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niles edited this page May 22, 2011 · 34 revisions

What is VisualAid?

VisualAid is a visual analogy tool that allows anybody to put complex statistics in perspective. It was demoed at TechCrunch NYC Hackathon 2011.

This will become an independent project that anyone can use to visualize data. You'll also be able to contribute "data units" that other people can use to build stories with their data.

It is the first of many applications built with CleanFormat data. See below for contact info.

What is Clean Format?

  1. A standard data schema to be used with APIs and import / export tools to ensure all field names and data types / format are uniform.

Objects Defined:

  • restaurant
  • restaurant lists
  • menu
  • menu item
  • ingredient (raw material)
  • ingredient source (farms, suppliers)
  • ingredient packaged (products, grocery items)

Interconnect Types:

  • Free for all (open API calls)
  • Private (private API calls)
  • Paid (metered API calls)
  • Dump (full database / dataset definition)

2- In the future: A centralized key system for tracking unique ids for each record between various systems. For the time being, http://www.freebase.com/ will be used as the central key value store of choice.

What can I use this for?

This will be a free to use (and free to modify for your own use) format for sharing data between computer systems.

  • Import data dumps from another database to yours to "seed" a dataset
  • Subscribe to updates to keep your database up to date (and your modifications in tact)
  • Send updates from your database to another database
  • Ensure that the object in your database matches another (restaurant, menu, menu item, ingredient, etc)

Why is this being created?

Clean Format is the Food Data Rosetta Stone

This data format was created to support rapid application development with high data integrity. It was built to make hackathon projects easier to develop because of easy access to data and easy data mashups. Ultimately, once ratified by key industry players, it will be used as a database interconnect standard.

  • Problem 1 - Database schema varies greatly between different databases
  • Problem 2 - Duplicate data
  • Problem 3 - Data is often not accurate, or is miscategorized

What is the project Timeline?

Initial Draft Specification (and example hack) - Tech Crunch Disrupt & BarCampNYC6 - Late May 2011

Lessons Learned Briefing - First week of June

First Full Application(s) - End of June / early July

Enhancements & Additions - August

Standard RC 1 - End of summer

Comment Period for Standard RC 1 - September

Standard v 1.0 - Fall 2011

The initial specifications will be based in part on existing industry standards and in part on existing database schema of initial supporters of the format. Once a few applications have been created and we have a chance to address any performance, compatibility, legal or business concerns, we will then approach a targeted list of industry heavyweights to ratify and utilize the standard.

Who behind this project?

We're inviting broad industry participation in the creation of this standard interconnect format. If you have a personal interest in food data, or if your company has food data to share, feel free to get involved.

Add your name to this list:

The initial concept was developed by Clean Plates http://www.cleanplates.com.

Use the "message" link on this page for more details http://github.com/niles.

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