Descriptions of reusable location information solutions : European Union location framework.
Date: 2017-02-07
Institutions: Joint Research Centre
Subjects: computer network, data processing, electronic government, information technology, public administration, public sector, public service, research report, satellite navigation

Descriptions of reusable location 
information solutions 

European Union 
Location Framework 

Max Stahlecker 
Zakaria Arrassi 
Stijn Goedertier 
Ana Fernández de Soria 
Francesco Pignatelli 
Ray Boguslawski 
Robin S. Smith 

2017 

EUR 28265 EN 

This publication is a Technical report by the Joint Research Centre, the European Commission’s in-house science 
service. It aims to provide evidence-based scientific support to the European policy-making process. The scientific 
output expressed does not imply a policy position of the European Commission. Neither the European 
Commission nor any person acting on behalf of the Commission is responsible for the use which might be made 
of this publication. 

Contact information 
Name: Francesco Pignatelli 
Address: Via Enrico Fermi 2749, 21027 Ispra (VA), Italy 
E-mail: Francesco.pignatelli@ec.europa.eu 
Tel.: +39 0332785659 

JRC Science Hub 
https://ec.europa.eu/jrc 

JRC104245 

EUR 28265 EN 

ISBN 978-92-79-64108-4 (PDF) 

ISSN 1831-9424 (online) 

doi:10.2791/325541 (online) 

© European Union, 2017 

Reproduction is authorised provided the source is acknowledged. 

All images © European Union 2017, unless otherwise specified 

ArchiMate® and TOGAF® are registered trademarks of The Open Group.  
ArchiMate© and TOGAF© are copyrights of The Open Group. All rights reserved. 
Archi is a registered trademark of Phillip Beauvoir. 

How  to  cite:  Max  Stahlecker  et  al;  Descriptions  of  reusable  location  information  solutions;  EUR  28265  EN; 
doi:10.2791/325541 

Table of contents 

Abstract ............................................................................................................... 4 

1. 

Introduction ................................................................................................ 5 

1.1. 

Target audience ..................................................................................... 5 

1.2.  Structure of this document ...................................................................... 5 

1.3.  Context ................................................................................................ 5 

1.3.1. 

The European Union Location Framework (EULF) ................................. 6 

1.3.2. 

Joinup ............................................................................................ 6 

1.3.3. 
The  European  Interoperability  Reference  Architecture  (EIRA)  and  the 
European Interoperability Cartography (EIC) .................................................... 7 

1.3.4. 
The  ArchiMate  modelling  language  and  the  Asset  Description  Metadata 
Schema (ADMS) ........................................................................................... 7 

1.4.  Usage of key concepts ............................................................................ 7 

1.5.  Approach .............................................................................................. 9 

1.6.  Scope ................................................................................................... 9 

2. 
List  of  identified  standards  and  specifications  based  on  the  INSPIRE  Technical 
Guidelines .......................................................................................................... 10 

3. 

Reusable ABBs and solutions for spatial data infrastructures ........................... 14 

3.1.  Spatial Data Infrastructures .................................................................. 15 

3.2.  EIRA and INSPIRE based architecture model of a typical SDI ..................... 17 

3.2.1. 

Legal view .................................................................................... 19 

3.2.2.  Organisational view ........................................................................ 23 

3.2.3. 

Semantic view ............................................................................... 26 

3.2.4. 

Technical view – Application ............................................................ 31 

3.2.5. 

Technical view – Infrastructure ........................................................ 35 

3.3. 

List of Solution Building Blocks .............................................................. 38 

3.3.1. 

SBBs from national SDIs ................................................................. 38 

3.3.1.1.  Czech Republic - National Geo-Information Structure ..................... 38 

3.3.1.2.  Denmark - Danish Academy for Spatial Information (DAiSI) ............ 42 

3.3.1.3.  The Netherlands Geonovum (NGII) .............................................. 46 

3.3.1.4.  UK - The UK Location Infrastructure (UKLI) ................................... 48 

3.3.2. 

SBBs from cross-border SDIs .......................................................... 49 

3.3.2.1.  Danube Reference Data and Service Infrastructure (DRDSI) ............ 49 

3.3.2.2.  Geomatic Regional Partnership project (GRISI) .............................. 50 

3.3.2.3.  North-Rhine Westphalia SDI ........................................................ 50 

3.3.3. 

X-Border-GDI project ..................................................................... 51 

3.4.  Reusability assessment ......................................................................... 52 

3.4.1. 

Joinup eligibility criteria used for the reusability assessment ............... 52 

3.4.2.  National SDI assessment ................................................................ 54 

2 

 
 
 
3.4.2.1.  Czech Republic - National Geo-Information Structure ..................... 54 

3.4.2.2.  Denmark - Danish Academy for Spatial Information (DAiSI) ............ 57 

3.4.2.3.  The Netherlands Geonovum (NGII) .............................................. 59 

3.4.2.4.  UK - The UK Location Infrastructure (UKLI) ................................... 61 

3.4.3. 

Cross-border SDI assessment ......................................................... 62 

3.4.3.1.  Danube Reference Data and Service Infrastructure (DRDSI) ............ 62 

3.4.3.2.  Geomatic Regional Partnership project (GRISI) .............................. 63 

3.4.3.3.  North-Rhine Westphalia SDI ........................................................ 63 

3.5.  Assessment summary ........................................................................... 64 

4. 

5. 

Recommendations for the EIRA ................................................................... 66 

Conclusion ................................................................................................ 69 

References ......................................................................................................... 71 

List of abbreviations and definitions ....................................................................... 72 

List of figures ...................................................................................................... 75 

List of tables ....................................................................................................... 76 

Annex I – List of SBBs not considered as solutions in the context of Joinup ................ 78 

Annex II – List of relevant non-eligible services ...................................................... 80 

Annex III – List of solutions already published on Joinup .......................................... 86 

Annex IV – List of eligible solutions for EIC ............................................................. 87 

Annex V – List of geospatial solutions on Joinup ...................................................... 91 

3 

 
 
 
 
 
 
Abstract 

As part of the ISA programme, the Digital Economy Unit of the European Commission (EC) 
Joint Research Centre (JRC) is co-ordinating ISA Action 2.13 - Establishment of a European 
Union Location Framework (EULF). 

The goal of this analysis, carried out as part of the EULF action, was to identify a list of 
reusable  location  information  solutions  (including  standards  and  specifications)  which 
could be shared on Joinup; a list which public administrations and other geospatial data 
providers can leverage when developing location-enabled solutions and services.  

The following activities were carried out:  

1.  A list of standards and specifications recommended by the Infrastructure for Spatial 
Information  in  Europe  (INSPIRE)  was  derived  from  the  INSPIRE  Technical 
Guidelines, as possible input to Joinup; 

2.  An  architecture  model  (for  a  typical  Spatial  Data  Infrastructure  (SDI))  based  on 
the European Interoperability Reference Architecture (EIRA) and on INSPIRE was 
developed to facilitate the identification of reusable location information solutions 
for data publishing;  

3.  Selected  SDIs  were  analysed  and  their  solution  building  blocks  (SBBs)  were 
mapped  to  the  architecture  building  blocks  (ABBs)  of  the  defined  architecture 
model; 

4.  An assessment of the identified SBBs was carried out to determine whether these 
SBBs  were  eligible  to  be  included  in  the  European  Interoperability  Cartography 
(EIC). However, given that the EIC eligibility criteria were not yet mature at the 
time of carrying out the analysis, this partial assessment was only done against the 
Joinup  eligibility  criteria,  since  the  Joinup  platform  is  envisaged  to  be  where  the 
EIC will reside. 

The  analysis  resulted  in  the  identification  of  109  SBBs  (policy,  software,  service, 
specification  or  standard,  and  guideline  or  template),  out  of  which  49  meet  the  Joinup 
eligibility  criteria,  and  therefore  could  potentially  be  included  in  the  EIC,  provided  that 
these 49 SBBs would be compliant with the EIC eligibility criteria.  

The  work  performed  in  the  current  analysis  for  the  EULF  has  started  to  address  the 
challenges and opportunities in identifying and classifying location information  solutions 
that  may  contribute  to  the  catalogue  of  reusable  solutions  being  coordinated  under  the 
ISA and ISA2 programmes. It complements the cataloguing activity of the associated ISA 
Action 1.17 - A Reusable INSPIRE Reference Platform (ARE3NA), which identifies relevant 
resources related to the steps in implementing INSPIRE. 

4 

 
 
 
 
 
1.  Introduction 

This  document  introduces  the  reader  to  a  collection  of  identified  reusable  location 
information solutions (including standards and specifications) which public administrations 
and  other  geospatial  data  providers  can  leverage  when  developing  location-enabled 
solutions  and  services.  The  collection  is  provided  as  input  to  the  Joinup  Catalogue  of 
interoperable and reusable solutions. It contains a list of standards and specifications to 
be  provided  as  input  for  Joinup.  In  addition,  it  includes  a  list  of  reusable  spatial  data 
solutions to be provided as input for the European Interoperability Cartography (EIC).  

The collection of identified reusable location information solutions complements the work 
currently being developed by ISA Action 1.17 - A Reusable INSPIRE Reference Platform 
(ARE3NA):  the  cataloguing  of  tools  that  facilitate  the  sharing  and  usage  of  INSPIRE 
metadata, data and services and thus help to implement INSPIRE. 

1.1.  Target audience 

The main target audience for this document is public administrations or other parties who 
are  interested  in  developing  location-based  solutions  and  services  and  are  looking  for 
reusable location information solutions. 

1.2.  Structure of this document 

This document consists of the following sections: 

  Section 1 (this section) describes the purpose, target audience and structure of 
this document and provides the context. It also explains the usage of key concepts, 
the approach and the scope. 

  Section  2  contains  the  list  of  identified  standards  and  specifications  to  facilitate 

the development of location-enabled solutions and services. 

  Section 3 explains what a Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI) is, lists the SDIs to be 
analysed, elaborates on the developed architecture model based on the European 
Interoperability Reference Architecture (EIRA) and on the Infrastructure for Spatial 
Information in Europe (INSPIRE), describes the identified solution building blocks, 
and includes the reusability assessment of these identified solution building blocks. 

  Section 4 contains the recommendations to the EIRA. 
  Section 5 provides the conclusion and next steps. 
  The  main  sections  are  following  by  lists  of  References,  Abbreviations  and 

Definitions, Figures and Tables 

  Annex I contains a list solution building blocks not seen as solutions in the context 

of Joinup. 

  Annex  II  contains  a  list  of  relevant  non-eligible  services  discovered  during  the 

identification of reusable location information solutions. 

  Annex III contains a list of identified and assessed solutions already published on 

Joinup. 

  Annex IV contains a list of solutions eligible to be published on Joinup. 
  Annex V contains a list of geospatial solutions discovered during the identification 
of  reusable  location  information  solutions  and  which  are  already  documented  on 
Joinup. 

1.3.  Context 

This subsection provides the context to better understand the approach and output, i.e. 
the collection of identified reusable location information solutions. It briefly explains the 
EULF,  the  EIRA,  Joinup,  the  EIC,  the  ArchiMate  modelling  language,  and  the  Asset 
Description Metadata Schema (ADMS). In addition, it elaborates on the usage of key terms 
within this document, such as “solution” or “building block”. 

5 

 
 
 
 
1.3.1. 

The European Union Location Framework (EULF) 

Coherent  and  committed  action  is  required  to  remove  digital  barriers  and  realise  the 
potential of location information in e-Government, focusing on the needs and expectations 
of  users.  A  harmonising  initiative  is  needed  to  guide  alignment  in  policy  and 
implementation, and to ensure that best practices are followed, mistakes are not repeated, 
and collaboration occurs where it is needed, building on INSPIRE. 

To this end, under the Interoperability Solutions for European Public Administrations (ISA) 
programme,  the  Digital  Economy  Unit  of  the  EC  Joint  Research  Centre  (JRC),  is  co-
ordinating  ISA  Action  2.13  -  Establishment  of  a  European  Union  Location  Framework 
(EULF). The objective of the EULF action is to develop an EU-wide, cross-sector and cross-
border  interoperability  framework  for  the  exchange,  sharing  and  integration  of  location 
data in IT systems used to support e-Government processes and services [1]. The EULF 
supports the European Interoperability Framework (EIF), the Digital Single Market (DSM), 
and other aspects of the Digital Agenda for Europe (DAE). It is based on the information 
infrastructures developed at national and European levels that are being implemented in 
relation  to  the  requirements  of  the  INSPIRE  Directive  2/2007  [2]  and  related  daughter 
legislation.  

The INSPIRE Directive establishes an infrastructure for spatial information in Europe for 
the purposes of EU environmental policies or activities which may have an impact on the 
environment.  There  are over 150 references to specific EU policies in the  INSPIRE data 
specifications  and,  due  to  the  nature  of  INSPIRE,  many  stakeholder  organisations  are 
involved not only in the environmental sector but also in a large number of other areas. 
In fact, INSPIRE is a multi-purpose infrastructure for the exchange and sharing of spatial 
data,  meaning  that  it  can  be  used  for  other  thematic  sectors  as  well  -  ranging  from 
Transport to Marine to Energy, etc. The development of INSPIRE and its technical context 
have strong relationships with cross-cutting areas such as open data initiatives and similar 
activities  related  to  the  Public  Sector  Information  (PSI)  Directive,  standardisation 
activities,  and  the  service-provider  industry.  One  area  of  particular  note  is  the  use  of 
Geographical Information Systems (GIS), which offer the means to manipulate geospatial 
data  and  act  as  one  of  the  key  tools  to  exploit  the  content  SDIs  provide  as  well  as 
producing some of its content. 

Variations  in  technical  approaches  can  create  problems  for  interoperability,  as  well  as 
activities  which  miss  the  benefits  of  adopting  reusable  solutions.  Capturing  details  of 
reusable  tools  for  sharing  geospatial  data  and  metadata  can,  therefore,  both  help  to 
implement  INSPIRE  in  an  interoperable  way,  as  well  as  offering  solutions  for  other 
initiatives aiming to share or make use of geospatial data. 

1.3.2. 

Joinup 

Joinup is a collaborative platform created by the European Commission and funded by the 
European  Union  via  the  ISA  Programme.  It  offers  several  services  that  aim  to  help 
e-Government professionals share their experience with each other. In addition, it enables 
them to find, choose, re-use, develop and implement interoperability solutions. 

Joinup  involves  e-Government  and  interoperability  professionals  from  all  over  Europe. 
Professionals  from  other  countries  outside  the  EU  are  also  welcome  to  join.  It  offers 
relevant content and insight in various areas of interest, including among others: 

  Cross-border and cross-sector interactions between public administrations; 
  Pan-European electronic public services; 
  Legal information on usage and development of open-source software within public 

administrations; 
Interoperability impact of EU regulations and actions; 

 
  Access to a repository of reusable interoperability solutions; 
  Methodologies and practice aids on the development of interoperability solutions; 
  Pan-European e-Government projects. 

6 

 
 
 
1.3.3. 

The  European  Interoperability  Reference  Architecture  (EIRA) 
and the European Interoperability Cartography (EIC) 

The  European  Commission  aims  to  further  support  coordination  between  public 
administrations in EU institutions and/or Member States on ICT solutions to avoid the risk 
of creating new digital barriers1 for administrations, businesses, and citizens, such as the 
difficulty of data sharing due to processes, data or IT solutions being not interoperable. 
The ISA2 Programme [3] supports the development and maintenance of the EIRA [4] and 
the EIC. The EIRA is derived from the European Interoperability Strategy (EIS) and the 
EIF. The solutions within the EIC follow the EIF principles and comply with specific criteria 
that can be represented on the EIRA. The EIRA and the EIC are strong enablers to bring 
about coordination in terms of technical and organisational interoperability, as: 

  The  EIRA  defines  a  common  architectural  view  based  on  a  service  oriented 
reference  architecture  to  cover  cross-border  and  cross-sectorial  interoperability 
needs at European level; and 

  The  EIC  is  an  instrument  to  map  and  analyse  the  interoperability  landscape  in 
Europe and to identify solutions that are available and those that are still lacking. 

The consistent use of the EIRA and the EIC will create a fuller picture of existing solutions 
and provide a means to enhance the coordination between public administrations at EU 
level  and/or  in  Member  States  in  terms  of  the  technologies  they  are  adopting.  Better 
coordination  and  reusable  technologies  are  envisaged  to  lead  to  more  interoperable, 
coherent, effective and efficient digital public services. Such improvements should result 
in reduced administrative burden and create better services for EU citizens and businesses, 
while  offering  cost  savings  for  the  taxpayer  as  public  sector  efficiency  increases  and  IT 
spending can potentially be reduced. The EIRA and the EIC will contribute to the DSM and 
help reduce digital barriers.  

The Joinup platform (ISA Action 8.9 – European Collaborative Platform and Catalogue) is 
envisaged to be where the EIC will reside; thus acting as a one-stop shop for re-usable 
solutions and examples of best practices. 

1.3.4. 

The  ArchiMate  modelling  language  and  the  Asset  Description 
Metadata Schema (ADMS) 

ArchiMate and the ADMS are two languages used to create and describe interoperability 
building  blocks.  The  EIRA  adopts  a  service  oriented  architecture  style  and  promotes 
ArchiMate as a modelling notation. In fact, the architecture building blocks (ABBs) of the 
EIRA can be seen as an extension of the model concepts in ArchiMate. 

The ISA Programme created the ADMS [5] in 2011. The ADMS is a common vocabulary to 
describe  interoperability  assets  and  make  them  searchable  and  readily  explored  by  ICT 
developers.  

An  application  profile  of  ADMS  was  developed  to  extend  the  use  of  ADMS  for  the 
description  of  other  types  of  interoperability  solutions,  meaning  solutions  covering  the 
political, legal, organisational, information and technical interoperability layers, as defined 
by the EIF. 

1.4.  Usage of key concepts 

This subsection defines several key concepts and how they are used in the context of this 
document. The following figure includes these key concepts and depicts their relationships. 

1https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/sites/default/files/isa_field_path/study_presentation_towards_faster_take_up_of_
new_egovernment_services.pdf  

7 

 
 
 
 
                                           
These key concepts are defined as follows: 

Figure 1: Usage of key concepts 

  A  solution 2  is  a  collection  of  components  organised  to  accomplish  a  specific 

function or set of functions. 

  An architecture model3 is a formal description of a solution, or a detailed plan of 

the solution at component level to guide its implementation.  

  An  ABB 4  typically  describes  required  capability/functionality  and  shapes  the 

specification of solution building blocks (SBBs).  

  An  SBB 5 represents  components  that  will  be  used  to  implement  the  required 

capability/functionality of one or more ABBs. 

  A  Joinup  solution6 is  a  solution  facilitating  cooperation  between  organisations, 
either autonomously funded and developed by the ISA² Programme or developed 
in  cooperation  with  other  EU  initiatives,  based  on  identified  requirements  of 
European public administrations. Solutions have to meet a set of eligibility criteria7 
to be included within the Joinup catalogue. Currently, Joinup considers the following 
type of solutions: policy, software, service, specification or standard and guideline 
or template.  

  An  EIC  solution8 is  a  high  quality  solution  that  is  relevant  for  and  reusable  by 
public administrations, presented in a common format and complying with specific 
re-usability  and  interoperability  criteria  that  can  be  represented  on  the  EIRA.  At 
the time of writing this report the scope of the EIC is being defined. Consequently, 
it  has  been  considered  that  the  EIC  will  include  the  same  type  of  solutions  that 
Joinup includes.  

2   The Open Group, ‘The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF)”, 2011: 

http://pubs.opengroup.org/architecture/togaf9-doc/arch/chap35.html#tag_35 

3   The Open Group, ‘The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF)”, 2011: 

http://pubs.opengroup.org/architecture/togaf9-doc/arch/chap03.html#tag_03 

4   The Open Group, ‘The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF)”, 2011: 

http://pubs.opengroup.org/architecture/togaf9-doc/arch/index.html 

5   The Open Group, ‘The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF)”, 2011: 

http://pubs.opengroup.org/architecture/togaf9-doc/arch/index.html 

6   [2] DECISION (EU) 2015/2240 OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL. Article 2, Definitions: 

http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?qid=1449478436536&uri=CELEX:32015D2240 

7   Joinup  eligibility  criteria  non-extended  version:  https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/page/scope-statement-and-
eligibility-criteria. Joinup eligibility criteria extended version (this document has not been officially published): 
https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/CITnet/confluence/display/SEMIC/D02.02+-
Updated+Scope+and+eligibility+criteria 

8   EIC eligibility criteria (this document has not been officially published): 

https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/CITnet/confluence/display/SEMIC/D03.01+-Scoping+Criteria+for+EIC 

8 

 
 
 
 
                                           
1.5.  Approach 

This subsection briefly explains the approach used to produce the collection of identified 
reusable location information solutions. 

  Step 1 – Analyse the INSPIRE Technical Guidelines and derive a list of standards 
and  specifications  recommended  by  INSPIRE  which  a)  support  the 
development of location-based services or solutions and b) are potential candidates 
for the Joinup Catalogue of interoperable and reusable solutions (see Section 2). 
  Step 2 – Produce a list of SDIs to be investigated for identifying reusable location 

information solutions (see Section 3.1). 

  Step 3 – Develop an EIRA and INSPIRE based architecture model of a typical SDI 
to  identify  reusable  location  information  solutions  for  publishing  location-based 
data (see Section 3.2). 

  Step 4 – Analyse each of the selected SDIs with the help of the developed EIRA 
and  INSPIRE  based  architecture  model.  Identify  solution  building  blocks  which 
realise  the  architecture  model’s  ABBs,  resulting  in  a  set  of  SBBs  which  could 
potentially be reused when developing location-enabled solutions and services 
(see Section 0 and Annexes).  

  Step 5 – Assess the identified SBBs against Joinup’s eligibility criteria to derive a 
set of reusable location information solutions, eligible to be published in the 
Joinup catalogue (see Section 3.4 and Annexes).  

  Step  6  –  Derive  recommendations  on  how  the  EIRA  can  be  improved  to 
better reflect concerns related to location, such as ABBs relevant in the context of 
SDIs (see Section 4). 

  Step 7 – Formulate a conclusion and next steps (see Section 5). 

1.6.  Scope 

The work produced in the context of this document is based on the following scope. Two 
different sources were  used to identify reusable location information solutions (see also 
Figure 2): 

  The INSPIRE Technical Guidelines. These guidelines are non-binding Technical 
Guidance  (TG)  documents  which  describe  detailed  implementation  aspects  and 
relationships  with  existing  standards,  technologies,  and  practices  [6].  Therefore, 
the INSPIRE TGs were selected as a source to identify standards and specifications, 
recommended by  INSPIRE, as potential candidates to be published in the Joinup 
Catalogue of interoperable and reusable solutions. 

  A  list of identified  SDIs. For the scope  of the analysis, a total of 8  SDIs were 
selected (Section 3.1). These SDIs were then analysed with the help of a developed 
EIRA  and  INSPIRE  based  architecture  model  to  identify  reusable  solutions  to  be 
proposed as candidates for the EIC.  

9 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Figure 2: Sources and process to identify solutions proposed to be included on Joinup 

2.  List  of  identified  standards  and  specifications  based  on  the 

INSPIRE Technical Guidelines 

This  section  contains  a  list  of  identified  standards  and  specifications,  recommended  by 
INSPIRE, to facilitate the development of location-enabled solutions and services. This list 
is the outcome of the INSPIRE Technical Guidelines analysis. 

The  INSPIRE  Directive,  Directive  2007/2/EC  of  the  European  Parliament  and  of  the 
Council  of  14  March  2007,  establishes  an  Infrastructure  for  Spatial  Information  in  the 
European  Community  (INSPIRE)  [2].  INSPIRE  is  one  of  the  largest  data  harmonisation 
efforts ever undertaken in Europe, whose main focus is on the sharing and re-use of spatial 
data and services in support of European environmental policies and policies that affect 
the environment. 

To ensure that Member States’ spatial data infrastructures are compatible and usable in a 
Community  and  transboundary  context,  the  Directive  requires  that  common 
Implementing Rules (IR) are adopted in a number of specific areas (e.g. Metadata, 
Data  Specifications,  Network  Services,  Data  and  Service  Sharing  and  Monitoring  and 
Reporting).  These  IRs  are  adopted  as  Commission  Decisions  or  Regulations,  and  are 
binding in their entirety. 

In  addition,  INSPIRE  offers  non-binding  Technical  Guidance  documents  that 
describe  detailed  implementation  aspects  and  relationships  with  existing  standards, 
technologies, and practices, which in turn are supported by common ABBs and a range of 
software tools. Variations in technical approaches can create problems for interoperability, 
as  well  as  activities  which  miss  the  benefits  of  adopting  reusable  solutions.  Capturing 
details  of  reusable  tools  for  sharing  geospatial  data  and  metadata  can,  therefore,  both 
help to implement INSPIRE in an interoperable way, as well as offering evidence for other 
initiatives aiming to share or make use of geospatial data. 

In a nutshell, INSPIRE, seen from a legal point of view, can be summarised as a Directive 
which  requires  the  adoption  of  regulations  and  IRs.  Non-legally  binding  Technical 
Guidelines have been developed to support Member States in implementing the IRs, which 
can be represented in the EIRA (see Figure 3). 

More information about the INSPIRE Directive, Technical Guidelines, IRs, etc. can be found 
on the INSPIRE website. 

10 

JoinupDerive standards & specificationsrecommended by INSPIRE(see Section 2)INSPIRE Technical GuidelinesIdentify and assess reusable SBBs(see Section 3)Proposed to be publishedAgreed list of SDIsSet of reusable SSBs relevant to the development of SDIs 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Figure 3: INSPIRE Legal view using ArchiMate and EIRA 

The  analysis  of  the  INSPIRE  Technical  Guidelines  identified  a  total  of  32  standards  and 
specifications, listed in the table below. These standards and specifications recommended 
by  INSPIRE  could  be  proposed  for  publishing  in  the  Joinup  Catalogue  of  reusable  and 
interoperable solutions. Note that each standard and specification needs to be assessed 
against  Joinup’s  eligibility  criteria.  They  can  only  be  published  on  Joinup,  if  they  meet 
these criteria. 

11 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Table 1: List of identified standards and specifications based on the INSPIRE Technical 
Guidelines 

Standard / specification 

1 

  EN ISO 19115 

2 

  EN ISO 19119 

3 

  ISO 639-2/B 

Example Technical 
Guidelines document 

Metadata 

Metadata 

Monitoring and Reporting 

4 

  ISO 19131 Geographic information - Data product 

Data Specifications 

specifications 

5 

  ISO 19156 - Observations and Measurements 

Data Specifications 

standard 

6 

  ISO 2533:1975 - International Standard 

Data Specifications 

Atmosphere 

7 

  ISO 8601 - Data elements and interchange 

Data Specifications 

formats 

8 

  ISO 19118 

Data Specifications 

9 

  UML – Unified Modelling Language 

Data Specifications 

10    GML - Geography Markup Language 

Data Specifications, Network 
services 

11    OCL – Object Constraint Language 

Data Specifications 

12    Universal Postal Union (UPU) standard S.42 - 

International postal address ABBs and templates 

Data Specifications - 
Addresses 

13    EN ISO 19111 

14    ISO/DS 19152 – Geographical Information, Land 

Administration Domain Model 

15    ISO/CEN 19152 

16    ISO/CEN LADM 

Data Specifications - 
Addresses 

Data Specifications – 
Cadastral Parcels 

Data Specifications – 
Cadastral Parcels 

Data Specifications – 
Cadastral Parcels 

17    GRIB - WMO standard for gridded data exchange 

GRIdded Binary 

Data Specifications – 
Geographical Grid Systems 

12 

 
 
 
 
Standard / specification 

18    NetCDF – Network Common Data Form 

19    European Grid 

20    IHO - Transfer Standard for digital Hydrographic 

Data 

21    ISO 19148 - Linear referencing 

22    SOAP Framework 

23    WSDL request 

24    Web Services Addressing 

Example Technical 
Guidelines document 

Data Specifications – 
Geographical Grid Systems 

Data Specifications – 
Geographical Grid Systems 

Data Specifications – 
Hydrography 

Data Specifications – 
Transport Networks 

Network services 

Network services 

Network services 

25    RIF – Rule Interchange Format 

Network services 

26    Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) Simple 

Network services 

Features Interface Standard (SFS) 

27    ebXML – Electronic Business using eXtensible 

Network services 

markup 

28    MOF – Meta-Object Facility 

Network services 

29    QVT – Query/View/Transform 

Network services 

30    UUID – Universally Unique Identifier 

Network services 

31    XMI – XML Metadata Interchange 

Network services 

32    ISO/TS 19139 

Data specification 

13 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
3.  Reusable ABBs and solutions for spatial data infrastructures 

This section first explains what an SDI is and lists the analysed SDIs (Section 3.1). It then 
defines an EIRA and INSPIRE based architecture model (for a typical SDI) used to identify 
reusable  location  information  solutions  (for  publishing  location-based  data)  from  the 
selected SDIs (Section 3.2). In addition, this section lists the identified SBBs (Section 0) 
and includes their reusability assessment (Section 3.4). 

The  following  figure  illustrates  the  approach  followed  to  identify  reusable  location 
information solutions from real-life implemented SDIs with the help of the developed EIRA 
and INSPIRE based architecture model. 

Figure 4: Approach to identify reusable location information solutions from implemented 
SDIs 

14 

JoinupDerive standards & specificationsrecommended by INSPIRE(see Section 2)INSPIRE Technical GuidelinesIdentify and assess reusable SBBs(see Section 3)Proposed to be publishedAgreed list of SDIsSet of reusable SSBs relevant to the development of SDIsSection 3Agreed list of SDIs(Section 3.1)EIRA- and INSPIRE-based architecture modelof a typical SDI(Section 3.2)Set of non-assessed SBBs(Section 3.3)Joinup eligibility criteria(Section 3.4.1)SBBs eligiblefor Joinup(Section 3.4)Identify SBBs,based on the architecture modelAssess identfied SBBsagainst Joinupeligibility citeria 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
3.1.  Spatial Data Infrastructures 

According  to  the  Global  Spatial  Data  Infrastructure  (GSDI)  association,  an  SDI  “hosts 
geographic data and attributes, sufficient documentation (metadata), a means to discover, 
visualise,  and  evaluate  the  data  (catalogues  and  web  mapping),  and  some  method  to 
provide access to the geographic data. Beyond this are additional services or software to 
support  application  of  the  data.  To  make  an  SDI  functional,  it  must  also  include  the 
organisational  agreements  needed  to  coordinate  and  administer  it  on  a  local,  regional, 
national, and or trans-national scale.” [7]. SDIs also exist for thematic communities (e.g. 
marine,  geology,  space).  They  may  stand  alone  as  infrastructures  or  be  part  of  (= 
embedded in) national information infrastructures (e.g. UK) or international information 
infrastructures (e.g. data accessible through the European Data Portal). 

According to Longley et al. [8] there are over 150 SDIs identified in literature. However 
only  a  subset  was  selected  to  be  in  scope  for  identifying  reusable  location  information 
solutions.  

Note: Global SDIs were considered as out of scope for this analysis. However the list of 
SDIs to be analysed had to include both national and cross-borders SDIs. In addition, the 
INSPIRE Directive was included, as it supports the establishment of an SDI at the European 
level and because most of the ABBs of the developed architecture model are derived from 
the INSPIRE Directive and related documentation. 

Table  2  lists  the  SDIs  that  were  selected  for  analysis.  The  sources  to  identify  reusable 
location  information  solutions  are  included  in  the  “Documentation  studied”  column.  In 
addition, the SDI’s official websites were checked. 

Table 2: List of SDIs to be analysed 

Level 

SDI 

1    European 

INSPIRE 

2    National 

3    National 

Czech Republic – 
National Geo-
Information Structure 

Denmark - Danish 
Academy for Spatial 
Information (DAiSI) 

4    National 

The Netherlands 
Geonovum (NGII) 

In 
scope? 

Documentation studied 

Y9 

Y 

Y 

Y 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/rep
orts/stateofplay2011/rcr11CZv1
12.pdf 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/rep
orts/stateofplay2011/rcr11DKv
123.pdf 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/rep
orts/stateofplay2011/rcr11NLv1
23.pdf 

5    National 

UK – The UK Location 
Infrastructure (UKLI) 

Y 

https://data.gov.uk/location 

6    National 

UK - The UK Location 
Strategy 

Y 

https://data.gov.uk/sites/defaul
t/files/uk-location-
strategy_10.pdf 

9   INSPIRE served as input for the architecture model used to identify reusable location information solutions 

from real-life implemented SDIs (see Section 3.2) 

15 

 
 
 
 
                                           
Level 

SDI 

In 
scope? 

Documentation studied 

7    Cross-
border 

Danube Reference Data 
and Service 
Infrastructure (DRDSI) 

Y 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/eve
nts/conferences/inspire_2011/p
resentations/238.pdf 

https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/sites/d
efault/files/jrc-danube-
reference-data-service-
infrastructure.pdf 
http://www.geo-
solutions.it/portfolio/jrc-portal-
mapstore-ckan/ 

8    Cross-
border 

Geomatic Regional 
Partnership project 
(GRISI) 

Y 

http://www.grisi.org 

9    Cross-
border 

North-Rhine Westphalia 
SDI 

Y 

10   Cross-
border 

X-Border-GDI project 

Y 

http://www.ec-
gis.org/Workshops/9ec-
gis/papers/pd_portele.pdf 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/eve
nts/conferences/inspire_2010/p
resentations/WS-eSDI-Net+-X-
border-GDI.pdf 

Next to these identified SDIs, eSDI-NET+ should be mentioned. eSDI-NET+ is a network 
part of the eSDI-NET project and aims to promote cross-border dialogue and exchange of 
best practices on SDIs throughout Europe. It offers the SDI Best Practice Database, i.e. a 
database that summarises the results of the SDI analysis and selection process performed 
by eSDI-Net+. This public version of the database contains a subset of the collected data 
of  the  SDIs  analysed,  approved  by  the  SDI  owners.  European  SDI  Best  Practices  are 
documented and categorised according to the criteria and indicators based on the common 
methodology for the evaluation of SDI solutions. 

16 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
3.2.  EIRA and INSPIRE based architecture model of a typical SDI 

This subsection describes the developed EIRA and INSPIRE based architecture model (of 
a  typical  SDI)  used  as  a  basis  to  assess  the  selected  SDIs  and  to  identify  SBBs  (for 
publishing location-based data) which could potentially be reused. 

As discussed in Section 1.4, an architecture model consists of one or more ABBs. An SBB 
can  be  defined  as  a  concrete  element  that  implements  the  required  capabilities  / 
functionalities of one or more ABBs. 

An SDI can be described with the help of an architecture model which consists of a set of 
important  ABBs  needed  to  fulfil  the  SDI’s  objective  [9].  This  set  of  ABBs  covers  people 
(users), standards, policies, access network, data and financial resources. 

The architecture model uses ArchiMate as the modelling language and consists of the EIRA 
ABBs. Where needed, the architecture model was extended with non-EIRA ABBs, mostly 
derived from INSPIRE, to ensure the model sufficiently addresses the aspects related to 
location.  These  non-EIRA  ABBs  have  been  coloured  in  grey  in  Figure  6  and  have  been 
identified  as  I  and  SK  in  Table  3.  Hence,  the  architecture  model  identifies  the  most 
commonly used ABBs that an INSPIRE-based SDI could have.  

Note: The sole purpose of this architecture model is to decompose SDIs via ABBs to help 
identify reusable location information solutions. In addition, the architecture model is only 
focusing  on  the  provision  of  location  information  (see  v1.0  in  Figure  5).  Other  aspects, 
such  as  the  usage  of  location  information  or  governance,  are  currently  out  of  scope.  It 
also  does  not  describe  a  complete  INSPIRE  SDI  reference  model.  However,  the 
architecture model could be extended in the future (see v2.0 in Figure 5). 

Figure 5: Architecture model – versions and scope 

Figure 6 depicts a high-level view of the developed architecture model. A PDF-version and 
the corresponding ArchiMate file of this architecture model can be found on Confluence10. 
Being based on the EIRA, the architecture model consists of a) the different EIRA views 
(large  grey  horizontal  boxes),  i.e.  the  legal,  organisational,  semantic  and  technical 
(application and infrastructure) views, and b) their respective ABBs. 

10 https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/CITnet/confluence/x/J4M2Hg 

17 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                           
Figure 6: EIRA and INSPIRE-based architecture model of a typical SDI 

The following subsections describe for each EIRA view the different ABBs depicted in the 
figure above. Each subsection contains two tables: 

  The first table identifies the source from which each ABB was obtained. 

  The  second  table  provides  a  definition  for  each  ABB.  In  addition,  a  source 
classification for each ABB is provided, based on the classification depicted in Table 
3 below. 

18 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Table 3: ABB source classification 

Identification  Name 

Explanation 

I&E 

INSPIRE and EIRA 

ABB is defined by INSPIRE and is mapped to 
a corresponding EIRA ABB. 

I 

INSPIRE 

ABB is defined by INSPIRE, but does not have 
a corresponding ABB within the EIRA. A new 
ABB has been added to the model. 

SK&E 

SDI knowledge and 
EIRA 

ABB is defined with the help of SDI knowledge 
(not  based  on  INSPIRE)  and  is  mapped  to  a 
corresponding EIRA ABB. 

SK 

SDI knowledge 

ABB is defined with the help of SDI knowledge 
(not  based  on  INSPIRE).  However,  neither  a 
corresponding  INSPIRE  definition  nor  a 
corresponding  ABB  within  the  EIRA  exists.  A 
new ABB has been added to the model. 

3.2.1. 

Legal view 

This subsection provides a source (first table) and definition (second table) for each ABB 
of the legal view. 

Table 4: List of ABBs/sources – Legal view 

Building Block Name 

EIRA 

INSPIRE  SDI 

Knowledge 

INSPIRE Framework Documents 

INSPIRE Technical Guidance 

INSPIRE Metadata: Technical Guidelines based 
on EN ISO 19115 and EN ISO 19119 

Methodology for the development of data 
specification 

INSPIRE TG on Discovery, View, Download, and 
Transformation Network Services 

TG for INSPIRE Spatial Data Services and 
services allowing spatial data services to be 
invoked 

INSPIRE Regulations and Implementing Rules 

INSPIRE IR Metadata 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

19 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block Name 

EIRA 

INSPIRE  SDI 

Knowledge 

INSPIRE IR Interoperability of spatial data 
services 

INSPIRE IR Network services 

INSPIRE IR Data and Service Sharing 

INSPIRE IR Monitoring and Reporting 

INSPIRE Directive 2007/2/EC 

INSPIRE Policy 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

Table 5: List of ABBs/definitions – Legal view 

Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

INSPIRE 
Framework 
Documents 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
Data Specification - Framework documents: 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/index.cfm/pageid/2 
Network Services - Framework documents: 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/index.cfm/pageid/5 

Based on EIRA Building Block (BB) Non-Binding Instrument (A 
Non-binding  Instrument  is  a  set  of  recommendations  and 
opinions,  as  well  as  rules  governing  how  EU  institutions  and 
programmes  work,  etc.)  and  Implementation  Guideline  (An 
Implementing  Guideline  is  a  set  of  instructions  that  provides 
insight into how to implement a policy). 

INSPIRE Technical 
Guidance 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
Technical guidelines for the implementation of INSPIRE. 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/Technical-Guidelines/Data-
Specifications/2892  

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Non-Binding  Instrument  (A  Non-binding 
Instrument is a set of recommendations and opinions, as well as 
rules governing how EU institutions and programmes work, etc.) 
and Implementation Guideline (An Implementing Guideline is 
a set of instructions that provides insight into how to implement 
a policy). 

INSPIRE 
Metadata: 
Technical 

Source : INSPIRE 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/documents/Metadata/MD_IR_and_IS
O_20131029.pdf 

20 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Guidelines based 
on EN ISO 19115 
and EN ISO 19119 
(I&E) 

Methodology for 
the development 
of data 
specification 
(I&E) 

INSPIRE TG on 
Discovery, View, 
Download, and 
Transformation 
Network Services 
(I&E) 

TG for INSPIRE 
Spatial Data 
Services and 
services allowing 
spatial data 
services to be 
invoked 
(I&E) 

INSPIRE 
Regulations and 
Implementing 
Rules 
(I&E) 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Non-Binding  Instrument  (A  Non-binding 
Instrument is a set of recommendations and opinions, as well as 
rules governing how EU institutions and programmes work, etc.), 
Implementation Guideline (An Implementing Guideline is a set 
of  instructions  that  provides  insight  into  how  to  implement  a 
policy), Data Model (A Data Model includes formal data names, 
comprehensive  data  definitions,  proper  data  structures  and 
precise  data  integrity  rules)  and  Specification  (A  Technical 
Specification  is  a  document  describing  the  functional/technical 
specifications of a solution). 

Source: INSPIRE 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/index.cfm/pageid/2 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Non-Binding  Instrument  (A  Non-binding 
Instrument is a set of recommendations and opinions, as well as 
rules governing how EU institutions and programmes work, etc.) 
and Implementation Guideline (An Implementing Guideline is 
a set of instructions that provides insight into how to implement 
a policy). 

Source: INSPIRE 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/index.cfm/pageid/5 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Non-Binding  Instrument  (A  Non-binding 
Instrument is a set of recommendations and opinions, as well as 
rules governing how EU institutions and programmes work, etc.) 
and Implementation Guideline (An Implementing Guideline is 
a set of instructions that provides insight into how to implement 
a policy). 

Source: INSPIRE 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/documents/Spatial_Data_Services/T
G_for_INSPIRE_SDS_3_1.pdf 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Non-Binding  Instrument  (A  Non-binding 
Instrument is a set of recommendations and opinions, as well as 
rules governing how EU institutions and programmes work, etc.) 
and Implementation Guideline (An Implementing Guideline is 
a set of instructions that provides insight into how to implement 
a policy). 

Source: INSPIRE 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/inspire-implementing-rules/51763  

To  ensure  that  the  spatial  data  infrastructures  of  the  Member 
States  are  compatible  and  usable  in  a  Community  and 

21 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
transboundary context, the Directive requires that common IR are 
adopted in a number of specific areas: 
- Metadata 
- Interoperability of spatial data services 
- Data Specifications 
- Network Services 
- Data and Service Sharing 
- Monitoring and Reporting 

These IRs were adopted as Commission Decisions or Regulations, 
and are binding in their entirety. The Commission was assisted in 
the  process  of  adopting  such  rules  by  a  regulatory  committee 
composed  of  representatives  of  the  Member  States  and  chaired 
by a representative of the Commission. 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/inspire-implementing-rules/51763 

Based on EIRA BB Binding Instrument (A Binding Instrument is 
a legal instrument that expresses something which is obligatory). 

INSPIRE IR 
Metadata 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-
content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32008R1205&from=EN 

INSPIRE IR 
Interoperability of 
spatial data 
services 
(I&E) 

Based on EIRA BB Binding Instrument. 

Source: INSPIRE 
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-
content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32014R1312&from=EN 

Based on EIRA BB Binding Instrument. 

INSPIRE IR 
Network services 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/index.cfm/pageid/5 
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-
content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32009R0976&from=EN 

Based on EIRA BB Binding Instrument. 

INSPIRE IR Data 
and Service 
Sharing 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-
content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32010R0268&from=EN 

Based on EIRA BB Binding Instrument. 

INSPIRE IR 
Monitoring and 
Reporting 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
http://eur-
lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2009:148:00
18:0026:EN:PDF 

22 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Based on EIRA BB Binding Instrument. 

INSPIRE Directive 
2007/2/EC 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-
content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32007L0002&from=EN 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/index.cfm 

Based on EIRA BB Binding Instrument. 

INSPIRE Policy 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-
content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32007L0002&from=EN 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/index.cfm 

Needed  EIRA  focal  ABB,  creating  the  interconnections  to  the 
Organisational view.  

Based on EIRA BB Public Policy (A Public Policy is the whole of 
actions under a policy domain taken by a public authority to bring 
about social change in the medium and long term. It is based on 
certain values and objectives and is implemented using a variety 
of methods. It applies on the territory within which the authority 
is authorised to act). 

3.2.2.  Organisational view 

This subsection provides a source (first table) and definition (second table) for each ABB 
of the organisational view. 

Table 6: List of ABBs/sources – Organisational view 

Building Block Name 

EIRA 

INSPIRE  SDI 

Spatial data set 

Administrative Units 

Business Capability 

Business Information Exchange 

Public Service 

Partner Organisations 

Service Delivery Model 

Partnering agreement / Service level 
agreement (SLA) / Terms of agreement 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

Knowledge 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

23 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block Name 

EIRA 

INSPIRE  SDI 

Public Service Provider / Data provider 

Consumer 

Knowledge 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

Table 7: List of ABBs/definitions – Organisational view 

Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

Spatial data set 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
An identifiable collection of spatial data. 

Needed  EIRA  focal  ABB,  creating  the  interconnections  to  the 
Semantic view. 

Based on EIRA BB Business Information (Business Information 
is  a  piece  of  business  data  or  a  group  of  pieces  of  business  data 
with a unique business  semantics definition in a specific business 
context). 

Administrative 
Units 
(I) 

Source: INSPIRE 
Units of administration, dividing areas where Member States have 
and/or exercise jurisdictional rights, for local, regional and national 
governance, separated by administrative boundaries. 

Business 
Capability 
(SK&E) 

Source: SDI Knowledge 
Needed  EIRA  focal  ABB,  creating  the  interconnections  to  the 
Technical – application view. 

Based on EIRA BB Business Capability (Business Capability is the 
expression  or  the  articulation  of  the  capacity,  materials  and 
expertise  an  organisation  needs  to  perform  core  functions. 
Enterprise architects use business capabilities to illustrate the over-
arching needs of the business to better strategise IT solutions that 
meet those business needs). 

Source: SDI Knowledge 
Needed  EIRA  focal  ABB,  creating  the  interconnections  to  the 
Technical – application view. 

Based on EIRA BB Business Information Exchange (A Business 
Information Exchange is an interaction between two or more public 
administrations, businesses or citizens). 

Business 
Information 
Exchange 
(SK&E) 

Public Service 
(SK&E) 

Source: SDI Knowledge 

24 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

Needed EIRA focal ABB, creating the interconnections to the Legal 
view and Technical – application view. 

Based on EIRA BB Public Service (A public service is an economic 
activity  that  public  authorities  identify  as  being  of  particular 
importance to citizens, businesses and public administrations and 
that  would  not  be  supplied  (or  would  be  supplied  under  different 
conditions) if there were no public intervention. A public service is 
also the capacity to carry out a procedure and exists whether it is 
used or not. It is a set of deeds and acts performed by or on behalf 
of a public agency for the benefit of a citizen, a business or another 
public agency). 
http://ec.europa.eu/competition/state_aid/overview/public_servic
es_en.html 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/site/core_public_service/rdfs.html#Pu
blicService 

Source: SDI Knowledge 

Based on EIRA BB Organisation (An Organisation is an entity that 
provides and/or consumes Public Services), Business (A Business 
is  an  organisational  entity  that  provides  and/or  consumes  Public 
Services.  This  includes  non-governmental  organisations  and  not-
for-profit  organisations)  and  Citizen  (A  Citizen  is  a  consumer  of 
Public Services). 

Partner 
Organisations 
(SK&E) 

Service Delivery 
Model (SK&E) 

Source: SDI Knowledge 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Service  Delivery  Model  (A  Service  Delivery 
Model  defines  how  the  organisation  arranges  the  delivery  of  its 
services to service consumers. This includes: 
- How will the service be delivered (e.g. multi-channel, SPOCs, only 
once)? 
- How will the interaction between the service provider and service 
consumer take place? 
-  How  will  certain  situations  be  handled  (e.g. 
management)? 
- What will the support & maintenance look like? [ITIL v3]). 

incident 

Partnering 
agreement / SLA 
/ Terms of 
agreement 
(SK&E) 

Source: SDI Knowledge  
Based  on  EIRA  BB  (An  Interoperability  Agreement  is  the  means 
through which organisations (public administrations, or businesses) 
formalise the cooperation with one another. These agreements aim 
at the development of interoperability solutions, which meets the 
functional / technical requirements and needs of one another.) 

25 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

The EIRA differentiates the following Interoperability Agreements: 
-  Interoperability  Service  Agreement  (between  Public  Service 
Consumers and Public Service Providers; 
- 
Organisations); or 
-  Interoperability  Provider  Agreement  (between  Public  Service 
Providers). 

Interoperability 

Collaboration 

Agreement 

(between 

Data provider 
(SK&E) 

Source: SDI Knowledge  
http://ec.europa.eu/competition/state_aid/overview/public_servic
es_en.html 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Public  Service  Provider  (A  Public  Service 
Provider  is  a  Public  Administration  or  Business  providing  Public 
Services financed through public resource). 

Consumer 
(SK&E) 

Source: SDI Knowledge based on EIF 2.0 
http://ec.europa.eu/isa/documents/isa_annex_ii_eif_en.pdf 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Public  Service  Consumer  (A  Public  Service 
Consumer is a Public Administration, Business or Citizen consuming 
public services). 

3.2.3.  Semantic view  

This subsection provides a source (first table) and definition (second table) for each ABB 
of the semantic view. 

Table 8: List of ABBs/sources – Semantic view 

Building Block Name 

EIRA 

INSPIRE 

SDI 
Knowledge 

INSPIRE framework documents 

INSPIRE data specifications 

Reference systems, units of measure and 
geographic grid systems 

Encoding 

Identifier Management 

Data Quality 

Portrayal 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

26 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block Name 

EIRA 

INSPIRE 

SDI 
Knowledge 

Representation 

Organisation data policy on privacy, 
licensing.... 

Data Model 

ISO/OGC/CEN standards (Foundation 
schemas) 

INSPIRE RDF and metadata RDF vocabularies 
(Linked Data) 

INSPIRE GML application schema's and 
metadata ISO/xml schemas (INSPIRE) 

Metadata schema  

Metadata 

INSPIRE Discovery Metadata 

INSPIRE Evaluation and Use Metadata 

Data 

SDI Registry 

Spatial Data set / Authentic Data source 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

Table 9: List of ABBs/definitions – Semantic view  

Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

INSPIRE 
framework 
documents 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
The  INSPIRE  infrastructure  involves  a  number  of  items,  which 
require  clear  descriptions  and  the  possibility  to  be  referenced 
through unique identifiers. Examples for such items include INSPIRE 
themes,  code  lists,  application  schemas  or  discovery  services. 
Registers  provide  a  means  to  assign  identifiers  to  items  and  their 
labels,  definitions  and  descriptions  (in  different  languages).  The 
INSPIRE  registry  provides  a  central  access  point  to  a  number  of 
centrally managed INSPIRE registers. The content of these registers 
are  based  on  the  INSPIRE  Directive,  Implementing  Rules  and 
Technical Guidelines. 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/registry 

27 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

INSPIRE data 
specifications 
(I&E) 

Reference 
systems, units 
of measure and 
geographic grid 
systems 
(I&E) 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Data  Standard  Catalogue  (A  Data  Standard 
Catalogue is a catalogue of Data Standards). 

Source: INSPIRE 
INSPIRE Technical Guidelines on data specifications e.g. Addresses, 
Administrative  Units,  Cadastral  Parcels,  Coordinate  Reference 
Systems,  Geographical  Grid  Systems,  Geographical  Names, 
Hydrography, Protected Sites and Transport Networks. 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/data-specifications/2892  
Based on EIRA BB Data Standard (A data standard is a structural 
metadata specification that describes or defines other data). 

Source: INSPIRE 
Systems  for  uniquely  referencing  spatial  information  in  space  as  a 
set of coordinates (x, y, z) and/or latitude and longitude and height, 
based on a geodetic horizontal and vertical datum. 

Based on EIRA BB Data Standard (A data standard is a structural 
metadata specification that describes or defines other data). 

Encoding 
(SK&E) 

Source: SDI Knowledge 

Based on EIRA BB Syntax Encoding Scheme (A Syntax Encoding 
Scheme indicates that the value is a string formatted in accordance 
with a formal notation). 

Identifier 
Management 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
It is important for the INSPIRE ID and the work on RDF and PIDs in 
ARE3NA. 

Based on EIRA BB Data Standard (A data standard is a structural 
metadata specification that describes or defines other data). 

Data Quality 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/documents/INSPIRE_/JRC83209_Online
_Data_quality_in_INSPIRE.pdf 

Based on EIRA BB Data Standard (A data standard is a structural 
metadata specification that describes or defines other data). 

Portrayal 
(SK&E) 

Source: SDI Knowledge 

Based on EIRA BB Data Standard (A data standard is a structural 
metadata specification that describes or defines other data). 

Representation 
(SK&E) 

Source: SDI Knowledge 
XML, (Geo) JSON, N3 Triples, TIFF, JPEG... 

28 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

Organisation 
data policy on 
privacy, 
licensing.... 
(SK&E) 

Needed  EIRA  focal  ABB,  creating  the  interconnections  to  the 
Organisational and Technical – application view. 

Based on EIRA BB Representation (A Representation is a physical 
embodiment or manifestation of data). 

Source: SDI Knowledge 

Needed  EIRA  focal  ABB,  creating  the  interconnections  to  the 
Organisational view. 

Based on EIRA BB Data Policy (A data policy is a short statement 
of management intent and fundamental rules governing the creation, 
acquisition,  integrity,  security,  quality,  and  use  of  data  and 
information). A data policy can be among others the following: 
- Information security policy; 
- Privacy policy; 
- Licensing and charging policy; 
- Data quality policy; 
- Metadata management policy. 

Data Model 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
Chapter  5  of  INSPIRE  Data  Specifications,  i.e.  Data  content  & 
structure. 

Based on EIRA BB Data Model (A Data Model includes formal data 
names, comprehensive data definitions, proper data structures and 
precise data integrity rules). 

Source: INSPIRE 

Based on EIRA BB Core Data Model (A context-neutral data model 
that captures the fundamental characteristics of an entity). 

Source: INSPIRE 

Based on EIRA BB Data Model (A Data Model includes formal data 
names, comprehensive data definitions, proper data structures and 
precise data integrity rules). 

Source: INSPIRE 

ISO/OGC/CEN 
standards 
(Foundation 
schemas) 
(I&E) 

INSPIRE RDF 
and metadata 
RDF 
vocabularies 
(Linked Data) 
(I&E) 

INSPIRE GML 
application 
schema's and 

29 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

metadata 
ISO/xml 
schemas 
(INSPIRE) 
(I&E) 

Metadata 
schema  
(SK) 

Metadata 
(I) 

INSPIRE 
Discovery 
Metadata 
(I&E) 

INSPIRE 
Evaluation and 
Use Metadata 
(I) 

Data 
(I&E) 

Based on EIRA BB Data Model (A Data Model includes formal data 
names, comprehensive data definitions, proper data structures and 
precise data integrity rules). 

Source: SDI Knowledge  
Data  model  by  which 
DCAT/GeoDCAT. 

the  metadata 

is  structured,  e.g. 

Source: INSPIRE 
It  means  information  describing  spatial  data  sets  and  spatial  data 
services and making it possible to discover, inventory and use them. 
According to INSPIRE Generic Conceptual Model (GCM), this ABB will 
cover metadata on the following levels: 
- Discovery 
- Evaluation 
- Use 
Metadata associated with individual spatial objects will be described 
as part of the application schemas.  

Source: INSPIRE 
According  to  INSPIRE  GCM,  this  ABB  will  cover  metadata  on  the 
discovery level. 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Descriptive  Metadata  (Descriptive  metadata 
for  purposes  such  as  discovery  and 
describes  a  resource 
identification. It can include elements such as title, abstract, author, 
and keywords). 

Source: INSPIRE 
According  to  INSPIRE  GCM,  this  ABB  will  cover  metadata  on  the 
evaluation and use levels. 

Source: INSPIRE  

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Data  (Data  are  facts  represented  as  text, 
numbers, graphics, images, sound, video or geometric objects). 

SDI Registry 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
INSPIRE Registry is a specialisation of an SDI Registry. 

Based on EIRA BB Reference Data (Reference Data is any data used 
to  organise  or  categorise  other  data,  or  for  relating  data  to 
information  both  within  and  beyond  the  boundaries  of  the 
enterprise). 

30 

 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

Spatial Data set 
/ Authentic 
Data source 
(I&E) 

in 

the  ISO  19100  series  of  standards, 

Source: INSPIRE 
Published  quality  levels  of  each  spatial  data  set  using  the  criteria 
defined 
including 
completeness, consistency, currency and accuracy. This will include 
methods of best practice in publishing:  
- Acceptable quality levels of each spatial data set 
- Attainment against those levels for reach spatial data set. 
Quality information associated with individual spatial objects is part 
of the metadata associated with respective spatial objects (see ABB 
"Metadata") and will in general be described as part of the application 
schema. 
Based  on  EIRA  BB  Data  Set  (A  Data  Set  is  a  collection  of  data, 
published or curated by a single agent, and available for access or 
download in one or more formats). 

3.2.4. 

Technical view – Application 

This subsection provides a source (first table) and definition (second table) for each ABB 
of the technical - application view. 

Table 10: List of ABBs/sources – Technical view – Application 

Building Block Name 

EIRA 

INSPIRE  SDI 

Knowledge 

Spatial Data Service 

API 

Web interface / Desktop / Mobile 

SDI 

GIS Application 

Data Portal 

Geoportal 

Sector based Geoportal (not INSPIRE) 

National Geoportal (not INSPIRE) 

INPSIRE EU Geoportal 

Discovery of services 

Data validator (Conformance) 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

31 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block Name 

EIRA 

INSPIRE  SDI 

Knowledge 

Transformation service 

X 

X 

Table 11: List of ABBs/definitions – Technical view – Application 

Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

Spatial Data 
Service 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
Operations  which  may  be  performed,  by  invoking  a  computer 
application, on the spatial data contained in spatial data sets or on the 
related metadata. 

Based on EIRA BB Application Service (An Application Service is an 
externally  visible  unit  of  functionality,  provided  by  one  or  more 
application ABBs). 

API 
(SK&E) 

Source: SDI Knowledge 

Web interface / 
Desktop / 
Mobile 
(SK&E) 

SDI 
(SK&E) 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Machine  to  Machine  Interface  (A  Machine  to 
Machine  Interface  is  a  description  of  a  boundary  between  a  system 
and  other  systems,  usually  including  the  mechanisms  by  which 
information is transferred). 

Source: SDI Knowledge 

Based on EIRA BB Human Interface (A Human Interface is a specific 
interface between the human users of an IT system and the programs 
providing screen or printed results). 

Source: SDI Knowledge 
Hosts  geographic  data  and  attributes,  sufficient  documentation 
(metadata),  a  means  to  discover,  visualise,  and  evaluate  the  data 
(catalogues and Web mapping), and some method to provide access 
to the geographic data. 

Needed EIRA focal ABB, creating the interconnections to the Technical 
- application view.  

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Interoperable  European  Solution  (An 
Interoperable  European  Solution  (IES)  is  a  solution,  developed  by 
Public  Administrations  that  facilitate  the  delivery  of  electronic  Public 
Services  and  cross-border  exchange  of  information  between  Public 
Administrations  (or  Citizens)  in  support  to  the  implementation  and 
advancement of EU, national or local Public Policies). 

GIS Application 
(SK&E) 

Source: SDI Knowledge 

32 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

A  Geographical  Information  System  (GIS)  is  a  system  designed  to 
capture, store, manipulate, analyse, manage, and present all types of 
spatial or geographical data. 

Based on EIRA BB Application Service (An Application Service is an 
externally  visible  unit  of  functionality,  provided  by  one  or  more 
application ABBs). 

Source: SDI Knowledge 
Web portal used to find and access information via the Internet, not 
only associated to geographic services (display, analysis, and in some 
cases content editing, e.g. OpenStreetMap), but with the publication 
of any type of data. It may also contain transactional capabilities, such 
as public service applications. 

Based on EIRA BB Application Service (An Application Service is an 
externally  visible  unit  of  functionality,  provided  by  one  or  more 
application ABBs). 

Source: SDI Knowledge 
A geoportal is a type of web portal used to find and access geographic 
information  (geospatial  information)  and  associated  geographic 
services (display, editing, analysis, etc.) via the Internet. Geoportals 
are important for the effective use of GIS and a key element of SDIs. 
The EU INSPIRE Geoportal is an example of this ABB. 

Based on EIRA BB Application Service (An Application Service is an 
externally  visible  unit  of  functionality,  provided  by  one  or  more 
application ABBs). 

Source: SDI Knowledge 
Geoportal oriented to a certain sector. 

Based on EIRA BB Application Service (An Application Service is an 
externally  visible  unit  of  functionality,  provided  by  one  or  more 
application ABBs). 

Source: SDI Knowledge 
Geoportal oriented to a certain country. 

Based on EIRA BB Application Service (An Application Service is an 
externally  visible  unit  of  functionality,  provided  by  one  or  more 
application ABBs). 

Data Portal 
(SK&E) 

Geoportal 
(SK&E) 

Sector based 
Geoportal (not 
INSPIRE) 
(SK&E) 

National 
Geoportal (not 
INSPIRE) 
(SK&E) 

INPSIRE EU 
Geoportal 

Source: INSPIRE 

33 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

(I&E) 

The INSPIRE geoportal provides the means to search for spatial data 
sets  and  spatial  data  services,  and  subject  to  access  restrictions,  to 
view  spatial  data  sets  from  the  EU  Member  States  within  the 
framework of the INSPIRE Directive. 

Based on EIRA BB Application Service (An Application Service is an 
externally  visible  unit  of  functionality,  provided  by  one  or  more 
application ABBs). 

Discovery of 
services 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
Discovery services making it possible to search for spatial data sets 
and services on the basis of the content of the corresponding metadata 
and to display the content of the metadata. 

Data validator 
(Conformance) 
(SK&E) 

Based on EIRA BB Service Discovery Service (A Service Discovery 
Service allows the automatic discovery of other services). 

Source: SDI Knowledge 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Data  Validation  Service  (A  Data  Validation 
Service  is  used  to  validate  data  against  predefined  semantic  and 
syntactic constraints). Assume this covers data validation, metadata 
validation, and service validation, all relevant to INSPIRE publication. 

Transformation 
service 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
Transformation services, enabling spatial data sets to be transformed 
with a view to achieving interoperability. 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Data  Transformation  Service  (A  Data 
Transformation  Service  converts  data.  This  includes  the  conversion 
from one data format to another). 

34 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
3.2.5. 

Technical view – Infrastructure 

This subsection provides a source (first table) and definition (second table) for each ABB 
of the technical - infrastructure view. 

Table 12: List of ABBs/sources – Technical view – Infrastructure 

Building Block Name 

EIRA 

INSPIRE  SDI 

Knowledge 

Service Registration 

Registry service 

Data Collector Service 

Sensor Observation Service 

Discovery of metadata 

Administration and Monitoring Service 

Download services 

View services 

Search service 

Gazetteer 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

X 

Table 13: List of ABBs/definitions – Technical view – Infrastructure 

Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

Service 
Registration 
(SK&E) 

Source: SDI Knowledge 
To  document/describe  the  service  in  a  catalogue.  Also  contained  in 
INSPIRE metadata for services. 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Service  Registration  Service  (A  Service 
Registration  Service  provides  a  mechanism  to  register  the  system 
service within a catalogue to be discovered by other services). 

Registry service 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
Service to access and make use of the registers. 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Data  Publication  Service  (A  Data  Publication 
Service makes data available to other services or users). 

Data Collector 
Service 
(SK) 

Source: SDI Knowledge 

Service to collect data from different sources. 

35 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

Sensor 
Observation 
Service 
(I) 

Discovery of 
metadata 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
Online sensors delivering spatio-temporal data have emerged in many 
sectors.  To  have  comparable,  efficient,  real  time  data  flows  coming 
from devices, ARE3NA has developed guidelines, demonstrators and 
updates  to  open  source  tools  using  the  OGC  SOS  standard  for  a 
potential  new  INSPIRE  data  download  service  direct  from  sensor 
devices.  
https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/software/are3nasos/description 

Source: INSPIRE 
Services making it possible to search for spatial data sets and services 
on  the  basis  of  the  content  of  the  corresponding  metadata  and  to 
display the content of the metadata. 
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-
content/EN/TXT/PDF/?uri=CELEX:32008R1205&from=EN 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Metadata  Management  Service  (A  Metadata 
Management Service enables the creation, storage, categorisation and 
retrieval of metadata). 

Administration 
and Monitoring 
Service 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
This ABB will define best practice in ensuring that spatial data can be 
information  without 
managed  against  updates  of 
interruption  of  services.  This  will  require,  where  practicable,  the 
definition  of  mechanism  by  different  stakeholder  areas  to  manage 
where this is required and it is feasible. 

reference 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Administration  and  Monitoring  Service  (An 
Administration and Monitoring Service enables the administration and 
monitoring of services offered by the different ABBs). 

Download 
services 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
Download  services,  enabling  copies  of  spatial  data  sets,  or  parts  of 
such sets, to be downloaded and, where practicable, accessed directly. 
Includes sensor observation data, as noted above. 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Data  Publication  Service  (A  Data  Publication 
Service makes data available to other services or users). 

View services 
(I&E) 

Source: INSPIRE 
View services making it possible, as a minimum, to display, navigate, 
zoom in/out, pan, or overlay viewable spatial data sets and to display 
legend information and any relevant content of metadata. 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Data  Publication  Service  (A  Data  Publication 
Service makes data available to other services or users). 

36 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Building Block 
Name 

Definition 

Search service 
(SK&E) 

Source: SDI Knowledge 
Service to search for addresses, geonames, etc. 

Gazetteer 
(I&E) 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Data  Publication  Service  (A  Data  Publication 
Service makes data available to other services or users). 

Source: INSPIRE 
A  gazetteer  is  a  register  of  features  of  a  country,  region,  continent 
etc. containing information on their geographical position. 
http://www.iso.org/iso/catalogue_detail.htm?csnumber=26017 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/metadata-
codelist/SpatialDataServiceCategory/infoGazetteerService 

Based  on  EIRA  BB  Data  Publication  Service  (A  Data  Publication 
Service makes data available to other services or users). 

37 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
3.3.  List of Solution Building Blocks 

This subsection contains the identified SBBs realising ABBs of the EIRA and INSPIRE based 
architecture model. The SBBs are presented in a table per SDI. These tables consist of 
three columns: 

  SBB name – name of the SBB identified; 
  ABB mapping – mapping to the ABB from the architecture model; 
  URL – link to additional information about the SBB in the SDI documentation.  

Note:  An  official  source  has  not  been  found  for  every  SBB.  However,  the  SBBs  are 
documented on the SDI. For these SBBs, the SDI source is included and highlighted with 
a (*), meaning that the information comes only from the definition of the SBB on the SDI 
documentation and not from the SBB source.  

The approach followed to identify SBBs within the selected SDIs is the following: 

1.  Analyse the existing documentation of the SDI. The link to the documents analysed 
for each SDI is collected in Table 2. For example, read the existing description of 
the Danish Academy for Spatial Information (DAiSI) SDI. 

2.  Identify  SBBs  by  thoroughly  reading  throughout  the  SDI  documentation.  For 
example, the DAiSI documentation mentions that “the KMS web-based services are 
based on the OGC Web Map Service standards”. Therefore, “OGC Web Map Service 
standards”  were  identified  as  an  SBB.  In  addition,  “KMW  services”  are  further 
explained  in  the  documentation  as  a  generalisation  of  services:  KMSTrans, 
MIFTrans, etc. In this case, “KMSTrans” and “MIFTrans” were identified as SBBs, 
not the “KMS services”. 

3.  Create the mapping between the identified SBBs and the ABBs from the data model 
developed previously (see Section 3.2). The SBBs were mapped by selecting which 
ABB  complies  better  with  the  description  of  the  SBB  documented  in  the  SDI 
documentation. When needed, desk research was performed to better understand 
the SBB and do the mapping. Every source used for this mapping is indicated in 
the SBB documentation (column “URL” in the subsections below). For example, the 
OGC Web Map Service standards is mapped to the ABB “Core Data Model”. 

The subsections below collect the results obtained from the SDIs analysis, i.e. the list of 
SBBs identified for each SDI. 

3.3.1.  SBBs from national SDIs 

This section contains the SBBs identified from the SDIs listed in Section 3.1. 

3.3.1.1.  Czech Republic - National Geo-Information Structure 

This  section  lists  the  SBBs  identified  in  the  Czech  Republic  National  Geo-Information 
Structure SDI. 

Table 14: Identification of SBBs – Czech Republic National Geo-Information Structure 

SBB name 

ABB mapping 

URL 

Law 183/2006 Sb. on landscape 
planning and building 
regulations 

Binding instrument 

http://ggim.un.org/knowlege
base/Print51525.aspx 

State Statistical Act 

Binding Instrument 

http://ggim.un.org/knowledg
ebase/Print51525.aspx 

38 

 
 
 
 
Act on Freedom of Access to 
Environmental Information 

Binding Instrument 

http://ggim.un.org/knowledg
ebase/Print51525.aspx 

Act 106/1999 

Binding Instrument 

Copyright Act 

Non-Binding 
Instrument 

http://ggim.un.org/knowledg
ebase/Print51525.aspx 

http://portal.unesco.org/cultu
re/es/files/30389/114243108
03cz_copyright_en_2000.pdf/
cz_copyright_en_2000.pdf 

GML 

SHP 

SABE 

Data standard 

http://www.opengeospatial.or
g/standards/gml 

Representation 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Shapefile 

Data Set 

ZABAGED 

SDI Registry 

3D contours 

Data Set 

(digital raster data) RZM 

Data Set 

OGC Web Services (OWS) 

Core Data Model 

GIS standards 

Data Standard 

http://www.eurogeographics.
org/documents/ug2001v11_fi
nal.pdf 

http://geoportal.cuzk.cz/(S(d
rsdduxorzvwf2zz0hh34fgh))/
Default.aspx?lng=EN&mode=
TextMeta&side=vyskopis&met
adataID=CZ-CUZK-
ZABAGED-
VV&mapid=8&menu=304 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/re
ports/stateofplay2011/rcr11C
Zv112.pdf (*) 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/re
ports/stateofplay2011/rcr11C
Zv112.pdf (*) 

http://www.opengeospatial.or
g/standards/owc 

http://www.esri.com/library/
whitepapers/pdfs/spatial-
data-standards.pdf 

Specialised dictionary of the 
Czech Office for Surveying, 
Mapping and Cadastre and the 
Authority of Geodesy, 
Cartography and Cadastre of the 
Slovak Republic 

SDI Registry / 
Metadata  

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/re
ports/stateofplay2011/rcr11C
Zv112.pdf (*) 

39 

 
 
 
Glossary of the Czech 
Association of Geoinformation 
and the Ministry of Informatics 

SDI Registry / 
Metadata 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/re
ports/stateofplay2011/rcr11C
Zv112.pdf (*) 

General Multilingual 
Environmental Thesaurus 
(GEMET) 

SDI Registry 

https://www.eionet.europa.e
u/gemet/ 

ISO 8859P2 

Standard 

Mapmaker 

INSPIRE geoportal 

MoE Metadata portal 

Discovery of 
Services 

Discovery of 
Metadata 

Discovery of 
Metadata 

ISO 19119 

Standard 

ISO 19130 

Standard 

MIDAS-metadata catalogue 

Metainformation system MIS 

Discovery of 
Metadata 

Discovery of 
Metadata 

Czech national geo-portal 
(CENIA) 

Discovery of 
Metadata / View 
service 

40 

http://www.iso.org/iso/home
/store/catalogue_tc/catalogue
_detail.htm?csnumber=2824
6 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/re
ports/stateofplay2011/rcr11C
Zv112.pdf (*) 

http://inspire-
geoportal.ec.europa.eu/ 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/re
ports/stateofplay2011/rcr11C
Zv112.pdf (*) 

http://www.iso.org/iso/home
/store/catalogue_ics/catalogu
e_detail_ics.htm?csnumber=
59221 
INSPIRE recommended: 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/d
ocuments/Metadata/MD_IR_a
nd_ISO_20131029.pdf 

http://www.iso.org/iso/home
/store/catalogue_tc/catalogue
_detail.htm?csnumber=5178
9 

https://midas3.kitware.com/
midas/ 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/re
ports/stateofplay2011/rcr11C
Zv112.pdf (*) 

http://www.czechspaceportal.
cz/en/ministries/ministry-of-
the-environment-of-the-
czech-republic/cenia-czech-

 
 
 
WMS 

Discovery of 
Metadata / View 
service / Data 
Validator 

COSMC geo-portal 

Portal 

MIS Catalogue service 

Discovery of 
Services 

OGC CSW discovery service of 
the INSPIRE geoportal 

Discovery of 
Services 

Portal of geohazards 

CUZK portal 

Discovery of 
Services 

Discovery of 
Services 

COSMC view services 

View services 

UNSDI portal 

Portal 

environmental-information-
agency/ 

http://www.geology.cz/extra
net-eng/maps/online/wms 

http://geoportal.cuzk.cz/(S(o
qygkqbvn5c3vvzry23fbwua))/
Default.aspx?lng=EN&head_t
ab=sekce-00-
gp&mode=TextMeta&text=uv
od_uvod&menu=01&news=y
es&UvodniStrana=yes 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/re
ports/stateofplay2011/rcr11C
Zv112.pdf (*) 

http://inspire-
geoportal.ec.europa.eu/disco
very/ 

http://www.geology.cz/extra
net-eng/maps/online/map-
applications 

http://geoportal.cuzk.cz/(S(kf
t3piyu3gq3l1rljlvpirgr))/Defau
lt.aspx?head_tab=sekce-00-
gp&mode=TextMeta&text=uv
od_uvod&menu=01&news=y
es&UvodniStrana=yes 

http://geoportal.cuzk.cz/(S(o
qygkqbvn5c3vvzry23fbwua))/
Default.aspx?mode=TextMeta
&side=WMS.uvod&text=WMS
.uvod&head_tab=sekce-03-
gp&menu=31 

http://www.ungiwg.org/conte
nt/united-nations-spatial-
data-infrastructure-unsdi 

UNSDI applications 

Search service / 
View service 

http://www.ungiwg.org/conte
nt/links 

41 

 
 
 
WCT Transformation Service 

Transformation 
service 

Mapmaker 

View service 

Public administration portal 

Discovery of 
services 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/re
ports/stateofplay2011/rcr11C
Zv112.pdf (*) 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/re
ports/stateofplay2011/rcr11C
Zv112.pdf (*) 

http://geoportal.cenia.cz 

Data store of forestry data 

View service 

http://www.uhul.cz/ 

3.3.1.2.  Denmark - Danish Academy for Spatial Information (DAiSI) 

This section lists the SBBs identified in DAiSI SDI. 

Table 15: Identification of SBBs – Danish Academy for Spatial Information 
(DAiSI) 

SBB name 

ABB mapping 

URL 

Law on Infrastructure for 
Spatial Information 

Public Policy 

Access to Environmental 
Information Act 

Binding Instrument 

https://www.google.be/url?sa=t&rc
t=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=
3&ved=0ahUKEwj1wYOB-
bnQAhWBC8AKHQ6vCokQFggwMAI
&url=http%3A%2F%2Fggim.un.org
%2Fknowledgebase%2FExportPDF
51514.aspx&usg=AFQjCNHTMzzmK
iuHehZjmHvUEYUVmCkHlA&sig2=n
SJRwElZZkEznhkMOpUKag&bvm=b
v.139250283,d.ZGg&cad=rja 

https://www.google.be/url?sa=t&rc
t=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=
3&ved=0ahUKEwj1wYOB-
bnQAhWBC8AKHQ6vCokQFggwMAI
&url=http%3A%2F%2Fggim.un.org
%2Fknowledgebase%2FExportPDF
51514.aspx&usg=AFQjCNHTMzzmK
iuHehZjmHvUEYUVmCkHlA&sig2=n
SJRwElZZkEznhkMOpUKag&bvm=b
v.139250283,d.ZGg&cad=rja 

TOP10DK (digital national 
topographic database) 

Data base 

http://www.gisgeo.dk/copenhagen/
arcex.htm 

KMS Map Supply API 
(kortforsyningen) 

API 

http://kortforsyningen.dk/ 

42 

 
 
 
SBB name 

ABB mapping 

URL 

DAV (Danish Address 
Road Register) 

Registry service 

Address Project 

Registry service 

KMS FLAT 

Registry service 

DD0 

Registry service 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/reports
/stateofplay2011/rcr11DKv123.pdf 
(*) 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/reports
/stateofplay2011/rcr11DKv123.pdf 
(*) 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/reports
/stateofplay2011/rcr11DKv123.pdf 
(*) 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/reports
/stateofplay2011/rcr11DKv123.pdf 
(*) 

KMS geo-referenced 
building ids. 

Registry service 

http://kortforsyningen.dk/ 

ETRS89 

Reference system 

http://etrs89.ensg.ign.fr/ 

KMSTrans (KMS 
Transformation tool) 

Transformation 
service / tool 

http://kortforsyningen.dk/ 

MIFTrans 

SHPTrans 

DWGTrans 

KMSTrLib 

Transformation 
service / tool 

Transformation 
service / tool 

Transformation 
service / tool 

Transformation 
service / tool 

http://kortforsyningen.dk/ 

http://kortforsyningen.dk/ 

http://kortforsyningen.dk/ 

http://kortforsyningen.dk/ 

UTM/EUREF89 

Reference system 

https://www.google.be/url?sa=t&rc
t=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=
1&ved=0ahUKEwjv7eSN-
7nQAhWIAMAKHWpZBRIQFggbMAA
&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.euref.
eu%2Fsymposia%2Fbook2004%2F
6-7-
denmark.pdf&usg=AFQjCNEaDyEFq
IU4zYtt2AmOq9EkJ4NEjw&sig2=Oy
40K1mQt0o0MIs4ga4nXw&bvm=bv
.139250283,d.ZGg&cad=rja 

43 

 
 
 
SBB name 

ABB mapping 

URL 

DVR90 

Reference system 

MIA 

miniMAKS 

Data quality 
assessment 

Data quality 
assessment 

DSFL 

Encoding 

FOT specification 

Specification 

http://georepository.com/crs_5799
/DVR90-height.html 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/reports
/stateofplay2011/rcr11DKv123.pdf 
(*) 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/reports
/stateofplay2011/rcr11DKv123.pdf 
(*) 

https://docs.safe.com/fme/html/F
ME_Desktop_Documentation/FME_
ReadersWriters/dsfl/dsfl.htm 

http://www.geodanmark.dk/Materi
ale/files/FOTspecifikation/FOT4+sp
ecifikation_UK.pdf 

KMS official place names 
database 

Geodata-info.dk 
(national geoportal) 

Gazetteer  

http://kortforsyningen.dk/ 

Portal / View service 

http://geodata-info.dk/Portal/ 

ISO 19115 

Standard 

ISO 19139 

Standard 

Geodata-info.dk 
(national geoportal) – 
Metadata service 

Discovery of 
metadata 

http://www.iso.org/iso/home/store
/catalogue_tc/catalogue_detail.htm
?csnumber=32579 
INSPIRE recommended: 
http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/docum
ents/Metadata/MD_IR_and_ISO_20
131029.pdf 

http://www.iso.org/iso/home/store
/catalogue_tc/catalogue_detail.htm
?csnumber=32557 

http://geodata-info.dk/Portal/ 

The Environmental Portal  Portal / View service 

http://kort.arealinfo.dk/ 

The Public Information 
Online (OIS) 

Portal / View service 

https://www.ois.dk/ 

on-line Danish access 
service for metadata on 
reference data and core 

Discovery of 
metadata 

http://geodata-info.dk/Portal/ 

44 

 
 
 
SBB name 

ABB mapping 

URL 

thematic data of the 
national geoportal 

KMS.dk/sepaakort 

View service 

http://kmswww3.kms.dk/kortpaan
ettet/ 

KMS.dk/sepaakort – 
Download service 

Matriculation (=basis for 
property registration in 
Denmark; it consists of 
the land registry, 
cadastral map and 
cadastral archive) 

The Nature and 
Environment Portal – 
Download service 

Vis Stedet (“Show the 
location”) 

Download service 

http://kortforsyningen.dk/ 

Registry service 

http://kmswww3.kms.dk/kortpaan
ettet/index.htm?map=mat 

Download service 

http://www.miljoeportal.dk/Arealin
formation/Vejledninger/ 

View service 

http://visstedet.kms.dk/ 

Vis Kort (“Show map”) 

View service - Tool 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/reports
/stateofplay2011/rcr11DKv123.pdf 
(*) 

OGC Web Services 
(OWS) 

Core Data Model 

http://www.opengeospatial.org/sta
ndards/owc 

PlansystemDK 

Data set 

http://www.plansystemdk.dk/ 

FOTdanmark 

Data set - Tool 

Danish Area Information 
System (AIS) 

Data set catalogue – 
Download service 

http://translate.googleusercontent.
com/translate_c?hl=en&sl=auto&tl
=en&u=http://kortforsyningen.dk/
&rurl=translate.google.com&usg=A
LkJrhiIm0DWA5m5Mfw0_wPPNiUqB
xTMZA 

http://www.dmu.dk/1_Viden/2_Milj
oe-
tilstand/3_samfund/AIS/index_en.h
tm 

45 

 
 
 
 
 
 
3.3.1.3.  The Netherlands Geonovum (NGII) 

This section lists the SBBs identified in the SDI from NGII. 

Table 16: Identification of SBBs – The Netherlands Geonovum (NGII) 

SBB name 

ABB mapping 

URL 

Nationaal Georegister 

Geoportal/SDI 

Dutch version of the 
European Directive on the 
legal protection of 
databases (96/9/EC) 

Public Policy 

Government Information 
Public 
Access Act 

Binding 
Instrument 

The Netherlands Data 
Registration Act 

Binding 
Instrument 

Personal Data Protection 
Act 

Binding 
Instrument 

EU Directive 2002/58 on 
privacy and electronic 
communications 

Public Policy 

http://www.nationaalgeoregister.nl
/geonetwork/srv/nl/main.home 

http://eur-
lex.europa.eu/lexUriServ/LexUriSer
v.do?uri=CELEX:31996L0009:EN:H
TML 

http://eur-
lex.europa.eu/lexUriServ/LexUriSer
v.do?uri=CELEX:31996L0009:EN:H
TML 

http://eur-
lex.europa.eu/lexUriServ/LexUriSer
v.do?uri=CELEX:31996L0009:EN:H
TML 

http://eur-
lex.europa.eu/lexUriServ/LexUriSer
v.do?uri=CELEX:31996L0009:EN:H
TML 

http://eur-
lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriSe
rv.do?uri=CELEX:32002L0058:en:
HTML 

Geo gedeeld 

Data Policy 

http://geogedeeld.geonovum.nl/ 

13 basic registers – 5 
spatial in nature 

Data Set 

Rijksdriehoeksstelsel (RD) 

Reference system 

Lambert conformal conical 

Reference system 

Geographic 

Reference system 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/reports
/stateofplay2011/rcr11NLv123.pdf 
(*) 

http://www.kadaster.nl/rijksdrieho
eksstelsel 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamb
ert_conformal_conic_projection 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/reports
/stateofplay2011/rcr11NLv123.pdf 
(*) 

ETRS 

Reference system 

http://etrs89.ensg.ign.fr/ 

46 

 
 
 
SBB name 

ABB mapping 

URL 

Framework for 
standards 

Implementing 
guideline 

http://wiki.geonovum.nl/index.php
?title=1_Framework_geostandards 

National validation service 

Data Validation 
Service 

http://www.geonovum.nl/diensten/
valideren 

The Nationaal 
Georegister 

Discovery of 
metadata 

http://www.nationaalgeoregister.nl
/geonetwork/srv/nl/main.home 

OGC standards 

Metadata schema 

http://www.opengeospatial.org/sta
ndards 

NODC (National 
Oceanographic Data 
Committee of the 
Netherlands) metadata 
catalogue 

NODC data catalogue 

data.overheid.nl 

Geonovum services 

Discovery of 
metadata  

http://www.nodc.nl/ 

Discovery of 
services 

Discovery of 
metadata 

http://www.nodc.nl/content/conten
t.asp?lang=0&menu=4&submenu=
4 

https://data.overheid.nl// 

Discovery of 
services / Network 
services 

http://www.geonovum.nl/onderwer
pen/services 

The Nationaal 
Georegister – View service 

View service 

http://www.nationaalgeoregister.nl
/geonetwork/srv/eng/search 

National Atlas 

View service 

http://www.nationaleatlas.nl/ 

36 download services 

Download services  http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/reports
/stateofplay2011/rcr11NLv123.pdf 
(*) 

GML3 

Data standard 

Dutch ISO 19115 metadata  Metadata schema 

http://www.opengeospatial.org/sta
ndards/gml 

http://www.geonovum.nl/sites/def
ault/files/Nederlands%20metadata
%20profiel%20op%20ISO%20191
15%20voor%20geografie%20-
%20v1.3.1%20def.pdf 

KNMI (Royal 

Catalogue of data 
collector service 

http://www.knmi.nl/over-het-
knmi/about 

47 

 
 
 
SBB name 

ABB mapping 

URL 

Netherlands Meteorological 
Institute) Catalog of basic 
data 

stelselcatalogus 

Reference system 

http://www.stelselcatalogus.nl/ 

3.3.1.4.  UK - The UK Location Infrastructure (UKLI) 

This section lists the SBBs identified in the SDI from the UKLI. 

Table 17: Identification of SBBs – The UK location strategy (UKLI) 

SBB name 

ABB mapping 

URL 

Digital National Framework 
(UK) 

Cm7157 Government 
response to the Power of 
Information Review 

UK GEMINI 

Implementing 
guideline / 
Standard 

Binding-
instrument 

http://geospatial.bcs.org/lisg/digital-
national-framework 

https://www.gov.uk/government/pu
blications/government-response-to-
the-power-of-information-review 

Metadata 
standard 

http://www.agi.org.uk/agi-
group/standards-committee/uk-
gemini 

data.gov.uk 

Portal 

https://data.gov.uk/ 

data.gov.uk – Registry 

Service 
registration 

https://data.gov.uk/publisher/land-
registry 

UK Location Infrastructure 
(UKLI) 

Non-binding 
instrument 

https://data.gov.uk/location/uk-
location-infrastructure 

UKLI – Data and Search 
Publishing 

Discovery of 
services 

UKLI – Search and 
Evaluation 

Search service 

https://data.gov.uk/sites/default/file
s/UKLII-Roadmap-20100208-v1-
3_10.pdf 

https://data.gov.uk/sites/default/file
s/UKLII-Roadmap-20100208-v1-
3_10.pdf 

UK Location Discovery 
Metadata Service - 
Operational Guide 

Technical 
guidance 

https://data.gov.uk/library/uk-
location-discovery-metadata-
service-operational-guide 

UKLI – Discovery Metadata 
Service (DMS) 

Discovery 
metadata 

https://data.gov.uk/sites/default/file
s/DMS%20Operational%20Guide%2
02-2_10.pdf 

48 

 
 
 
UKLI – Access and 
Exploitation 

View service / 
Download service 
/ Transformation 
service 

https://data.gov.uk/sites/default/file
s/UKLII-Roadmap-20100208-v1-
3_10.pdf 

UKLP Download Services 
Operational Guidance 

Technical 
guidance 

UK Location Getting Started 
Guide 

Technical 
guidance 

UK Location View Service 
Operational Guide 

Technical 
guidance 

Ordnance Survey gazetteer 
service 

Gazetteer 

https://data.gov.uk/library/uklp-
download-services-operational-
guidance-v11  

https://data.gov.uk/library/uk-
location-getting-started-guide-0-the-
uk-implementation-of-inspire 

https://data.gov.uk/library/uk-
location-view-service-operational-
guide 

https://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/
business-and-
government/products/50k-
gazetteer.html 

3.3.2.  SBBs from cross-border SDIs 

The subsections below  gather the identified SBBs of the SDIs classified as cross-border 
SDIs.  However,  the  information  available  of  these  SDIs  is  not  very  detailed.  Therefore, 
the number of SBBs identified for the list of cross-border SDIs is less than the number of 
SBBs identified at national level. 

3.3.2.1.  Danube Reference Data and Service Infrastructure (DRDSI) 

This section lists the SBBs identified in the DRDSI. 

Table 18: Identification of SBBs – Danube Reference Data and Service Infrastructure 
(DRDSI) 

SBB name 

ABB mapping 

URL 

DRDSI Datasets 

Spatial data sets 
catalogue 

http://drdsi.jrc.ec.europa.eu/datas
et?sort=sort_criteria+desc 

CKAN-based catalogue 

Registry service 

http://ckan.org/ 

CKAN-based metadata 
search 

Search service 

http://ckan.org/ 

MapStore-based browser of 
geographic data on the map 

View service 

http://mapstore.geo-
solutions.it/mapstore/ 

http://demo.geo-
solutions.it/share/JRC/deliverables/
documentation/online/install/mapst
ore_config.html 

49 

 
 
 
 
SBB name 

ABB mapping 

URL 

http://demo.geo-
solutions.it/share/JRC/deliverables/
documentation/online/install/mapst
ore_config.html 

3.3.2.2.  Geomatic Regional Partnership project (GRISI) 

This section lists the SBBs identified in the GRISI project. 

Table 19: Identification of SBBs – Geomatic Regional Partnership project (GRISI) 

SBB name 

ABB mapping 

URL 

Good Practices for the 
Development of Rural Areas 

Non-binding 
instrument / 
Implementing 
guideline 

http://www.grisiplus.eu/data/up
load/GOOD_PRACTICES_GUIDE
_in_English_language.pdf 

3.3.2.3.  North-Rhine Westphalia SDI 

This section lists the solutions identified in the North-Rhine Westphalia SDI. 

Table 20: Identification of solutions – North-Rhine Westphalia SDI 

Solution name 

Type of solution 

URL 

ETRS89 

UTM 

Reference system 

http://etrs89.ensg.ign.fr/ 

Reference system 

Centre for Geoinformation 
(CeGI) – Web Catalogue 
Services (WCatS) 

Dutch National 
Clearing House for 
Geoinformation (NCGI) 

Discovery of 
metadata 

Discovery of 
metadata 

Institute for Geoinformatics at 
Münster University (IFGI) – 
Multilingual 
web mapping client 

Application service 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Universal_Transverse_Mercat
or_coordinate_system 

http://www.ec-
gis.org/Workshops/9ec-
gis/papers/pd_portele.pdf (*) 

http://www.ec-
gis.org/Workshops/9ec-
gis/papers/pd_portele.pdf (*) 

http://www.ec-
gis.org/Workshops/9ec-
gis/papers/pd_portele.pdf (*) 

GDI NRW - GeoViewer 

View service 

https://www.geoportal.nrw/ 

Guidelines for metadata 
capture for the GDI-NW 

Technical guideline 

https://apps.geoportal.nrw.d
e/terraCatalog 

GEOkatalog 

Service registration 

http://www.geokatalog.de/ 

50 

 
 
 
3.3.3.  X-Border-GDI project 

After a preliminary analysis, the X-Border-GDI project was not considered as an SDI but 
as  a  programme  framework  for  a  large  number  of  particular  activities  along  the  entire 
border region Netherlands-Germany. The analysis of the available documentation did not 
reveal any SDI SBBs. 

51 

 
 
 
 
 
3.4.  Reusability assessment 

This subsection defines the criteria used for assessing reusability and elaborates on the 
assessment  of  SBBs  against  these  criteria  to  determine  the  set  of  reusable  location 
information solutions (see also Figure 4 above). 

3.4.1. 

Joinup eligibility criteria used for the reusability assessment 

A set of existing reuse criteria has been applied, to determine which of the identified SBBs 
listed in Section 0 can be reused to develop location-based solutions and services. 

The initial goal was to derive a set of reusable location information solutions for the EIC 
(= EIC solutions), however the EIC eligibility criteria were not yet mature by the time the 
assessment was performed. As described in Section 1.4, each EIC solution has to meet 
the  Joinup  eligibility  criteria  which  already  exist  and  are  regularly  applied.  Hence,  the 
existing Joinup eligibility criteria were used to derive from the set of identified SBBs a set 
of reusable location information solutions in the form of eligible candidates for Joinup.  

These Joinup eligibility criteria are defined as follows [10]: 

  Language: every solution description must be at least in English; 

  Licence  or  agreement:  solutions  must  be  published  under  a  licence,  except 

services which should have some type of agreement (terms of use, SLA); 

  Relevance: every solution has to be relevant for public administrations; 

  Quality:  the  solutions  must  be  described  in  conformance  to  the  latest  official 

release of the ADMS Application Profile (ADMS-AP); 

  Interface:  services  must  be  provided  through  digital  channels  such  as  web-

interface, machine-to-machine or other type of digital (stable) interfaces; 

  Unicity: solutions on Joinup should be unique; 

  Location: services must at least be applicable at European level, as explained in 

the example below. 

Next to these criteria, the assessment used the following rules and guidelines: 

  Solutions:  only  solutions  related  to  policy,  software,  service,  specification  or 
standard and guideline or template are considered eligible to be on Joinup. SBBs, 
such as portals, data sets, data bases, representations, etc. are not considered to 
match any of the Joinup solution types and therefore are excluded from the scope 
of the current analysis. 

  Unicity:  Joinup  prevents  the  introduction  of  duplicate  solutions.  The  “Unicity” 
criterion  has  been  assessed  through  a  Joinup  search,  confirming  whether  the 
eligible solutions are already shared on Joinup. Eligible solutions which are not yet 
published  are  candidates  to  be  published  on  Joinup  and  included  in  the  EIC, 
depending on their compliancy with the EIC eligibility criteria. 

  Language: every solution is described in English in the SDI documentation where 
it  was  identified.  Therefore,  it  is  considered  that  every  solution  fulfils  the 
“Language”  criterion  and  thus  no  detailed  assessment  for  this  criterion  was 
performed. 

  Quality: the criterion “Quality” is not applied and will not be scored, as it is related 
to  the  publication  of  the  solution  on  Joinup.  It  is  the  responsibility  of  the  Joinup 
operational  team  to  determine  if  the  proposed  solution  to  be  published 
accomplishes the “Quality” criterion or not. 

  Location: Joinup only includes basic and shared service building blocks that can 
be used by public administrations to develop European public services. This means 
that all services offered by Joinup are cross-border services and are usable by all 

52 

 
 
 
Member  States  (e.g.  eID,  the  European  Commission  Authentication  Service 
(ECAS),  Machine  Translation).  Given  that  the  assessed  services  only  have  a 
national  coverage,  they  are  considered  as  services  not  fulfilling  the  “Location” 
criterion.  This  assumption  could,  however,  be  debated  in  that  national  geodata 
services (e.g. INSPIRE services) form part of a European infrastructure and can be 
combined with data from other national services to form cross-border solutions. 
  Knock-out  criteria:  Each  criterion  is  treated  as  a  knock-out  criterion,  i.e.  the 
assessment of a solution will stop, if the solution does not comply with a criterion. 
The knock-out appliance follows the criteria order described below: 

1.  Solution type (policy, software, service, specification or standard and guideline 

or template); 

2.  Location (only applies to services); 

3.  Relevance; 

4.  Interface (only applies to services); 

5.  Licence or agreement; 

6.  Unicity – Not yet published on Joinup. 

The reusability assessment approach is summarised below, using the assessment of the 
SBB  “OGC  Web  Map  Service  (OWS)  standards”  as  a  concrete  example.  This  SBB  was 
identified during the analysis of the DAiSI SDI. 

1.  Analyse the existing documentation of the SBB, i.e. the description of the SBB 
in the SDI documentation, and the additional sources for each SBB, listed in Section 
0. 

2.  Check if the SBB could be a solution on Joinup, i.e. if it would be considered 
as a policy, software, service, specification or standard and guideline or template. 
For instance, Joinup would consider the OWS standards as a solution. The solution 
would be regarded as “standard” (indicated by an “S” in the assessment table). 

3.  Check  if  the  SBB  meets  the  “Location”  criterion.  This  criterion  is  only 
applicable for services. As the OWS is a standard, this criterion does not apply. 

4.  Check if the SBB meets the “Relevance” criterion. In general, all the solutions 
are  used  by  public  administrations  because  they  are  part  of  SDIs  in  whose 
development  public  administrations  participated.  Therefore,  all  the  solutions  are 
considered relevant. 

5.  Check if the SBB meets the “Interface” criterion. This criterion only applies to 

services, thus this criterion does not apply to the OWS standards. 

6.  Check if the SBB meets the “License or agreement” criterion. By analysing 
the information of the solution, it should be specified if they have an open license 
or usage agreement. However, the Joinup eligibility criteria accept some exceptions 
for  endorsed  solutions.  By  endorsement,  it  is  meant  that  a  national  public 
administration has recommended the use of the solution. It can also mean that the 
solution is funded by the European Commission or a national public administration. 
Going  back  to  step  4,  it  is  considered  that  by  making  use  of  the  solution,  every 
solution is endorsed by public administrations, thus the solutions assessed fulfil this 
criterion.  For  the  OWS  example,  these  standards  are  created  by  the  Open 

53 

 
 
 
Geospatial  Consortium  (OGC11),  i.e.  an  international  not  for  profit  organisation 
committed to making quality open standards for the global geospatial community. 
Therefore, the OWS standards have an open license and thus fulfil this criterion. 

7.  Finally, check if the SBB is already published on Joinup. To do so, a search 
on Joinup was done, using the title of the solution, keywords from the definition, 
etc. For the OWS example, no solution was found. However, during this research, 
other geospatial solutions than the ones identified in the SDI analysis were found. 
These solutions are listed in Annex V – List of geospatial solutions on Joinup, as they 
could  be  relevant  for  public  administrations  developing  SDIs  or  location-related 
solutions or services. 

Each  subsection  below  contains  the  assessment  of  the  different  SBBs  identified  from 
national and cross-border SDIs. The assessment tables use the following values: 

  Solution types: 

o  L: indicates that the solution is a policy; 

o  G: indicates that the solution is a guideline or template; 

o  P: indicates that the solution is a public service; 

o  S: indicates that the solutions is a specification or standard; and 

o  T: indicates that the solution is a software solution. 

  Assessment outcome: 

o  Y: compliance with Joinup eligibility criteria; 

o  N: non-compliance with Joinup eligibility criteria. 

3.4.2.  National SDI assessment 

This section contains the assessment of SBBs that were identified in Section 3.3.1 from 
national SDIs. 

3.4.2.1.  Czech Republic - National Geo-Information Structure 

This section assesses the SBBs identified in The Czech Republic National Geo-Information 
Structure (Section 3.3.1.1) against the Joinup eligibility criteria. 

Table 21: Assessment of SBBs – Czech Republic National Geo-Information Structure 

e
m
a
n
B
B
S

B
B
A

e
c
n
a
v
e
l
e
R

e
c
a
f
r
e
t
n
I

n
o

i
t
a
c
o
L

r
o
e
c
n
e
c
i
L

t
n
e
m
e
e
r
g
a

t
o
N
–
y
t
i
c
i
n
U

i

p
u
n
o
J
n
o

n
o

i
t
u
o
S

l

Law 183/2006 Sb. on 
landscape planning and 
building regulations 

Binding instrument 

L 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

State Statistical Act 

Binding Instrument 

L 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

11 http://www.opengeospatial.org  

54 

 
 
 
                                           
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Act on Freedom of Access to 
Environmental Information 

Binding Instrument 

L 

- 

Y 

- 

Act 106/1999 

Binding Instrument 

Copyright Act 

Non-Binding 
Instrument 

L 

L 

- 

- 

Y 

Y 

- 

- 

Data standard 

S 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

GML 

SHP 

SABE 

Representation 

Data Set 

ZABAGED 

SDI Registry 

3D contours 

Data Set 

(Digital raster data) RZM 

Data Set 

OGC Web Services (OWS) 

Core Data Model 

GIS standards 

Data Standard 

N 

N 

N 

N 

N 

S 

S 

- 

- 

Y 

Y 

- 

- 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Specialized dictionary of the 
Czech Office for Surveying, 
Mapping and Cadastre and 
the Authority of Geodesy, 
Cartography and Cadastre 
of the Slovak Republic 

Glossary of the Czech 
Association of 
Geoinformation and the 
Ministry of Informatics 

General Multilingual 
Environmental Thesaurus 
(GEMET) 

SDI Registry / 
Metadata  

P  N 

SDI Registry / 
Metadata 

P  N 

SDI Registry 

P  N 

ISO 8859P2 

Standard 

S 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

Mapmaker 

INSPIRE geoportal 

MoE Metadata portal 

Discovery of 
Services 

Discovery of 
Metadata 

Discovery of 
Metadata 

P  N 

P  N 

P  N 

ISO 19119 

Standard 

S 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

55 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
ISO 19130 

Standard 

S 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

MIDAS-metadata catalogue  Discovery of 

P  N 

Metadata 

Metainformation system MIS  Discovery of 

P  N 

Czech national geo-portal 
(CENIA) 

WMS 

Metadata 

Discovery of 
Metadata / View 
service 

Discovery of 
Metadata / View 
service / Data 
Validator 

COSMC geo-portal 

Portal 

MIS Catalogue service 

Discovery of 
Services 

OGC CSW discovery service 
of the INSPIRE geoportal 

Discovery of 
Services 

Portal of geohazards 

CUZK portal 

Discovery of 
Services 

Discovery of 
Services 

P  N 

P  N 

N 

P  N 

P  N 

P  N 

P  N 

COSMC view services 

View services 

P  N 

UNSDI portal 

Portal 

UNSDI applications 

Search service / 
View service 

N 

P  N 

WCT Transformation Service  Transformation 

P  N 

service 

Mapmaker 

View service 

P  N 

Public administration portal  Discovery of 

P  N 

services 

Data store of forestry data 

View service 

P  N 

56 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
3.4.2.2.  Denmark - Danish Academy for Spatial Information (DAiSI) 

This section assesses the SBBs identified in The Danish SDI (Section 3.3.1.2) against the 
Joinup eligibility criteria. 

Table 22: Assessment of SBBs – Danish Academy for Spatial Information (DAiSI) 

e
m
a
n
B
B
S

Law on Infrastructure for 
Spatial Information 

Access to Environmental 
Information Act 

TOP10DK (digital national 
topographic database) 

KMS Map Supply API 
(kortforsyningen) 

n
o
i
t
u
o
S

l

n
o
i
t
a
c
o
L

e
c
n
a
v
e
l
e
R

e
c
a
f
r
e
t
n
I

r
o

e
c
n
e
c
i
L

t
n
e
m
e
e
r
g
a

B
B
A

Public Policy 

L 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Binding Instrument 

L 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

t
o
N

–

y
t
i
c
i
n
U

i

p
u
n
o
J
n
o

Y 

Y 

Data base 

N 

API 

P 

N 

DAV (Danish Address Road 
Register) 

Registry service 

P 

N 

Address Project 

Registry service 

KMS FLAT 

Registry service 

DD0 

KMS geo-referenced 
building ids. 

Registry service 

Registry service 

ETRS89 

Reference system 

KMSTrans (KMS 
Transformation tool) 

Transformation 
service / tool 

P 

P 

P 

P 

N 

T 

N 

N 

N 

N 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

MIFTrans 

SHPTrans 

DWGTrans 

Transformation 
service / tool 

Transformation 
service / tool 

Transformation 
service / tool 

T 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

T 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

T 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

57 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
e
m
a
n
B
B
S

KMSTrLib 

B
B
A

Transformation 
service / tool 

n
o
i
t
u
o
S

l

n
o
i
t
a
c
o
L

e
c
n
a
v
e
l
e
R

e
c
a
f
r
e
t
n
I

r
o

e
c
n
e
c
i
L

t
n
e
m
e
e
r
g
a

t
o
N

–

y
t
i
c
i
n
U

i

p
u
n
o
J
n
o

T 

Y 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

UTM/EUREF89 

Reference system 

DVR90 

MIA 

Reference system 

Data quality  

miniMAKS 

Data quality  

DSFL 

Encoding 

FOT specification 

Specification 

KMS official place names 
database 

Gazetteer  

N 

N 

S 

S 

N 

S 

P 

- 

- 

Y 

Y 

- 

- 

Y 

Y 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

N 

Geodata-info.dk 
(national geoportal) 

Portal / View service 

P 

N 

ISO 19115 

ISO 19139 

Geodata-info.dk 
(national geoportal) – 
Metadata service 

Standard 

Standard 

Discovery of 
metadata 

The Environmental Portal 

Portal / View service 

Y 

Y 

- 

- 

Y 

Y 

S 

S 

P 

P 

P 

- 

- 

N 

N 

N 

The Public Information 
Online (OIS) 

on-line Danish access 
service for metadata on 
reference data and core 
thematic data of the 
national geoportal 

Portal / View service 

Discovery of 
metadata 

P 

N 

KMS.dk/sepaakort 

View service 

KMS.dk/sepaakort – 
Download service 

Download service 

P 

P 

N 

N 

58 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
e
m
a
n
B
B
S

B
B
A

Matriculation 

Registry service 

Download service 

The Nature and 
Environment Portal – 
Download service 

Vis Stedet (“Show the 
location”) 

View service 

P 

N 

e
c
n
a
v
e
l
e
R

e
c
a
f
r
e
t
n
I

r
o

e
c
n
e
c
i
L

t
n
e
m
e
e
r
g
a

t
o
N

–

y
t
i
c
i
n
U

i

p
u
n
o
J
n
o

n
o
i
t
u
o
S

l

P 

P 

n
o
i
t
a
c
o
L

N 

N 

Vis Kort (“Show map”) 

View service / Tool 

OGC Web Services (OWS) 

Core Data Model 

PlansystemDK 

Data set 

FOTdanmark 

Data set / Tool 

Danish Area Information 
System (AIS) 

Data set catalogue / 
Download service 

T 

S 

N 

T 

P 

- 

- 

Y 

Y 

- 

- 

Y 

Y 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

N 

Y 

Y 

Y 

3.4.2.3.  The Netherlands Geonovum (NGII) 

This section assesses the SBBs identified in The Netherlands Geonovum SDI (Section 0) 
against the Joinup eligibility criteria. 

Table 23: Assessment of SBBs – The Netherlands Geonovum (NGII) 

e
m
a
n
B
B
S

B
B
A

e
c
n
a
v
e
l
e
R

n
o

i
t
a
c
o
L

e
c
a
f
r
e
t
n
I

r
o
e
c
n
e
c
i
L

t
n
e
m
e
e
r
g
a

t
o
N

–

y
t
i
c
i
n
U

i

p
u
n
o
J
n
o

n
o

i
t
u
o
S

l

Nationaal Georegister  Geoportal/SDI 

N 

Dutch version of the 
European Directive on 
the legal protection of 
databases (96/9/EC) 

Government 
Information Public 
Access Act 

Public Policy 

L 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

Binding Instrument 

L 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

59 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
The Netherlands Data 
Registration Act  

Personal Data 
Protection Act 

EU Directive 2002/58 
on privacy and 
electronic 
communications 

Binding Instrument 

L 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

Binding Instrument 

L 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Public Policy 

L 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Geo gedeeld 

Data Policy 

L 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

13 basic registers – 5 
spatial in nature 

Data Set 

Rijksdriehoeksstelsel 
(RD) 

Reference system 

Lambert conformal 
conical 

Reference system 

Geographic 

Reference system 

ETRS 

Reference system 

N 

N 

N 

N 

N 

Framework for 
standards 

National validation 
service 

The Nationaal 
Georegister 

Implementing guideline 

G 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

N 

Data Validation Service 

P  N 

Discovery of metadata 

P  N 

OGC standards 

Metadata schema 

S 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

Discovery of metadata  

P  N 

NODC (National 
Oceanographic Data 
Committee of the 
Netherlands) metadata 
catalogue 

NODC data catalogue 

Discovery of services 

P  N 

data.overheid.nl 

Discovery of metadata 

P  N 

Geonovum services 

Discovery of services / 
Network services 

P  N 

60 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
The Nationaal 
Georegister – View 
service 

View service 

P  N 

National Atlas 

View service 

36 download services 

Download services 

GML3 

Data standard 

Metadata schema 

P  N 

P  N 

S 

S 

- 

- 

Y 

Y 

- 

- 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Dutch ISO 19115 
metadata 

KNMI (Royal 
Netherlands 
Meteorological 
Institute) Catalog of 
basic data 

Catalogue of data collector 
service 

P  N 

stelselcatalogus 

Reference system 

N 

3.4.2.4.  UK - The UK Location Infrastructure (UKLI) 

This section assesses the SBBs identified in The UKLI SDI (Section 3.3.1.4) against the 
Joinup eligibility criteria. 

Table 24: Assessment of SBBs – The UK location infrastructure (UKLI) 

e
m
a
n
B
B
S

B
B
A

n
o

i
t
a
c
o
L

e
c
n
a
v
e
l
e
R

n
o

i
t
u
o
S

l

Digital National 
Framework (UK) 

Implementing 
guideline/Standard 

G/S 

- 

Y 

t
o
N

–

y
t
i
c
i
n
U

i

p
u
n
o
J
n
o

r
o
e
c
n
e
c
i
L

t
n
e
m
e
e
r
g
a

Y 

Y 

e
c
a
f
r
e
t
n
I

- 

Cm7157 Government 
response to the Power of 
Information Review 

Binding-instrument 

L 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

UK GEMINI 

Metadata standard 

data.gov.uk 

Portal 

data.gov.uk – Registry 

Service registration 

UK Location 
Infrastructure (UKLI) 

Non-binging 
instrument 

S 

N 

P 

L 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

N 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

61 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
UKLI – Data and Search 
Publishing 

UKLI – Search and 
Evaluation 

UK Location Discovery 
Metadata Service - 
Operational Guide 

UKLI – Discovery 
Metadata Service (DMS) 

UKLI – Access and 
Exploitation 

UKLP Download Services 
Operational Guidance 

UK Location Getting 
Started Guide 

UK Location View Service 
Operational Guide 

Ordnance Survey 
gazetteer service 

Discovery of services 

P 

N 

Search service 

P 

N 

Technical guidance 

G 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

Discovery metadata 

P 

N 

View service / 
Download service / 
Transformation 
service 

P 

N 

Technical guidance 

G 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

Technical guidance 

G 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

Technical guidance 

G 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

Gazetteer 

P 

N 

3.4.3.  Cross-border SDI assessment 

The  subsections  below  assesses  the  SBBs  identified  under  Section  3.3.2  from  the  SDIs 
classified as cross-border SDIs.  

3.4.3.1.  Danube Reference Data and Service Infrastructure (DRDSI) 

This section assesses the SBBs identified in DRDSI (Section 3.3.2.1) against the Joinup 
eligibility criteria. 

Table 25: Assessment of SBBs – Danube Reference Data and Service Infrastructure 
(DRDSI) 

e
m
a
n
B
B
S

B
B
A

DRDSI Datasets 

Spatial data sets 
catalogue 

n
o
i
t
u
o
S

l

n
o
i
t
a
c
o
L

e
c
n
a
v
e
l
e
R

e
c
a
f
r
e
t
n
I

r
o

e
c
n
e
c
i
L

t
n
e
m
e
e
r
g
a

t
o
N

–

y
t
i
c
i
n
U

i

p
u
n
o
J
n
o

P 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

Y 

CKAN-based catalogue 

Registry service 

T 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

62 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
CKAN-based metadata 
search 

MapStore-based browser 
of geographic data on the 
map 

Search service 

T 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

View service 

T 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

Y 

3.4.3.2.  Geomatic Regional Partnership project (GRISI) 

This section assesses the SBBs identified in the GRISI (Section 3.3.2.2) against the Joinup 
eligibility criteria. 

Table 26: Assessment of SBBs – Geomatic Regional Partnership project (GRISI) 

e
m
a
n
B
B
S

Good Practices for the 
Development of Rural Areas 

B
B
A

Non-binding 
instrument / 
Implementing 
guideline 

n
o
i
t
u
o
S

l

n
o
i
t
a
c
o
L

e
c
n
a
v
e
l
e
R

e
c
a
f
r
e
t
n
I

r
o

e
c
n
e
c
i
L

t
n
e
m
e
e
r
g
a

t
o
N
–
y
t
i
c
i
n
U

i

p
u
n
o
J
n
o

G 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

3.4.3.3.  North-Rhine Westphalia SDI 

This  section  assesses  the  SBBs  identified  in  the  North-Rhine  Westphalia  SDI  (Section 
3.3.2.3) against the Joinup eligibility criteria. 

Table 27: Assessment of SBBs – North-Rhine Westphalia SDI 

e
m
a
n
B
B
S

ETRS89 

UTM 

Centre for Geoinformation 
(CeGI) – Web Catalogue 
Services (WCatS) 

Dutch National Clearing 
House for Geoinformation 
(NCGI) 

e
c
n
a
v
e
l
e
R

n
o
i
t
a
c
o
L

e
c
a
f
r
e
t
n
I

r
o

e
c
n
e
c
i
L

t
n
e
m
e
e
r
g
a

t
o
N

–

y
t
i
c
i
n
U

i

p
u
n
o
J
n
o

B
B
A

Reference system 

Reference system 

n
o
i
t
u
o
S

l

N 

N 

Discovery of metadata 

P  N 

Discovery of metadata 

P  N 

Institute for Geoinformatics 
at Münster University (IFGI) 

Application service 

P  N 

63 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
e
m
a
n
B
B
S

– Multilingual web mapping 
client 

n
o
i
t
u
o
S

l

n
o
i
t
a
c
o
L

e
c
n
a
v
e
l
e
R

e
c
a
f
r
e
t
n
I

r
o

e
c
n
e
c
i
L

t
n
e
m
e
e
r
g
a

t
o
N

–

y
t
i
c
i
n
U

i

p
u
n
o
J
n
o

B
B
A

GDI NRW - GeoViewer 

View service 

P  N 

Guidelines for metadata 
capture for the GDI-NW 

Technical guideline 

G 

- 

Y 

- 

Y 

Y 

GEOkatalog 

Service registration 

P  N 

3.5.  Assessment summary 

A total of 132 discreet SBBs were assessed, out of which 109 are seen as solutions in the 
context  of  Joinup.  The  remaining  23  SBBs  could  not  be  mapped  to  any  of  the  Joinup 
solution  types  (i.e.  policy,  guideline,  standard,  service  or  software).  However,  these  23 
SBBs (i.e. specific data sets, portals or reference systems) might still be of interest to SDI 
developers and are therefore listed in Annex I – List of SBBs not considered as solutions 
in the context of Joinup. 

Of the 109 SSBs classified as solutions in the context of Joinup, 98 are from national SDIs 
and 11 from cross-border SDIs. Most of these SBBs are extracted from the national SDIs 
as more (detailed) documentation for these SDIs was available. 

59 (54 from national SDIs and 5 from cross-border SDIs) of these 109 SSBs are services 
which do not meet the Joinup criteria. They do not have a European coverage and are 
therefore assessed as solutions not eligible for Joinup. However, these SBBs could be 
interesting when developing location-based services and solutions and are therefore 
listed in Annex II – List of relevant non-eligible services.  

In addition, 1 of the 109 SSBs, the Framework of Standards of The Netherlands Geonovum 
SDI, is already shared on Joinup (see also Annex III – List of solutions already published 
on  Joinup).  Thus  it  could  be  included  into  the  EIC,  if  it  complies  with  the  EIC  eligibility 
criteria.  It  should  be  noted,  that  solutions  of  the  EIC  need  to  comply  with  the  Joinup 
eligibility criteria and the EIC eligibility criteria, as described in Section 1.4. However, the 
EIC eligibility criteria were not yet mature by the time the assessment was performed. 

49 (43 from national SDIs and 6 from cross-border SDIs) of these 109 SSBs meet the 
Joinup criteria and are therefore assessed as solutions eligible to be published on Joinup, 
potentially eligible solutions to be published on the EIC. These SBBs are listed in Annex 
IV – List of eligible solutions for EIC. 

The table below provides the corresponding overview of the identified and assessed SBBs 
(listed in Sections 3.4.2 and 3.4.3), including the  eligible Joinup solutions  and thus the 
possible candidates to be included in the EIC. 

64 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Table 28: Summary of identified and assessed SBBs 

Identified and assessed 
SBBs 

National 
SDIs 

Cross-border 
SDIs 

Total 

No solutions 
in the context of Joinup 

21 
(out of 119) 

2 
(out of 13) 

23 
(out of 132) 

Solutions  
in the context of Joinup 

98 
(out of 119) 

11 
(out of 13) 

109 
(out of 132) 

Non-eligible  
Joinup solutions 

Eligible  
Joinup solutions 

Policies 

Guidelines or 
templates 

Public services 

54 
(out of 98) 

44 
(out of 98) 

15 
(out of 15) 

612 
(out of 6) 

0 
(out of 54) 

5 
(out of 11) 

59 
(out of 109) 

6 
(out of 11) 

50 
(out of 109) 

no policies identified 

15 
(out of 15) 

2 
(out of 2) 

8 
(out of 8) 

1 
(out of 6) 

1 
(out of 60) 

Specifications or 
standards 

16 
(out of 16) 

no specifications or 
standards identified 

16 
(out of 16) 

Software 
solutions 

7 
(out of 7) 

3 
(out of 3) 

10 
(out of 10) 

As a final step of the assessment, Joinup was checked to see if SBBs were already 
available on Joinup (to avoid publishing duplication; Unicity criteria). This check led to 
the identification of additional reusable location information solutions already published 
on Joinup. This list of reusable location information solutions can be found in Annex V – 
List of geospatial solutions on Joinup. Note that these solutions were merely collected, 
no selection criteria were applied. 

12   This includes the SSB “Framework of Standards” (from The Netherlands Geonovum SDI) already published 

on Joinup. 

65 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
                                           
4.  Recommendations for the EIRA 

This section contains the recommendations on how the EIRA can be improved to better 
reflect aspects related to location information. These recommendations are based on a) 
the development of the EIRA and INSPIRE based architecture model and b) the model’s 
application to identify reusable location information solutions.  

In the exercise performed under Section 3, some ABBs of a generic SDI architecture model 
were  mapped  to  the  EIRA  model.  However,  the  EIRA  model  was  created  to  model  the 
essential  ABBs  of  Interoperable  European  Solutions,  not  only  SDIs.  As  a  result,  not  all 
location-related  aspects  are  covered  by  the  current  EIRA  version,  i.e.  version  1.013,  for 
example in terms of geospatial creation and management, as well as tools for analysis and 
application development/data publication. 

The following recommendations, collected while building the architecture model, can help 
to improve the EIRA for what concerns location / geospatial data and information. 

Recommendation 1:  Provide guidelines  and best practices on  how to apply the 
EIRA for developing EIRA-based architecture models. 

During the development of the EIRA and INSPIRE based architecture model for a typical 
SDI,  the  need  for  (better)  guidelines  and  best  practices  on  how  to  apply  the  EIRA  was 
evident. Such guidelines and best practices / worked examples could facilitate modelling 
discussions,  improve  the  modelling  experience  and  reduce  the  development  time.  This 
could  include  a  glossary  of  key  EIRA  terms,  which  could  facilitate  the  mapping  of  EIRA 
concepts to specific domains, such as activities related to geospatial data. 

Recommendation 2: Include ABBs to model physical sensors. 

Location data is created from different sources, varying from field surveys to sensors, as 
well as the re-combination of existing geospatial data to make new derived datasets, often 
from  quite  heterogeneous  data  formats  and  sources.  One  means  of  generating  data  is 
from physical devices – equipped with sensors – that capture for example environmental 
conditions (noise, air quality, temperature …). The EIRA is missing the ability to model the 
content  of  these  physical  devices.  Therefore,  it  is  recommended  that  the  EIRA  includes 
ABBs to model physical sensors. Figure 7 below depicts such a reference architecture for 
sensors, devices and aggregators. 

Figure 7: Reference architecture for physical devices with sensors and data aggregator 

13 https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/asset/eia/asset_release/eira-v100 

66 

 
 
 
 
 
 
                                           
Recommendation 3: Facilitate the modelling of the data flow. 

It is difficult from the EIRA model to represent who are the data subjects, data consumers, 
and data managers in a process. Within the EIRA model, the data flow modelling is done 
on the organisational view, but only at the service level and not at the process level. 

However,  the  modelling  of  the  data  flow  is  important  when  designing  location-enabled 
services as the (up-to-date) data involved is normally coming from multiple sources (which 
is in part one of the drivers for creating SDIs) and involves multiple roles. Data flows help 
to understand in what steps of the process data is being manipulated and by whom.  

For  example,  data  may  be  collected  from  a  monitoring  station  to  measure  air  quality. 
Measurements are processed and fed to a service that creates, averages and publishes 
them on a website for consumption by citizens, including related maps to show the location 
of  polluted  places.  At  the  same  time,  raw  data  are  processed  by  the  monitoring 
organisation  and  then  sent  to  another  body  for  quality  assurance  and  quality  control, 
before being sent to the public administration for  reporting purposes  on a monthly and 
annual basis, according to policy requirements.  

The  same  time-series  data  can  also  be  registered  as  an  INSPIRE  dataset  and  the 
appropriate metadata created to register it in the INSPIRE Geoportal, allowing the content 
to be discovered for policy/analytical purposes, as well as cases where open data policies 
allow the data to be accessed and used to build new end-user applications combining this 
dataset with data coming from other sources. 

Such  data  flows  could  be  defined  in  a  related  modelling  activity  (see  related  EULF 
document: Use Case Methodology applied to Traffic Safety Monitoring). The EIRA should 
support the possibility to link these modelled data flows (incl. actors and datasets, and 
potentially defined business processes or specific e-government service patterns) to the 
corresponding EIRA ABBs. 

Recommendation  4:  Foresee  the  possibility  to  create  a  link  between  the  legal 
view and its realisation on the technical view. 

Compliance with data protection and privacy law is mandatory and crucial to any service, 
including certain cases involving location data. The EIRA has loose links between its legal 
view and the concrete realisation of a Directive, Regulation or technical guidelines on the 
application and infrastructure view, i.e. all legal ABBs are associated to the Public Service 
ABB. This complicates the visualisation of the impact of the legal view on the underlying 
application views. On the application view, the EIRA offers two ABBs that could implicitly 
cover more or less the implementation of legal requirements: Operational Procedure and 
the Technical Specification. 

Even though it is possible to draw associations on the model between legal ABBs and their 
realisation,  the  EIRA  would  benefit  from  encouraging  users  of  the  architecture  to  draw 
more  explicit  links.  This  would  allow  organisations  to  demonstrate  how  content-related 
compliance  rules  are  being  followed  and  implemented  (e.g.  validation  of  a  service’s 
operation,  correct  entry  of  metadata  or  appropriate  form  of  the  data).  This  is  both 
reflecting the organisational activities involved in developing or using, for example, data 
infrastructures, as well as the technical development activities to support them. 

Recommendation 5: Provide a list of relevant standards and specifications. 

The  EIRA  should  have  the  list  of  relevant  standards  and  specifications  built  within  its 
collection  of  re-usable  SBBs.  This  would  allow  architects  to  select  the  most  appropriate 
standards  and  use  them  directly  in  their  models.  The  management  of  this  information 
could relate to the ICT standardisation programme of DG GROW. Technical resources such 
as  the  Re3gistry  software  (developed  by  ARE3NA  and  already  used  for  the  core 
vocabularies in Joinup) could be used to manage the authentic code list of such standards 

67 

 
 
 
 
 
and specifications. In the geospatial arena, the EULF Architectures and Standards for SDIs 
and e-Government would be a relevant source of content. 

Recommendation  6:  Promote  the  use  of  controlled  vocabularies  for  the 
dct:spatial attribute. 

The EIRA allows leveraging the dct:spatial property also used in the DCAT vocabulary to 
indicate the spatial coverage of a SBB. However, it does not recommend how to document 
this  property.  As  location  services  use  different  forms  of  location  referencing  (names, 
coordinates, relative distances), the EIRA should recommend controlled vocabularies for 
dct:spatial to prevent SBBs having heterogeneous dct:spatial values for the same entity. 
These controlled vocabularies should support different levels of granularity (e.g. regions, 
countries, cities or specific points), as well as more formal terms for certain entities, such 
as an Administrative Unit or Protected Site (as defined by INSPIRE data specifications). 

Recommendation 7: More specific definitions for the ABBs. 

As  a  general  note,  the  definitions  of  many  ABBs  are  too  generic  and  it  is  difficult  to 
understand exactly the purpose of an ABB. Users making reference architectures should 
have both definitions (INSPIRE and EIRA) to ensure re-users understand the purpose of 
ABBs. A first step into this direction has already been done with the creation of an EIRA 
and INSPIRE based architecture model for a typical SDI.  

For example, the stereotype of the ABB “<<Data Publication Service>>Registry service” 
should  indicate  the  EIRA  definition  and  the  INSPIRE  definition  to  help  developers 
understand the ABB. 

  EIRA definition: A Data Publication Service makes data available to other services 

or users. This covers all types of data. 

 

INSPIRE: service to access and make use of the registers. This is one type of data 
in  INSPIRE,  mainly  related  to  official  reference  codes,  but  INSPIRE  also  includes 
data  at  an  object  level  (as  defined  in  the  data  specifications  /  models)  and  the 
content of INSPIRE metadata about datasets and services, which could also be seen 
as data.  

In  general,  more  work  could  be  done  to  create  domain  specific  forms  of  ICT  solutions, 
such as those coming from the geospatial domain, where this report has mainly focussed 
on components of an SDI but has not addressed where such data (etc.) can be consumed 
in systems and applications, including but not limited to GIS. 

Recommendation 8: Review the scope of eligible solutions for the EIC 

Finally, extending the scope of eligible solutions for the EIC should be considered. There 
may be national solutions that can be re-used in other countries or combined with solutions 
from  other  countries  to  create  multi-national  solutions.  The  latter  point  is  part  of  the 
purpose of INSPIRE, where one of the aims is to be able to combine data from different 
countries to undertake cross-border environmental analysis. 

68 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
5.  Conclusion 

The goal of this analysis was to identify a list of  reusable location information solutions 
(including  standards  and  specifications)  which  could  be  shared  on  Joinup;  a  list  which 
public administrations and other geospatial data providers can leverage when developing 
location-enabled solutions and services.  

The following activities were carried out:  

1.  A list of INSPIRE-recommended standards and specifications was derived from the 

INSPIRE Technical Guidelines, as possible input for Joinup. 

2.  An EIRA and INSPIRE based architecture model (for a typical SDI) was developed 
to  facilitate  the  identification  of  reusable  location  information  solutions  for  data 
publishing.  

3.  Selected  SDIs  were  analysed  and  their  SBBs  were  mapped  to  the  ABBs  of  the 

defined architecture model. 

4.  An assessment of the identified SBBs was carried out to determine whether these 
SBBs were eligible to be included in the EIC. However, given that the EIC eligibility 
criteria were not yet mature at the time of carrying out the analysis, this partial 
assessment was  only done against the Joinup eligibility criteria, since the Joinup 
platform is envisaged to be where the EIC will reside. 

The  analysis  resulted  in  the  identification  of  132  discreet  SBBs,  out  of  which  109  SBBs 
were  classified  as  solutions  in  the  context  of  Joinup  (i.e.  policy,  software,  service, 
specification or standard and guideline or template). 49 of the 109 SBBs meet the Joinup 
eligibility  criteria.  One  additional  SBB  has  already  been  published  on  Joinup:  the 
Framework of Standards from The Netherlands Geonovum SDI. 

These  50  SBBs  are  split  as  follows:  15  policies,  8  guidelines/templates,  1  service,  16 
standards/specifications and 10 software solutions. They could potentially be included in 
the EIC, provided that they would be compliant with the EIC eligibility criteria. 

The  other  59  out  of  the  109  solutions  are  not  eligible  for  Joinup,  given  that  they  are 
services with a national geographical coverage. According to the Joinup eligibility criteria, 
services  need  a  European  coverage  to  be  published  as  Joinup  solutions.  Nevertheless, 
those services can still be useful for public administrations by sharing metadata of potential 
cross-border services on national and European level promoting cross-border cooperation. 
For  instance,  these  services  could  be  used  to  retrieve  national  data,  to  consult  and 
integrate available maps into solutions, and to leverage the national gazetteer. In addition, 
sharing  metadata  of  potential  cross-border  services  on  national  and  European  level 
promotes cross-border cooperation  

This analysis and search for reusable location information solutions was limited to the SDIs 
in scope. Should this work be taken further, the recommendations are to a) enlarge the 
scope by covering more SDIs, and b) to conduct interviews with the SDI owners to collect 
additional detailed information that might not always be published or available online. For 
example, collecting input about a) the type of licence that the solution uses, b) the level 
of the data authenticity in case the information does not originate from official sources, or 
c) the maturity of the solution should be facilitated through interviews.  

In  addition,  to  enlarge  the  list  of  solutions,  the  three  EULF  pilots  could  be  thoroughly 
studied to look for reusable solutions to be published in the EIC. In the ARE3NA ISA Action 
(1.17) related work has created a  vocabulary to define the tasks public administrations 
need  to  perform  when  implementing  the  Directive  and  asks  implementers  and  solution 
providers to highlight which tools are being used in practice. Further work could make use 
of this process to map tasks and related solutions to the EIRA to ensure a full coverage of 
an SDI (at least in the case of INSPIRE) can be analysed. Such work could also help to 

69 

 
 
 
select  candidates  for  full  tool  documentation  in  ADMS,  as  examples  in  ARE3NA’s 
inventories are being used in practice but are only documented lightly to point interested 
parties to where they may find more information about the tools. 

Furthermore, once the EIC eligibility criteria are mature, the identified solutions should be 
assessed against them. Once completed, this test would help to progress their publication 
on Joinup, following the ADMS-AP14 specifications.  

The focus of this study has placed an emphasis on ABBs related to spatial data, metadata 
and service provision. However, for an exhaustive comprehensive modelling analysis the 
current EIRA and INSPIRE based architecture model for a typical SDI should be extended 
with additional ABBs covering areas such as data usage and governance. In addition, the 
assessment  of  the  software  and  service  components  developed  by  ARE3NA  (e.g.  the 
Re3gistry, available on Joinup) could be considered. In addition, it should be noted that 
SDI  implementation,  management  and  use  are  only  one  dimension  of  location 
interoperability and there are many more occasions where location information performs 
a role in cross-sector and cross-border services and policies. Some of these may include 
data  for  inclusion  in  SDIs  but  the  work  could  also  be  extended  to  see  how  location 
information is being managed and exchanged in other domains related to e-government 
or ICT innovation in the private sector or even voluntary sectors, including the creation of 
citizen-generated resources such as OpenStreetMap and its related technologies. 

To conclude, the work performed in the current analysis for the EULF and in ARE3NA have 
partially  addressed  the  challenges  and  opportunities  in  location-related  interoperability 
and put in place processes to explore and address them.  

As a next step, the JRC-led European Location Interoperability Solutions for e-Government 
ISA2 Action (4.1) will continue and build on the work of the EULF and ARE3NA Actions from 
the ISA programme. The interoperability solutions produced by ELISE will include guidance 
and tools for data publication and access, building on INSPIRE (e.g. approaches to help 
build  the  European  data  economy  envisaged  in  the  Digital  Single  Market  strategy)  and 
explore patterns of e-government services that make use of location information in detail. 
This  work  could  help  consolidate  some  of  the  work  from  both  EULF  and  ARE3NA  and 
provide  an  update  to  this  mapping  against  the  EIRA.  ELISE  will  also  act  as  the  “geo 
knowledge base”  for  ISA² and Commission services  for aspects  of legal, organisational, 
semantic  and  technical  interoperability,  where  “location”  is  an  important  characteristic, 
helping  also  to  promote  ISA/ISA²  solutions,  like  the  EIRA,  with  Member  States’ 
organisations working with geospatial data and INSPIRE, and the ISA² Working Group on 
Geospatial Solutions.  

14 https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/asset/adms/description 

70 

 
 
 
 
 
 
                                           
References 

[1]   European Commission, ISA Programme, “Action 2.13,” [Online]. Available: 

http://ec.europa.eu/isa/documents/actions/more-about-action-2.13_en.pdf  

[2]   European Parliament and Council, “INSPIRE Directive,” [Online]. Available: 
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/ALL/?uri=CELEX:32007L0002.  

[3]   European Commission, “ISA2 Programme,” [Online]. Available: 

http://ec.europa.eu/isa/documents/celex_en.pdf.  

[4]   European Commission, ISA Programme, “European Interoperability Reference 

Arhcitecture, EIRA,” [Online]. Available: 
https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/asset/eia/description.  

[5]   European Commission, “Asset Description Metadata Schema (ADMS),” 18 April 

2012. [Online]. Available: https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/asset/adms/description.  

[6]   European Commission, “INSPIRE Technical Guidance,” [Online]. Available: 

http://inspire.ec.europa.eu/inspire-technical-guidance/57753.  

[7]  GDSI, “SDI Cookbook,” GDSI, 2009. [Online]. Available: 

http://gsdiassociation.org/images/publications/cookbooks/SDI_Cookbook_from_Wi
ki_2009.pdf. 

[8]  P. G. M. M. D. J. &. R. D. Longley, “Geographic Information Systems & Science,” 

Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2011, pp. 1-525. 

[9]  B. V. L. J. C. B. Nushi, “The STIG - A new SDI assessment method,” International 

Journal of Spatial Data Infrastructures Research, vol. 10, pp. 55-83, 2015. 

[10] European Commission, ISA Programme, “Joinup scope criteria,” [Online]. 

Available: https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/page/scope-statement-and-eligibility-
criteria. 

[11] The Open Goup, “The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF®),” 2011. 

[Online]. Available: http://pubs.opengroup.org/architecture/togaf9-
doc/arch/index.html. 

[12] European Commission, ISA Programme, e-Government Core Vocabularies: The 

SEMIC.EU approach, 2011. 

[13] European Commission, ISA Programme, “Europeran Interoperability Framework,” 
[Online]. Available: http://ec.europa.eu/isa/documents/isa_annex_ii_eif_en.pdf. 

71 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
List of abbreviations and definitions 

Table 29: List of abbreviations and definitions 

Term / Acronym  Description 

Architecture 
building block 
(ABB) 

An  architecture  building  block 
typically  describes  required 
capability/functionality  and  shapes  the  specification  of  solution 
building blocks (SBBs) (TOGAF [11]). 

Architecture 
model 

An  architecture  model15 is  a  formal  description of  a  solution,  or  a 
detailed  plan  of  the  solution  at  component  level  to  guide  its 
implementation. 

ARE3NA platform 

A  reusable  tool  being  tested  in  the  context  of  implementing  and 
using INSPIRE to connect policy implementation tasks to practical 
examples in public administrations and software support tools 

Asset Description 
Metadata Schema 
(ADMS) 

The Asset Description Metadata Schema (ADMS) [5] is a vocabulary 
to  describe  interoperability  assets  making  it  possible  for  ICT 
developers to explore and search for interoperability assets. 

Core data model 

A  context-neutral  data  model  that  captures  the  fundamental 
characteristics of an entity. The Core Vocabularies are at this level. 

Core Vocabularies  Simplified, re-usable, and extensible data models that capture the 
fundamental  characteristics  of  a  data  entity  in  a  context-neutral 
fashion [12]. 

Domain model 

A data model of a particular domain (e.g. the justice domain, the 
healthcare  domain)  that  identifies  the  entities  involved  and  their 
relationships. 

Generic structure, comprising principles and guidelines applying to 
the implementation of interoperability solutions in the Union. 

European 
Interoperability 
Reference 
Architecture 
(EIRA) 

European 
Interoperability 
Cartography (EIC) 

An instrument to map and analyse the interoperability landscape in 
Europe and to identify  solutions that are available and those that 
are still lacking. 

EIC solutions 

High quality solutions that are relevant for and reusable by public 
administrations, presented in a common format and complying with 
specific  re-usability  and  interoperability  criteria  that  can  be 
represented on the EIRA. 

15   The Open Group, ‘The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF)”, 2011: 

http://pubs.opengroup.org/architecture/togaf9-doc/arch/chap03.html#tag_03 

72 

 
 
 
                                           
Term / Acronym  Description 

Information 
exchange 
specification 

A data model that defines and describes the structure and content 
of information that is exchanged in a specific information exchange 
context. 

INSPIRE Technical 
Guidelines (TG) 

Non-binding Technical Guidance documents which describe detailed 
implementation  aspects  and  relations  with  existing  standards, 
technologies, and practices. 

Interoperability 

Interoperability 
framework 

Interoperable 
European Solution 

Joinup 

Joinup solution 

According to the ISA Decision, interoperability means the ability of 
disparate  and  diverse  organisations  to  interact  towards  mutually 
beneficial  and  agreed  common  goals,  involving  the  sharing  of 
information and knowledge between the organisations, through the 
business processes they support, by means of the exchange of data 
between their respective ICT systems. 

framework 

interoperability 

is  an  agreed  approach 

An 
to 
interoperability for organisations that wish to work together towards 
the joint delivery of public services. Within its scope of applicability, 
it specifies a set of common elements such as vocabulary, concepts, 
principles,  policies,  guidelines,  recommendations,  standards, 
specifications and practices. 

An Interoperable European Solution (IES) is a solution, developed 
by  public  administrations  that  facilitate  the  delivery  of  electronic 
Public Services and cross-border exchange of information between 
public  administrations 
the 
(or  Citizens) 
implementation  and  advancement  of  EU,  national  or  local  Public 
Policies.  Source:  This  IES  definition  was  derived  from  the  Trans-
European Systems definition. 

support 

to 

in 

Joinup  is  a  collaborative  platform  created  by  the  European 
funded  by  the  European  Union  via  the 
Commission  and 
Interoperability Solutions for European Public Administrations (ISA) 
Programme.  It  offers  several  services  that  aim  to  help  e-
Government professionals share their experience with each other. 
It also aims to support them to find, choose, re-use, develop and 
implement interoperability solutions. 

Solutions  facilitating  cooperation  between  organisations,  either 
autonomously  funded  and  developed  by  the  ISA2  Programme  or 
developed  in  cooperation  with  other  Union  initiatives,  based  on 
identified requirements of European public administrations. Joinup 
considers the following type of solutions: policy, software, service, 
specification or standard and guideline or template. 

Reusable 

Reuse means that public administrations confronted with a specific 
problem seek to benefit from the work of others by looking at what 
is available, assessing its usefulness or relevance to the problem at 

73 

 
 
 
Term / Acronym  Description 

hand,  and  deciding  to  use  solutions  that  have  proven  their  value 
elsewhere [13]. 

Solution 

A solution16 is a collection of components organised to accomplish 
a specific function or set of functions. 

Solution building 
block (SBB) 

A solution building block (SBB) represents components that will be 
used  to  implement  the  required  capability/functionality  of  one  or 
more architecture building blocks (TOGAF [11]).  

Spatial Data 
Infrastructure 
(SDI) 

An  SDI  hosts  geographic  data  and  attributes,  sufficient 
documentation  (metadata),  a  means  to  discover,  visualise,  and 
evaluate  the  data  (catalogues  and  Web  mapping),  and  some 
method to provide access to the geographic data. 

16   The Open Group, ‘The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF)”, 2011: 

http://pubs.opengroup.org/architecture/togaf9-doc/arch/chap35.html#tag_35 

74 

 
 
 
  
 
                                           
List of figures 

FIGURE 1: USAGE OF KEY CONCEPTS .................................................................................................................. 8 

FIGURE 2: SOURCES AND PROCESS TO IDENTIFY SOLUTIONS PROPOSED TO BE INCLUDED ON JOINUP ..... 10 

FIGURE 3: INSPIRE LEGAL VIEW USING ARCHIMATE AND EIRA ................................................................ 11 

FIGURE 4: APPROACH TO IDENTIFY REUSABLE LOCATION INFORMATION SOLUTIONS FROM IMPLEMENTED 
SDIS .................................................................................................................................................................... 14 

FIGURE 5: ARCHITECTURE MODEL – VERSIONS AND SCOPE ........................................................................... 17 

FIGURE 6: EIRA AND INSPIRE-BASED ARCHITECTURE MODEL OF A TYPICAL SDI .................................... 18 

FIGURE 7: REFERENCE ARCHITECTURE FOR PHYSICAL DEVICES WITH SENSORS AND DATA AGGREGATOR . 66 

75 

 
 
 
 
 
List of tables 

TABLE 1: LIST OF IDENTIFIED STANDARDS AND SPECIFICATIONS BASED ON THE INSPIRE TECHNICAL 
GUIDELINES ......................................................................................................................................................... 12 

TABLE 2: LIST OF SDIS TO BE ANALYSED ........................................................................................................ 15 

TABLE 3: ABB SOURCE CLASSIFICATION ......................................................................................................... 19 

TABLE 4: LIST OF ABBS/SOURCES – LEGAL VIEW .......................................................................................... 19 

TABLE 5: LIST OF ABBS/DEFINITIONS – LEGAL VIEW .................................................................................... 20 

TABLE 6: LIST OF ABBS/SOURCES – ORGANISATIONAL VIEW ...................................................................... 23 

TABLE 7: LIST OF ABBS/DEFINITIONS – ORGANISATIONAL VIEW ................................................................ 24 

TABLE 8: LIST OF ABBS/SOURCES – SEMANTIC VIEW ................................................................................... 26 

TABLE 9: LIST OF ABBS/DEFINITIONS – SEMANTIC VIEW ............................................................................. 27 

TABLE 10: LIST OF ABBS/SOURCES – TECHNICAL VIEW – APPLICATION .................................................... 31 

TABLE 11: LIST OF ABBS/DEFINITIONS – TECHNICAL VIEW – APPLICATION .............................................. 32 

TABLE 12: LIST OF ABBS/SOURCES – TECHNICAL VIEW – INFRASTRUCTURE............................................. 35 

TABLE 13: LIST OF ABBS/DEFINITIONS – TECHNICAL VIEW – INFRASTRUCTURE ...................................... 35 

TABLE 14: IDENTIFICATION OF SBBS – CZECH REPUBLIC NATIONAL GEO-INFORMATION STRUCTURE .. 38 

TABLE 15: IDENTIFICATION OF SBBS – DANISH ACADEMY FOR SPATIAL INFORMATION (DAISI) ........... 42 

TABLE 16: IDENTIFICATION OF SBBS – THE NETHERLANDS GEONOVUM (NGII) ...................................... 46 

TABLE 17: IDENTIFICATION OF SBBS – THE UK LOCATION STRATEGY (UKLI) ......................................... 48 

TABLE 18: IDENTIFICATION OF SBBS – DANUBE REFERENCE DATA AND SERVICE INFRASTRUCTURE 
(DRDSI) ............................................................................................................................................................. 49 

TABLE 19: IDENTIFICATION OF SBBS – GEOMATIC REGIONAL PARTNERSHIP PROJECT (GRISI) ............ 50 

TABLE 20: IDENTIFICATION OF SOLUTIONS – NORTH-RHINE WESTPHALIA SDI ........................................ 50 

TABLE 21: ASSESSMENT OF SBBS – CZECH REPUBLIC NATIONAL GEO-INFORMATION STRUCTURE ........ 54 

TABLE 22: ASSESSMENT OF SBBS – DANISH ACADEMY FOR SPATIAL INFORMATION (DAISI) ................ 57 

TABLE 23: ASSESSMENT OF SBBS – THE NETHERLANDS GEONOVUM (NGII) ........................................... 59 

TABLE 24: ASSESSMENT OF SBBS – THE UK LOCATION INFRASTRUCTURE (UKLI) .................................. 61 

TABLE 25: ASSESSMENT OF SBBS – DANUBE REFERENCE DATA AND SERVICE INFRASTRUCTURE 
(DRDSI) ............................................................................................................................................................. 62 

TABLE 26: ASSESSMENT OF SBBS – GEOMATIC REGIONAL PARTNERSHIP PROJECT (GRISI) .................. 63 

TABLE 27: ASSESSMENT OF SBBS – NORTH-RHINE WESTPHALIA SDI ...................................................... 63 

TABLE 28: SUMMARY OF IDENTIFIED AND ASSESSED SBBS .......................................................................... 65 

TABLE 29: LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AND DEFINITIONS .................................................................................. 72 

TABLE 30: LIST OF SBBS NOT CONSIDERED AS SOLUTIONS IN THE CONTEXT OF JOINUP .......................... 78 

76 

 
 
 
TABLE 31: LIST OF RELEVANT NON-ELIGIBLE SERVICES ................................................................................. 80 

TABLE 32: LIST OF SOLUTIONS ALREADY PUBLISHED ON JOINUP .................................................................. 86 

TABLE 33: LIST OF ELIGIBLE SOLUTIONS FOR EIC ......................................................................................... 87 

TABLE 34: LIST OF GEOSPATIAL SOLUTIONS ON JOINUP ................................................................................ 91 

77 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Annex I – List of SBBs not considered as solutions in the context of 
Joinup 

During the assessment of the identified SSBs, 23 SBBs could not be mapped to any of the 
Joinup solution types (i.e. policy, guideline, standard, service or software) are therefore 
not  seen  as  solutions  in  the  context  of  Joinup.  However,  these  SBBs  (i.e.  specific  data 
sets,  portals  or  reference  systems)  might  still  be  of  interest  to  SDI  developers.  The 
following table lists these 23 SBBs. 

Table 30: List of SBBs not considered as solutions in the context of Joinup 

Ref.  SDI name 

SBB name 

ABB Mapping 

1 

  Cross-Border – North-Rhine 

ETRS89 

Reference system 

Westphalia SDI 

2 

  Cross-Border – North-Rhine 

UTM 

Reference system 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

Westphalia SDI 

  National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

  National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

  National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

  National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

  National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

  National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

  National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

SHP 

Representation 

SABE 

Data Set 

ZABAGED 

SDI Registry 

3D contours 

Data Set 

(Digital raster data) RZM 

Data Set 

COSMC geo-portal 

Portal 

UNSDI portal 

Portal 

10    National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

TOP10DK (digital national 
topographic database) 

Data base 

78 

 
 
 
 
Ref.  SDI name 

SBB name 

ABB Mapping 

11    National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

ETRS89 

Reference system 

12    National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

UTM/EUREF89 

Reference system 

13    National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

DVR90 

14    National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

DSFL 

Reference system 

Encoding 

15    National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

PlansystemDK 

Data set 

16    National – The Netherlands 

Nationaal Georegister 

Geoportal/SDI 

Geonovum 

17    National – The Netherlands 

Geonovum 

13 basic registers – 5 spatial 
in nature 

Data Set 

18    National – The Netherlands 

Rijksdriehoeksstelsel (RD) 

Reference system 

Geonovum 

19    National – The Netherlands 

Lambert conformal conical 

Reference system 

Geonovum 

20    National – The Netherlands 

Geographic 

Reference system 

Geonovum 

21    National – The Netherlands 

ETRS 

Reference system 

Geonovum 

22    National – The Netherlands 

stelselcatalogus 

Reference system 

Geonovum 

23    National – The UK location 

data.gov.uk 

Portal 

strategy 

79 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Annex II – List of relevant non-eligible services 

During the assessment of the identified SBBs, 59 services were assessed as not eligible to 
be shared on Joinup. However, these SBBs could be interesting when developing location-
based services and solutions. These non-eligible services are listed in the following table. 

Table 31: List of relevant non-eligible services 

Ref  SDI name 

SBB name 

Type of service 

1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

  National – The 
Netherlands 
Geonovum 

  National – The 
Netherlands 
Geonovum 

National validation service 

Data Validation Service 

The Nationaal Georegister 

Discovery of metadata 

  National – The 
Netherlands 
Geonovum 

NODC (National Oceanographic 
Data Committee of the 
Netherlands) metadata catalogue 

Discovery of metadata  

  National – The 
Netherlands 
Geonovum 

  National – The 
Netherlands 
Geonovum 

  National – The 
Netherlands 
Geonovum 

  National – The 
Netherlands 
Geonovum 

  National – The 
Netherlands 
Geonovum 

  National – The 
Netherlands 
Geonovum 

NODC data catalogue 

Discovery of services 

data.overheid.nl 

Discovery of metadata 

Geonovum services 

Discovery of services / 
Network services 

The Nationaal  
Georegister – View service 

View service 

National Atlas 

View service 

36 download services 

Download services 

10    National – The 

Netherlands 
Geonovum 

KNMI (Royal 
Netherlands Meteorological 
Institute) Catalog of basic data 

Catalogue of data 
collector service 

80 

 
 
 
 
Ref  SDI name 

SBB name 

Type of service 

11    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

Specialized dictionary of the 
Czech Office for Surveying, 
Mapping and Cadastre and the 
Authority of Geodesy, 
Cartography and Cadastre of the 
Slovak Republic 

Reference Data / 
Metadata  

12    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

13    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

14    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

15    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

16    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

17    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

18    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

19    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

Glossary of the Czech Association 
of Geoinformation and the 
Ministry of Informatics 

Reference Data / 
Metadata 

General Multilingual 
Environmental Thesaurus 
(GEMET) 

Reference Data 

Mapmaker 

Discovery of Services 

INSPIRE geoportal 

Discovery of Metadata 

MoE Metadata portal 

Discovery of Metadata 

MIDAS-metadata catalogue 

Discovery of Metadata 

Metainformation system MIS 

Discovery of Metadata 

Czech national geo-portal (CENIA)  Discovery of Metadata / 

View service 

81 

 
 
 
Ref  SDI name 

SBB name 

Type of service 

20    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

WMS 

Discovery of Metadata / 
View service / Data 
Validator 

21    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

22    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

23    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

24    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

25    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

26    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

27    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

28    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

29    National – Czech 
Republic National 

MIS Catalogue service 

Discovery of Services 

OGC CSW discovery service of the 
INSPIRE geoportal 

Discovery of Services 

Portal of geohazards 

Discovery of Services 

CUZK portal 

Discovery of Services 

COSMC view services 

View services 

UNSDI applications 

Search service / View 
service 

WCT Transformation Service 

Transformation service 

Mapmaker 

View service 

Public administration portal 

Discovery of services 

82 

 
 
 
Ref  SDI name 

SBB name 

Type of service 

Geo-Information 
Structure 

30    National – Czech 
Republic National 
Geo-Information 
Structure 

31    National – 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

32    National – 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

Data store of forestry data 

View service 

KMS Map Supply API 
(kortforsyningen) 

API 

DAV (Danish Address Road 
Register) 

Registry service 

33    National – 

Address Project 

Registry service 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

34    National – 

KMS FLAT 

Registry service 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

35    National – 

DD0 

Registry service 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

36    National – 

KMS geo-referenced building ids. 

Registry service 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

37    National – 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

38    National – 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

KMS official place names 
database 

Gazetteer  

Geodata-info.dk (national 
geoportal) 

Portal / View service 

83 

 
 
 
Ref  SDI name 

SBB name 

Type of service 

39    National – 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

Geodata-info.dk (national 
geoportal) – Metadata service 

Discovery of metadata 

40    National – 

The Environmental Portal 

Portal / View service 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

41    National – 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

The Public Information Online 
(OIS) 

Portal / View service 

42    National – 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

on-line Danish access service for 
metadata on reference data and 
core thematic data of the national 
geoportal 

Discovery of metadata 

43    National – 

KMS.dk/sepaakort 

View service 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

44    National – 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

KMS.dk/sepaakort – Download 
service 

Download service 

45    National – 

Matriculation 

Registry service 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

46    National – 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

The Nature and Environment 
Portal – Download service 

Download service 

47    National – 

Vis Stedet (“Show the location”) 

View service 

Danish Academy 
for Spatial 
Information 

48    National – 

Danish Academy 

Danish Area Information System 
(AIS) 

Data set catalogue – 
Download service 

84 

 
 
 
Ref  SDI name 

SBB name 

Type of service 

for Spatial 
Information 

49    National – The 

data.gov.uk – Registry 

Service registration 

UK location 
strategy 

50    National – The 

UK location 
strategy 

UKLI – Data and Search 
Publishing 

Discovery of services 

51    National – The 

UKLI – Search and Evaluation 

Search service 

UK location 
strategy 

52    National – The 

UK location 
strategy 

UKLI – Discovery Metadata 
Service (DMS) 

Discovery metadata 

53    National – The 

UKLI – Access and Exploitation 

View service / Download 
service / Transformation 
service 

Ordnance Survey gazetteer 
service 

Gazetteer 

UK location 
strategy 

54    National – The 

UK location 
strategy 

55    Cross-Border – 

North-Rhine 
Westphalia SDI 

Centre for Geoinformation (CeGI) 
– Web Catalogue 
Services (WCatS) 

Discovery of metadata 

56    Cross-Border – 

North-Rhine 
Westphalia SDI 

Dutch National 
Clearing House for 
Geoinformation (NCGI) 

57    Cross-Border – 

North-Rhine 
Westphalia SDI 

Institute for Geoinformatics at 
Münster University (IFGI) – 
Multilingual 
web mapping client 

Discovery of metadata 

Application service 

58    Cross-Border – 

GDI NRW - GeoViewer 

View service 

North-Rhine 
Westphalia SDI 

59    Cross-Border – 

GEOkatalog 

Service registration 

North-Rhine 
Westphalia SDI 

85 

 
 
 
Annex III – List of solutions already published on Joinup 

During the assessment of the identified SBBs, one SBB met all Joinup eligibility criteria, 
except the Unicity criteria as it was already published on Joinup. This potentially eligible 
solution to be published on the EIC is contained in the following table. 

Table 32: List of solutions already published on Joinup 

Ref  SDI type 

SBB name 

ABB Mapping 

1 

National – The Netherlands 
Geonovum 

Framework for standards 

Implementing 
guideline 

86 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Annex IV – List of eligible solutions for EIC 

During  the  assessment  of  the  identified  SBBs,  49  SBBs  met  the  Joinup  criteria  and  are 
therefore  assessed  as  solutions  eligible  to  be  published  on  Joinup,  potentially  eligible 
solutions to be published on the EIC. The following table contains these SBBs.  

Table 33: List of eligible solutions for EIC 

Ref  SDI name 

SBB name 

ABB Mapping 

1 

2 

3 

4 

5 

6 

7 

8 

9 

Cross-Border – Danube 
Reference Data and Service 
Infrastructure 

Cross-Border – Danube 
Reference Data and Service 
Infrastructure 

Cross-Border – Danube 
Reference Data and Service 
Infrastructure 

Cross-Border – Danube 
Reference Data and Service 
Infrastructure 

DRDSI Datasets 

Spatial data sets 
catalogue 

CKAN-based catalogue 

Registry service 

CKAN-based metadata search 

Search service 

MapStore-based browser of 
geographic data on the map 

View service 

Cross-Border – Geomatic 
Regional Partnership project 

Good Practices for the 
Development of Rural Areas 

Non-binding 
instrument / 
Implementing 
guideline 

Cross-Border – North-Rhine 
Westphalia SDI 

Guidelines for metadata 
capture for the GDI-NW 

Technical 
guideline 

National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

Law 183/2006 Sb. on 
landscape planning and 
building regulations 

State Statistical Act 

Binding 
instrument 

Binding 
instrument 

National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

Act on Freedom of Access to 
Environmental Information 

Binding 
instrument 

10 

National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

Act 106/1999 

Binding 
instrument 

87 

 
 
 
 
Ref  SDI name 

SBB name 

ABB Mapping 

11 

12 

13 

14 

15 

16 

17 

18 

19 

20 

21 

22 

23 

24 

National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

National – Czech Republic 
National Geo-Information 
Structure 

Copyright Act 

Non-Binding 
Instrument 

GML 

Data standard 

OGC Web Services (OWS) 

Core Data Model 

GIS standards 

Data Standard 

ISO 8859P2 

Standard 

ISO 19119 

Standard 

ISO 19130 

Standard 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

Law on Infrastructure for 
Spatial Information 

Public Policy 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

Access to Environmental 
Information Act 

Binding 
Instrument 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

KMSTrans (KMS 
Transformation tool) 

Transformation 
service / tool 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

MIFTrans 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

SHPTrans 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

DWGTrans 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

KMSTrLib 

Transformation 
service / tool 

Transformation 
service / tool 

Transformation 
service / tool 

Transformation 
service / tool 

88 

 
 
 
Ref  SDI name 

SBB name 

ABB Mapping 

25 

26 

27 

28 

29 

30 

31 

32 

33 

34 

35 

36 

37 

38 

39 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

MIA 

Data quality 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

National – Danish Academy 
for Spatial Information 

National – The Netherlands 
Geonovum 

miniMAKS 

Data quality 

FOT specification 

Specification 

ISO 19115 

Standard 

ISO 19139 

Standard 

Vis Kort (“Show map”) 

View  service  / 
Tool 

OGC Web Services (OWS) 

Core Data Model 

FOTdanmark 

Data set / Tool 

Dutch version of the 
European Directive on the 
legal protection of 
databases (96/9/EC) 

Public Policy 

National – The Netherlands 
Geonovum 

Government Information 
Public Access Act 

Binding 
Instrument 

National – The Netherlands 
Geonovum 

The Netherlands Data 
Registration Act 

Binding 
Instrument 

National – The Netherlands 
Geonovum 

National – The Netherlands 
Geonovum 

National – The Netherlands 
Geonovum 

National – The Netherlands 
Geonovum 

Personal Data Protection Act  Binding 

Instrument 

Public Policy 

EU Directive 2002/58 on 
privacy and electronic 
communications 

Geo gedeeld 

Data Policy 

OGC standards 

Metadata schema 

89 

 
 
 
Ref  SDI name 

SBB name 

ABB Mapping 

40 

41 

42 

National – The Netherlands 
Geonovum 

GML3 

Data standard 

National – The Netherlands 
Geonovum 

Dutch ISO 19115 metadata  Metadata schema 

National – The UK location 
strategy 

Digital National Framework 
(UK) 

Implementing 
guideline/Standa
rd 

43 

National – The UK location 
strategy 

Cm7157 Government 
response to the Power of 
Information Review 

Binding-
instrument 

44 

45 

46 

47 

48 

49 

National – The UK location 
strategy 

UK GEMINI 

Metadata 
standard 

National – The UK location 
strategy 

UK Location Infrastructure 
(UKLI) 

Non-binging 
instrument 

National – The UK location 
strategy 

UK Location Discovery 
Metadata Service - 
Operational Guide 

Technical 
guidance 

National – The UK location 
strategy 

UKLP  Download  Services 
Operational Guidance 

Technical 
guidance 

National – The UK location 
strategy 

UK Location Getting Started 
Guide 

Technical 
guidance 

National – The UK location 
strategy 

UK Location View Service 
Operational Guide 

Technical 
guidance 

90 

Annex V – List of geospatial solutions on Joinup 

As a by-product of the SBB assessment, 14 reusable geospatial related solutions, already 
published  on  Joinup,  were  identified.  These  solutions  might  be  of  interest  to  public 
administrations or other parties developing location-based solutions and services. Hence 
they are included as an annex. The following table lists these identified Joinup solutions. 
No  criteria  were  applied.  Note:  The  table  does  not  comprise  all  geospatial  solutions 
published on Joinup, but only a subset. 

Table 34: List of geospatial solutions on Joinup 

Solution 

Link 

1  GeoNetwork 
opensource 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/software/geonetwork/descrip
tion 

2  GeoServer 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/software/geoserver/descripti
on 

3  GET SDI Portal 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/software/get_sdi_portal/desc
ription 

4 

SDI Analyzer 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/software/sdianalyzer/descript
ion 

5  GeoDCAT-AP 

Implementations 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/asset/dcat_application_profil
e/document/geodcat-ap-implementations 

6 

7 

8 

9 

Spain in 
Georeferencing 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/catalogue/asset_release/spai
n-georeferencing 

CatMDEdit - 
metadata editor 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/software/catmdedit/descripti
on 

ARE3NA Reusing 
INSPIRE 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/asset/are3na-
reuse/description 

ARE3NA Sensor 
Observation Service 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/software/are3nasos/descripti
on 

10  ARE3NA Re3ference 

Platform 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/asset/are3na-re3ference-
platform/description 

11  ARE3NA study on 
AAA for Data and 
Services 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/asset/are3na-aaa/description 

12  Esri Geoportal Server  https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/software/inspire/description 

13  deegree 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/software/deegree/description 

14  GRASS GIS 

https://joinup.ec.europa.eu/software/grassgis/description 

91 

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