DCAT, DCAT-AP

Knowledge organizationOpen dataTechnology

DCAT (Data Catalogue Vocabulary) is a standard developed by the W3C organization for describing datasets in data catalogs.

DCAT (Data Catalogue Vocabulary) is a standard developed by the W3C organization to describe datasets in data catalogs so that publishers can increase the discoverability and enable applications to consume metadata from multiple catalogs. It further enables decentralized publishing of catalogs and facilitates federated dataset search across sites.

DCAT-AP (Application Profile) extends this standard so that it helps in meeting the needs of data portals in Europe while providing semantic interoperability (the ability of computer systems to exchange data with unambiguous, shared meaning) with other applications.

Related terms

Open data

Linked Open Data

Linked data is structured data which is interlinked with other data so it becomes more useful through semantic queries.

Statistics

SDMX

SDMX, which stands for Statistical Data and Metadata eXchange is an international initiative that aims at standardising and modernising statistical processes.

Technology

API – Application Programming Interface

An API is an interface that defines how, for example, software applications can communicate with each other. APIs allow different software systems to interact and share data.