On 8 May 2012, at the tGovernment Workshop 2012, the Chair of the OASIS TGF, John Borras and the Chair of the ADMS Working Group, João Rodrigues Frade, presented how the TGF and the ADMS fit into the transformational government movement (tGovernment).

The European Interoperability Framework (EIF) of the Interoperability Solutions for European Public Administrations (ISA) Programme provides a conceptual framework for organisations, in particular public administrations, to understand the several levels of interoperability. In the ISA context, interoperability means the facilitation of cross-border and cross-sector information exchange, taking into account legal, organisational, semantic and technical aspects. The EIF provides a set of recommendations for achieving interoperability without prescribing specific standards and specifications. The new Transformational Government Framework (TGF) of OASIS  hooks onto the interoperability levels of the EIF. For each level, it sets out policies, strategies, methods and standards which should be considered in any transformational (government) programme.

For example, at a semantic level the TGF recommends governments to adopt a Metadata Management Policy as explained in ISA’s whitepaper: “Towards Open Government Metadata” . At this same level, the TGF recommends the adoption of ISA’s Asset Description Metadata Schema (ADMS) for improved sharing of government’s resources and assets.

 The conclusion of the presentation made by John Borras and João Rodrigues Frade was that the adoption of specifications like ADMS, which enhance, expand and promote the reuse of existing assets and capabilities, can generate significant improvement to the delivery of public services with little investment. It is all about forward-looking policies which create a context for transformation through “a managed process of ICT-enabled change in the public sector, which puts the needs of citizens and businesses at the heart of that process and which achieves significant impacts on the efficiency and effectiveness of government”.

Further Information:

• Original news article – Joinup website
• tGovernment Workshop 2012
• European Interoperability Framework (EIF)
• Interoperability Solutions for European Public Administrations (ISA) Programme
• Transformational Government Framework (TGF) of OASIS
• Metadata Management Policy
• “Towards Open Government Metadata” Whitepaper
• Asset Description Metadata Schema (ADMS)