We caught up with Iain, an internet engineering researcher at the University of Aberdeen, and the sole remaining member of team #FOIAWiki, just after he announced that the team’s project was complete! Local authorities are required to make disclosures under the Freedom of Information Act 2000, and a log of these disclosures made by Aberdeen City Council is available on their website. Currently the log is not searchable and it can be difficult for a visitor to the site to determine if anyone has made a similar request for information disclosure to one that you may plan to make.
The #FOIAWiki has taken the existing disclosures out and adapted them into a database to linked data standards, so that other people can use it. It allows searches to be made by keyword, incorporates data from two local authorities so far, and is based on modular scrapers so that data pertaining to other local authorities can be contributed.
You can read more about what Iain and Johnny (not pictured) have been doing on Iain’s blog.
Code The City 