About Open Data
The City of Ottawa provides free access to many of its data sets through a dedicated data portal. The data is licensed under the Open Government License, making it easy to use and reuse. The City continues to add data to the catalogue and accepts requests from the public to post specific data.
To find data from other Canadian governments you can use the Government of Canada’s Open Government listings.
Open Data licence version 2.0
Introduction
This licence is based on version 2.0 of the Open Government Licence – Canada, which was developed through public consultation. The only substantive changes in this licence are to replace direct references to the Government of Canada with the City of Ottawa, replace a reference to the Federal Privacy Act with a reference to the Ontario Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, and remove a reference to the Federal Court of Canada.
Using information under this licence
Use of any Information indicates your acceptance of the terms below.
The Information Provider grants you a worldwide, royalty-free, perpetual, non-exclusive licence to use the Information including for commercial purposes subject to the terms below.
You are free to:
Copy, modify, publish, translate, adapt, distribute or otherwise use the Information in any medium, mode or format for any lawful purpose.
You must, where you do any of the above:
Acknowledge the source of the Information by including any attribution statement specified by the Information Provider(s) and, where possible, provide a link to this licence.
If the Information Provider does not provide a specific attribution statement, or if you are using Information from several information providers and multiple attributions are not practical for your product or application, you must use the following attribution statement:
Contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence – City of Ottawa.
The terms of this licence are important, and if you fail to comply with any of them, the rights granted you under this licence, or any similar licence granted by the Information Provider, will end automatically.
Exemptions
This licence does not grant you any right to use:
- Personal Information;
- Third party rights the Information Provider is not authorized to license;
- The names, crests, logos, or other official symbols of the Information Provider; and
- Information subject to other intellectual property rights, including patents, trade-marks and official marks.
Non-endorsement
This licence does not grant you any right to use the Information in a way that suggests any official status or that the Information Provider endorses you or your use of Information.
No warranty
The Information is licensed “as is”, and the Information Provider excludes all representations, warranties, obligations and liabilities, whether express or implied, to the maximum extent permitted by law.
The Information Provider is not liable for any errors or omissions in the Information, and will not under any circumstances be liable for any direct, indirect, special, incidental, consequential, or other loss, injury or damage caused by its use or otherwise arising in connection with this licence or the Information, even if specifically advised of the possibility of such loss, injury or damage.
Governing law
This licence is governed by the laws of the Province of Ontario and the applicable laws of Canada.
Legal proceedings related to this licence may only be brought in the courts of Ontario.
Definitions
In this licence, the terms below have the following meanings:
- “Information” means information resources protected by copyright or other information that is offered for use under the terms of this licence.
- “Information Provider” means City of Ottawa.
- “Personal Information” means “personal information” as defined in section 2(1) of the Ontario Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act.
- “You” means the natural or legal person, or body of persons corporate or incorporate, acquiring rights under this licence.
Versioning
This is version 2.0 of the Open Government Licence – City of Ottawa. The Information Provider may make changes to the terms of this licence from time to time and issue a new version of the licence. Your use of the Information will be governed by the terms of the licence in force as of the date you accessed the information.
Updated: 8 September 2016
Open Data License change: FAQ
The City of Ottawa has implemented a new “Open Data Licence”, replacing the “Open Data – Terms of Use” that previously governed the usage and distribution of City of Ottawa data sets.
The Open Data License is based on version 2.0 of the “Open Government Licence – Canada” which was developed through public consultation and consultation with other jurisdictions. The only substantive changes in this licence are to replace references to the Government of Canada with the City of Ottawa, replace a reference to the Federal Privacy Act with a reference to the Ontario Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act, and remove a reference to the Federal Court of Canada.
Q: What is the purpose of the Open Data Licence?
A: The Open Data licence governs the usage of data made available by the City of Ottawa through its Open Data platform. It establishes what users can do with the data, what their responsibilities are, and clarifies the exemptions that are not covered by the licence.
The licence helps ensure that Open Data can be as beneficial as possible to residents and businesses by providing an updated framework for using data.
Q: Why were the Terms of Use replaced by the Open Data Licence?
A: Replacing the Terms of Use with the new Open Data Licence allows the City’s Open Data program to simplify the usage, modification and distribution of the data provided through its Open Data platform. Essentially, the goal is to reduce or eliminate as many barriers as possible to the free and open use of data provided by the City of Ottawa.
Different terms of use and licences across jurisdictions make it difficult for users, researchers and developers to fully benefit from open data originating from various government sources. Creating a coherent licensing framework across the municipal, provincial and federal levels facilitates the combination of data sets to create useful analyses or applications.
Adopting a common licensing framework has been an objective of the Open Data program since the first year of its launch in 2010. The creation of the Canadian licence, its positive reception by the public and adoption by many jurisdictions now provides the City with this opportunity.
Q: What are some of the important changes in the Open Data Licence?
A: The Open Data Licence eliminates distribution and proprietary interest wording. Often, this is a barrier for users and businesses that utilize multiple organizational data sets in their applications. The license also adds versioning and definitions sections: versioning helps users know when changes are made to the licence; definitions help clarify terms and reduce ambiguity when using data governed by the licence.
Q: What is the impact to users who obtained data from the City’s Open Data program under the old Terms of Use?
A: Any data set(s) previously accessed under the Terms of Use will continue to be governed by those terms; however, as of 8 September 2016, all data sets accessed through the City of Ottawa’s Open Data website will be governed by the new licence. For example, if data set “x” was accessed before 8 September 2016, it is governed by the terms of use; if the same data set is accessed on or following 8 September 2016, it is governed by the new licence.
Q: Was there any cost to adopting this license?
A: There were no costs associated with the adoption of this license outside of staff time.
Q: How will we ensure that we remain consistent with the Canadian Open Government License?
A: Staff participate in several inter-jurisdictional Open Data working/knowledge sharing groups. Any update to the Canadian license will be discussed within these groups and provide opportunity to assess changes to Ottawa’s license.
Users are encouraged to familiarize themselves with the new Open Data Licence which can be found at City of Ottawa’s Open Data website.
For any additional enquiries, please email opendata@ottawa.ca
Open Data - Glossary
As the site evolves, we plan to make each type of data available in multiple formats; however, it will take some time to get there. Not all data will be available in all formats and other formats may be added to this list.
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CSV
A basic text format that can be opened by many spreadsheet applications such as Excel. Read about CSV format on Wikipedia
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XLS
A basic text format that can be opened by many spreadsheet applications such as Excel. Read about XLS on Wikipedia
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DWG
DWG is a GIS standard format native to Autodesk design and GIS software. It is supported by a wide variety of CAD applications. Read about DWG format on Wikipedia
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KML
KML is an XML-based language developed by Keyhole Inc. and subsequently acquired by Google to display data in Google Maps, Google Earth and similar applications. KML is an Open Geospatial Consortium standard. Read about KML format on Wikipedia
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SHP
SHP (pronounced "shape") is a format native to ESRI GIS software. It can be consumed by a wide variety of ESRI and non-ESRI software packages. Read about SHP format on Wikipedia
A note about projections:
- DWG and SHP formats are projected in MTM Zone 9, NAD83 (CSRS)
- KML and CSV/XLS formats are projected in latitude, longitude (WGS84); this is relevant for CSV/XLS files only if they contain latitude and longitude.