SCORE Launches a Replication Guide for Open Source Solutions During Digital Partner Meeting
By Kata Börönte, Aarhus University
Due to the current no-traveling period, the SCORE partners met online, once again, for their biannual Partner Meeting. Instead of meeting in Bradford, the consortium came together online for an intensive three-day meeting to discuss the progress of the project and plan for the future.
The agenda included exciting new items, such as updates on the solutions, initiating the development of the first business cases, and introducing the 10 SCORE principles for solution development.
The 10 SCORE Principles
- SCORE is data-centric.
- SCORE is API-first.
- SCORE uses minimal interoperability.
- SCORE is agnostic towards but promotes best practices for code, stacks, and data life-cycle management.
- SCORE prefers open source code and open data.
- SCORE is agnostic towards in-house, out-sourced, or joint development teams and supports both sides of the market.
- SCORE delivers components, services, and solutions.
- SCORE validates the maturity of deliverables in living labs.
- SCORE components, services, and solutions are listed on the CITYxCITY Catalogue for others to discover and use.
- SCORE data is shared on the Urban Data Exchange
However, one of the biggest achievements of the meeting was the launch of a replication guide for open source solutions.
The objective of the guide is to help SCORE partners, but also project managers, coordinators, and decision-makers to facilitate the replication of open-source smart city solutions from one city to another. The guidelines highlight technical aspects of replication, essential considerations for assuring an enabling context for successful replication, as well as how this links to overall initiatives of digital transformation. They can also be useful for developers and programmers who want to know more about the context for preparation and implementation to be able to work with their city on the replication of open solutions.
The step-by-step guide links the replication activities to other deliverables within the SCORE project such as the guide for testing in urban living labs previously developed by Johanneberg Science Park, the tools and outcomes of the peer review process led by Bradford University and the preparation of business cases for the solutions facilitated by the City of Ghent.
More specifically, the guidelines cover three main topics:
- Definitions and background information
Defining the main concepts and explaining the rationale behind SCORE.
- Understanding the replication process of open-source smart city solutions
Explaining the process, barriers, drivers, and factors of replication.
- How to replicate open-source smart city solutions step by step
Providing details on steps to take, questions to ask, and decisions to make in a replication process.
The replication guide is well-aligned with great initiatives, such as the Living-in. EU declaration and establishes strong links to local initiatives too, while showing a way forward to working with open source solutions.
If you are interested in reading the full guide, you can download the document here.