Following the great success of the Data Providers Workshops held in 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019, the GEO Community was ready in 2020 to participate to the 1st Open Data and Open knowledge Workshop in China; Covid didn’t allow it and therefore in 2023 the 1st GEO Open Data Open Knowledge workshop (ODOK) was held at the WMO Building, Geneva (Switzerland), from 15th to 16th June 2023. The workshop was organized by the Data Working Group, GEOSS Platform Team, and GEO Knowledge Hub Team with the overall coordination done by the GEO Secretariat and the GEO Community.

Being a workshop widely supported by the GEO community, in two days of the event, ODOK counted 17 sessions (Thematic and practical), totalizing 38 hours of content. To fill these sessions, 95 speakers from 76 organizations coming from 5 continents participated. The figure below presents the participating organizations in ODOK 2023.

With this large amount of available content, ODOK created the perfect atmosphere for sharing content and knowledge related to Open EO Data and Open EO Knowledge practices. As a result, ODOK had approximately 400 participants, 193 in person and nearly 200 online.

The figure below presents an overview of ODOK through some numbers. We can see that the GEO community actively participated in the event.

Thematic sessions

To foster discussion on Open EO Data and Open EO Knowledge in the various areas of the GEO community, nine thematic sessions were held at ODOK. These sessions cover a wide range of topics:

Space-based data and data cubes
Very-high resolution data
Cloud providers and Open Data and Knowledge
In Situ Data
Capacity development
Youth community of practice
Open Data & Knowledge principles and Data Licensing aspects
Private sector contributions to the Open Data and Open Knowledge
Role of Regional GEOs

The figure below shows the name of each session held during the two days of the event. In addition to the sessions presented, an opening session was held.

The workshop follows the endorsement of the GEO Statement on Open Knowledge in 2021. It aims to enable all GEO Work Programme activities to embrace open knowledge practices. Thus, with this wide variety of topics, the GEO community had the opportunity to discuss the benefits, opportunities, and challenges involved in Open Data and Open Knowledge activities.

Practical sessions

To foster Open Knowledge practices, for the very first time, during the workshop, practical sections were held to allow GEO Work Programme Activities to present to the GEO community how the data, tools, and knowledge produced in their initiatives can be used. Those sessions covered various topics:

In situ data management
Knowledge preservation and sharing
Data Cubes applications
Water management and forecast services
Crop analysis
Spatiotemporal analysis using open-source tools.

In total, eight practical sessions (hands-on) were held. The figure below shows the title of each session. This document deals with specific details of each session in the following topics.

Based on this broad community interaction, different initiatives were able to interact and discover that joint work can be done, thus showing that the approach of sharing not only the data but all the knowledge produced by the GEO Work Programme Activities is a game changer in the way the GEO community performs its activities. These interactions are hoped to generate new joint projects and activities in the GEO community.

Content availability

ODOK 2023 produced a lot of content. In the spirit of Open Data and Open Knowledge, all these materials are being made freely and openly available to the GEO community. Listed below are the contents already available.

Impact report

The Impact Report with the actions identified by the GEO Community in the ODOK 2023 sessions is already available on the GEO Knowledge Hub. To access it, please, use the following link: doi.org/10.60566/tmdyw-qqk49.

Presentations

The files of all presentations and extra materials shared during the ODOK 2023 are now available on the GEO Knowledge Hub (doi.org/10.60566/sh0h7-efa36).

Photos

Photos of the event can be found in ODOK 2023 Flickr (https://flic.kr/s/aHBqjALb9K) . Below, a couple of photos from ODOK 2023 are presented:

Videos

The recordings from all sessions will be available soon.

Community comments

The ODOK 2023 triggered many positive reactions in the GEO community. Listed below are some of the comments we received from the community.

“Thank you all who have supported it. We need now to look for all the valuable information captured during the workshop to build on, producing results and new success stories strengthening GEO and its global Community”
“Thank you all for a job well done!”
“Thank you so much for your excellent job for the GEO ODOK workshop! It was very successful. Next generation for GEO was nice too”
“I was expecting a “political” conference and found interesting technical presentations!”
“First of all, let me express my enormous appreciation for the excellent work in organizing ODOK-2023. I am very grateful for the honor to present our work to the GEO community. Congratulations and thanks!”
“Thank you for your hard and great work on the amazing workshop. Congratulations to the team”
“Congratulations on a great job! Thank you for inviting me to this discussion. Looking forward to advancing the conversations from this meeting”
“Big congratulations on the success of the event. You were really great, and I want to thank you personally for the warm reception”
“Thank you for your email and opportunity to be part of the best Open Data and Open Knowledge Workshop 2023. Digital Earth Africa expresses its gratitude for the participation in the various sessions, connecting with participants from all over the world and establishing friendships that will blossom at the Geo Week 2023”
“I enjoyed much the presentations, the discussions, and I am grateful for the excellent organization and support you offered to the whole community”
“Thanks so much for the invitation, I event was very interesting, and I was very happy to attend”
“Thanks again so much for the invitation to the workshop. It was great to see the geo community and hear about the challenges and projects going on”
“Great conversations… glad to have been part of these discussions and sharing our perspectives. Thanks Group on Earth Observations (GEO) Secretariat for organizing this event and leading the conversation on Open Data Open Knowledge #ODOK2023 “
“This was a great event. The community is there and engaged, many ideas are there too, it is our challenge now to take the best of it to implement FAIR GEO Open Knowledge. “
“Intense days, significant exchanges with experts, stakeholders, decision makers. GEO is bringing together the geospatial community in way that facilitates dialogue, supports the definition of common goals, and strengthens and fosters new partnerships. Thank you GEO. “
“Thanks colleagues at Group on Earth Observations (GEO) Secretariat for an intense and well organized event… Great conversations by the GEO community on Open Data and Open Knowledge. “

Next events

To continue the ODOK discussions and keep fostering the Open Data and Open Knowledge practices, the following events have already started to be planned:

During GEO Week 2023 an ODOK follow up workshop will be organized in Cape town South Africa
ODOK 2024 location and dates will be announced asap.