USE OF TECHNOLOGICAL TOOLS IN THE DISSEMINATION OF CENSUS DATA

1. USE OF TECHNOLOGICAL TOOLS IN THE DISSEMINATION OF CENSUS DATA Some examples to make the census results available to the users United Nations Regional Seminar on Census Data Dissemination and Spatial Analysis 14-17 September, 2010 Nairobi, Kenya 1/31

2. Summary Overview on census dissemination tools census databases and interactive tools: - CensusInfo - CSPro - Redatam - PC-Axis - MSIS - Istar 3. Some suggestions for selecting census dissemination tools

3. 1. Overview on dissemination tools • Printed tables and reports • Computer media (CD_ROMs, DVD-ROMs, USB drivers) • Online dissemination: static web pages • census databases and web-based interactive tools for tabulating, analyzing and presenting data in graphs or in other formats • GIS web based mapping tools

4. 2. census databases and interactive tools - CensusInfo • A software application for disseminating census results • Developed by the United Nations Statistics Division, in partnership with UNICEF and UNFPA, to help countries disseminate their census results at different geographical levels • It is based on DevInfo database technology with added specific functionalities to meet census dissemination requirements • Organizes data by indicators, time periods, and geographic areas with extensive metadata based on international standards • Contains a core set of census indicators with options to add country-specific indicators, and can be customized to meet country-specific requirements • Can import data from other applications, such as CSPro and Redatam, and generates user-defined standard reports, tables, graphs and maps • http://www.devinfo.info/censusinfo/

5. 2. census databases and interactive tools - CensusInfo

6. 2. census databases and interactive tools - CSPro • The Census and Survey Processing System (CSPro) is a software package used for entry, editing, tabulation, and dissemination of census and survey data • The data are stored in (ASCII) text files described by data dictionaries • CSPro allows to define and select variables to tabulate. Tabulations can be saved in several formats. Tables can be copied to spreadsheets or word-processing documents. It produces tables by geographic area, and map results by geographic area • Map Viewer is a module of CSPro that allows you to create, view and print thematic maps. It is not a GIS • CSPro was developed jointly by the U.S. Census Bureau, Macro International, and Serpro, SA, with major funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development • CSProis in the public domain, www.census.gov/ipc/www/csproand as commercial software (CSProX), http://www.serpro.com

7. 2. census databases and interactive tools - Redatam • Redatam is an acronym for REtrieval of DATA for small Areas by Microcomputer • Developed and maintained by the Latin American and Caribbean Demographic Centre (CELADE) - http://www.eclac.org/redatam/ • It has modules for creating, managing, processing and disseminating very large hierarchical census and other databases • The user can define any area of interest in a database (such as city blocks) or any combination of areas, create new variables, obtain various types of tabulations, export outputs to other software and graphically display results • The data at different geographical levels can be combined hierarchically to create aggregated variables and the results shown on maps or transferred to a geographical information system (GIS) • WebServer, the latest module, is used for requesting information on-line from a Redatam database on an intranet, extranet or the Internet

8. 2. census databases and interactive tools - Redatam the Redatam+SP XPlan application for the 2008 population and housing census, developed using the Redatam platform Web server.

9. 2. census databases and interactive tools - PC-Axis • PC-Axis was originally designed for population census in Sweden and it is now supported by UNECE in the framework of a Consortium • The objective is to develop a common statistical data dissemination system in UNECE region. It is also integrated with the following modules: • PX-Map is a Windows program which allows you to create maps • PX-Make helps you to create PC-Axis files, by entering metadata • PX-Edit is a tool for editing, manipulating and generating PC-Axis files • PX-Web is a solution for the web. It works with PC-Axis files. PX-Web can also be a part of a solution with connection to SQL databases • http://www.pc-axis.scb.se/

10. Age Country Year 2. census databases and interactive tools - PC-Axis It is based on multidimensional cubes as requested by EU census hub The Eurostat Census Hub project is based on the production of multi-dimensional tables (hypercubes) covering common census variables in all 27 member states of the EU. It uses the SDMX standards for data exchange

11. 2. census databases and interactive tools - PC-Axis • The outputs are: • projecting cubes to tabular format • creating graphs • creating maps

12. 2. census databases and interactive tools - MSIS MSIS is the joint UNECE / Eurostat / OECD Group on the Management of Statistical Information Systems The project made available an inventory of software for statistical dissemination: http://www1.unece.org/stat/platform/display/msis/7.2+Produce+dissemination+products •Business Tool Box •CoSSI •ISTAR •Jaxi •PC-Axis •PX-Map2 •Remote Execution Environment for Microdata •SDMX ISTAT Framework •SDMX to Geospatial Coded and RDF Outputs •StatFlow •StatWeb

13. 2. census databases and interactive tools - ISTAR • Istar, is an open source approach to disseminate statistical data on the web developed by ISTAT, the Italian Institute of Statistics. It is planned to be used also for the 2011 population and housing census in Kosovo • It is an Integrated Output Management System for statistical data warehousing • It integrates not only data warehouses and metadata information systems, but also descriptive and textual information. The system offers a set of packages to extract data from statistical sources, transform them into other formats, load the data into statistical data warehouses or data banks and make the information available to many different users • Istaris a collection of tools specifically designed to support the statisticians in the several phases required to disseminate statistical aggregate data on the Web starting from a collection of validated data • The module for the access to the data via web (WebMD) was also developed in a open source environment • http://dawinci.istat.it/

14. 2. census databases and interactive tools - ISTAR The object of interest is the unit of analysis, e.g. resident population, residential density, percentage of population aged 65 and over, etc. The classifications correspond to the statistical characteristics used to classify the units of analysis

15. 2. census databases and interactive tools - ISTAR The territory represents the spatial reference of the data The year is the time reference of the data

16. 2. census databases and interactive tools - ISTAR The folder Tables contains the list of all tables corresponding to the previously performed selections The module WebMD allows also to navigate interactively among different pages in order to select different tables without starting the procedure from the beginning The geographic component of the application is under development.

17. 3. Some suggestions for selecting census dissemination technological tools • Developing cooperation with other statistical organizations, creation of regional groups to harmonize data outputs • Maximizing involvement of statisticians to develop statistical products and minimizing involvement of software resources • Preferring open source software • Keeping balance between own IT staff at the NSO and outsourcing

18. THANK YOU for your attention! roberto.bianchini@uniroma1.it