerous Statistics Canada public use microdata files, databases and geographic files. Use of these files is limited to academic research and teaching purposes.
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Dataset Documentation Manager (DSDM)
Developed by the Data Archive of GESIS, this tool imports SPSS data files; allows documentation of questions, sub-questions and answers; enables language-specific documentation; shows two languages concurrently on the screen; permits reuse of question documentation; exports into a DDI 2-compatible format, for Nesstar or long-term preservation; and exports into a DDI 3-compatible format, supporting enhanced publications.
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Via web application software, data citation standards , and statistical methods, the Dataverse Network project increases scholarly recognition and distributed control for authors, journals, archives, teachers, and others who produce or organize data; facilitates data access and analysis for researchers and students; and ensures long-term preservation whether or not the data are in the public domain.
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DevInfo
DevInfo offers easy access to information on human development. Developed by the UN, DevInfo enables national statistics offices, UN agencies, donors, NGOs, and civil society to prepare reports and presentations using this common database platform. The system has been endorsed by the UN Development Group and is being used in many countries to help track the Millennium Development Goals and other national priorities. The system organizes data by indicators, time periods and geographic areas with extensive metadata based on international standards. Version 5.0, includes significant advancements in handling metadata and conforms to standardized information sharing models for metadata storage and dissemination. These metadata standards help achieve efficiency by facilitating data exchange and harmonizing international and national data sets. DevInfo 5.0 is compliant with three international metadata standards for indicators, data sources, and digital maps: SDMX, DDI, and ISO 19115:2003.
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Documenting the Survey Life Cycle Using DDI
A pilot study was initiated during summer 2004 involving three Research Data Centres (Alberta, the Prairies, and McMaster) along with the Statistics Canada RDC and General Social Survey (GSS) Programs. This project consists of creating DDI documentation for the confidential data of GSS Cycle 17, assessing the information sources needed to complete this task, and evaluating the use of DDI documentation by researchers in an RDC. Overall, this project is trying to capture the information created during the life cycle of a GSS survey and to assess how much of this information can be recorded within DDI. The GSS uses a mix of systems during the production of a survey and part of the work is to identify this information (and its sources) and to map it into DDI elements. The research and analysis are based on data from Statistics Canada and the opinions expressed do not represent the views of Statistics Canada.
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This project, developed by the German Institute for Educational Progress (IQB) and hosted by Humboldt-University at Berlin, is an application of DDI 3 for large-scale assessments in education such as TIMSS and PISA.
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This project of DRIVER-II (Digital Repository Infrastructure Vision for European Research) has the objective of connecting publications to research data (evidence of the research), extra materials (to illustrate or clarify), and post-publication data (commentaries, ranking). DDI 3.0 will be used to document the research data.
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European Social Survey (ESS) and ESS-Edu-net
The European Social Survey (ESS) is a biennial multi-country survey covering over 30 nations. The first round was fielded in 2002/2003, the second in 2004/2005 and the third in 2006/2007. ESS data are provided in the Nesstar system. ESS EduNet is a training resource mainly developed for use in higher education. The ambition is to create a social science laboratory where theoretical questions can be explored using high quality empirical data. The resource, implemented in Nesstar, is based on the European Social Survey.
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Gallup serves the European Union by providing public opinion tracking in the candidate region. Authorized users can access and download the full data files of all publicly available Candidate Countries Eurobarometer surveys Gallup has carried out in the past four years through the Nesstar interface.
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The General Social Survey (GSS) is one of NORC's flagship surveys and our longest running project. The GSS started in 1972 and will begin its 27th round in 2008. For the last third of a century the GSS has been monitoring social change and the growing complexity of American society.
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ICPSR has marked up all of the metadata records in its catalog of holdings according to the DDI specification, specifically making use of the document, study, and file description components (<docDscr>, <stdyDscr>, and <fileDscr>).
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ICPSR Social Science Variables Database (SSVD)
The Social Science Variables Database, created with funding from the National Science Foundation as part of ICPSR's Infrastructure in the Social Sciences award (SES-9977984), is a project to demonstrate the effectiveness of searching across studies at the variable level to locate data of interest. Essentially, the SSVD lets you search for variables, compare variables across studies, and view the question text for select variables.
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Institute for the Study of Labor -- IZA
The Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in Bonn, Germany, is a private, independent research institute focusing on the economic analysis of national and international labor markets. The institute conducts extensive research in all relevant areas of labor economics and advises policymakers on current labor market issues. Financed by Deutsche Post World Net, IZA cooperates closely with the University of Bonn and other academic institutions.
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Israel Social Sciences Data Center (ISDC)
The ISDC Data Catalog contains information on over 600 datasets covering an extensive range of key economic and social quantitative data, spanning several disciplines and themes. The bulk of the datasets described in this catalog is in micro-level. Each dataset within the collection is described by bibliographic details, methodological information, abstract, geographical coverage and temporal coverage. Links to associated metadata include references to publications, subject keywords, extended metadata sources and links to related datasets, clustered in "Data Series".
The content of this catalog is structured in DDI format - an international standard for technical documentation describing social science data. The search engine is based on NESSTAR - a European software serving as an infrastructure for publishing and sharing data on the web.
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LISS (Longitudinal Internet studies in the Social Sciences)
This online panel survey, administered by CentERdata, a research institute located in Tilburg in the Netherlands, documents its data using DDI 3 through a backend called Questasy.
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Metadata Share Project (MSP)
Collaborators Duke University Library and Emory University Library support data collections that are similar/complementary, which makes it possible for them to divide up DDI metadata creation and share records across institutions, with each institution able to borrow and adapt DDI instances for particular needs.
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Michigan Questionnaire Documentation System (MQDS)
MQDS, developed by Survey Research Operations at the Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, documents Blaise instruments and produces survey documentation on the Web. MQDS can export documentation in DDI 3 format. Beginning in Summer 2009, MQDS will be part of the Blaise package.
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MIDUS II -- Midlife in the United States: A National Study of Health and Well-Being (ICPSR Mirror)
Sponsored by the National Institute on Aging and produced by the University of Wisconsin Survey Center, MIDUS II was undertaken to investigate the role of behavioral, psychological, and social factors in understanding age-related differences in physical and mental health. The study, conducted in 2004-2006, was a follow-up to MIDUS I, which was sponsored by the MacArthur Foundation. For MIDUS II the University of Wisconsin created interactive DDI-compliant documentation that can be used to investigate specific variables and navigate through the instrument.
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National Historical Geographic Information System
NHGIS provides U.S. aggregate census data and electronic boundary files for tracts and counties between 1790 and 2000. The search and retrival system is driven by DDI 2.1 documentation for over 300 studies.
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National Survey of Family Growth
ICPSR is participating in a collaborative project with other units of the University of Michigan's Institute for Social Research to conduct several waves of the National Survey of Family Growth, sponsored by the National Center for Health Statistics. ICPSR has prepared Web-based interactive documentation for the Wave 6 survey in DDI-compliant form.
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Nesstar provides a "seamless interface" between the user and the data and its documentation, through integrated data discovery, usage, and dissemination tools. The DDI is central to the ability of Nesstar to deliver these services. Nesstar is used by about one hundred institutions, and the number of installations is growing rapidly. Nesstar solutions for disemmination of data are found all over the world, both in academic and in public sector.
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Ontario Data Documentation, Extraction Service and Infrastructure <odesi>
<odesi>, the Ontario Data Documentation, Extraction Service and Infrastructure, is a Web-based data extraction system delivered thrugh Scholars Portal that provides central storage, ease of access, and simple data interpretation for key datasets. Carleton University, the lead institution for <odesi>, is working in close partnership with the University of Guelph to develop the system, which uses DDI 2 and Nesstar.
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Questionnaire Development Documentation System
The goal of this project, developed by the Center for Quantitative Methods and Survey Research at the University of Konstanz in Germany, is to create a system that allows permanent electronic documentation of questionnaire development and the final state of the instrument. The program will be suitable for paper&pencil, face-to-face and CATI instruments.
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Research Data Centre (FDZ) of the German Federal Employment Agency
This is a project, developed at the Institute for Employment Research (IAB) in Germany, to document restricted data like the Establishment Panel in DDI 3.
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Social Science Research Services (SSRS) and Social Science Libraries & Information Services (SSLIS) at Yale University
By making its catalog records DDI-compliant, Social Science Research Services at Yale University uses the DDI to inform the structure of StatCat, the Social Science Statistical Data Finder. They have also used the DDI to describe files in the Economic Growth Center Library Collection as part of a Mellon grant.
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Statistics New Zealand is in the process of building a Data Archive for Official Statistics which will use the DDI to store metadata for statistical collections.
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Survey Documentation and Analysis
SDA is a set of programs, developed and maintained by the Computer-assisted Survey Methods Program (CSM) at the University of California, Berkeley, for the documentation and Web-based analysis of survey data. SDA imports and exports DDI-compliant documentation.
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The Tromsø Study was initiated in 1974 in an attempt to help combat the high mortality due to cardiovascular diseases in Norway. The primary aim of the Tromsø Study was to determine the reasons for the high mortality rate, and also to develop ways of preventing heart attacks and strokes. The study was gradually expanded to include many other diseases.
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University of Chicago-UTCC Research Center
The University of Chicago-UTCC Research Center was established in August 2004 as a collaboration between the University of Chicago and University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce. The Center works to promote high-quality research in economics, business, and social science by providing a fertile environment for doing research among research fellows. The Center provides research data using Dataverse.
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The Vision of Britain Web site, a component of the Great Britain Historical Geographic Information System (www.gbhgis.org), provides a historical view of Britain between 1801 and 2001, including maps, statistical trends and historical descriptions.
A direct interface to the DDI-based structures is available.
The Great Britain Historical GIS Project is a unique digital collection of information about Britain's localities as they have changed over time. Information comes from census reports, historical gazetteers, travellers' tales and historic maps.
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World Bank -- International Household Survey Network (IHSN) and Microdata Management Toolkit
The World Bank and other international partners provide considerable support to statistical data collection in developing countries (mostly through household surveys and censuses). In September 2004, the World Bank created the International Household Survey Network (IHSN) (with various UN agencies, regional development banks, bilaterals, and other partners).
To ensure quality in documentation and data, the World Bank is creating a DDI-based "Survey Data Dissemination Toolkit". The Toolkit is a combination of an upgraded and custom-branded version of the Nesstar Publisher with an additional (open-source) application that will generate interactive CD-ROMs or Web sites. The World Bank will redistribute the Toolkit to all 81 IDA developing countries and to the IHSN members. Key survey sponsors (UNICEF, ILO, and others), and statistics offices in various countries are ready to adopt it as a standard. The intention is that the Toolkit will dramatically improve the preservation, documentation, and dissemination of microdata in/by developing countries. The DDI would therefore become a de facto metadata standard in all these countries.