ITOS Process

Overview

In order to improve the quality of COD-AB (Common Operation Dataset - Administrative Boundaries), OCHA FIS has partnered with ITOS to support OCHA country and regional offices with the processing and formatting. This processes is guided by the OCHA Country Office Information Management Officer; ITOS will not make any changes (attribute or spatial) without consent from the IMO responsible  for CODs. 

It is expected to take approximately two to three months* to process a COD-AB provided that there are no major interruptions during the process. See the breakdown below for more details. As part of the yearly COD maintenance cycle, the OCHA office is then expected to update ITOS and FIS of any changes to the COD-AB (based on ad-hoc demands or yearly maintenance requirementS) so a new version of the COD-AB can be made, including the web services.

OCHA is committed to processing COD-ABs with ITOS support the following priority countries (columns A+ and A) in 2017.

* The overall processing time will largely be dependent on the availability and responsiveness of a CO/RO during the cleaning and validation of ITOS Candidate layers. It is estimated that the amount of time for ITOS to review and clean submitted datasets will be between two and four weeks. It is expected that each CO/RO will review the candidate datasets up to two weeks time. As the process will involve many exchanges, the total amount of time until a final candidate gets approved by an office could be up to three months if not longer due to unexpected issues (emergencies, onset, etc.)

Benefits

The benefit to OCHA IMO are:

• Reduced workload as ITOS processes the COD-AB for the country office
• A high quality dataset for your COD-AB
• Creation of multiple formats of COD-AB is done as part of the ITOS process
• Helps with versioning of COD-AB

The benefits to operational partners

• A high quality COD-AB 
• Availability of multiple versions including web services

Formats created by ITOS:
By default, ITOS creates a 10.1 file geodatabase, and exports the attribute tables to stand-alone Excel files. These formats are available upon request:

Who needs to participate

There are two types of participants: 

1. Direct: ITOS, FIS and an OCHA country or regional office represented by the information management unit. CO and RO are expected to assign a dedicated focal point to the process. This IMO needs to have GIS skills to be able to discuss the process with ITOS and FIS. The process should not take too much of the OCHA IMO's time from his or her regular duties. 
2. In-direct: IM network and data sources. Agree to use ITOS to process data; may have to provide advise/information about the dataset to OCHA to help with the processing; endorse the Candidate ITOS provides at the end of the process.

Steps for OCHA Offices with ITOS

Prior to entering the ITOS process the OCHA CO/RO should have already identified, evaluated, and shared the latest and best available data from a reliable/official data source. The dataset must be shared on HDX and tagged as a "Provisional COD". This implies that no best available cod had been identified as part of preparedness activity. The OCHA Head of Office should be notified of the work so the work is prioritized in the coming months and they can update their network accordingly.

Current Status of COD Services

Resources

• COD Processing Services Scope between OCHA and ITOS (Draft - 28 April 2017)
• Priority countries for COD services
• Vetting Questionnaire
• Final Steps in COD Cycle (Draft - 28 April 2017)
• Map of COD Services Status
• How to consume COD Services
• ITOS White Paper: COD Evaluation and Candidate Creation
• COD Schema

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