#OAWeek2022: Free the world climate report together

A contribution by Axel Dürkop and Florian Hagen

One of the most important sources of information on the subject of climate is the UN’s IPCC reports. These are published approximately every five years. The Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was published in 2021 and 2022 in various volumes, unfortunately in the form of PDF files. This makes it difficult for people and machines to read, as well as to use them as widely as possible. The fact that parts of the reports are gradually being supplied in HTML format is encouraging.

Asynchron Hackathon “Formats For Future”

We want to remedy this poor usability together at the Hackathon Formats For Future: Liberating and Semantify IPCC Reports. This will take place from October 24, 2022 as part of the Open Access Week 2022, which this year was held under the motto “Open for Climate Justice”. It is organized by the group #semanticClimate with the support of the TUHH Library, the Open Science Labs of the TIB Hannover, the Hamburg Open Online University at TU Hamburg, the Single Source Publishing Community and many other people who have contributed time and expertise over the past weeks.

Hackathon information

During the Open Access Week, anyone interested can try out the #semanticClimate tools alone or in teams; registration is not necessary. However, if you want to meet the team of young Indian scientists around the chemist and open knowledge activist Peter Murray-Rust, you will receive a corresponding link after registration.

Previous experience is not required. All interested people with time and desire are cordially invited. More detailed information is available on the #semanticClimate website.

Joint hacking at the TU Hamburg

For those interested at TU Hamburg, we offer to work together with the tools and meet the team #semanticClimate on Wednesday, 10/26/2022, at 2:30 pm. Registration is also required for this.

Advantages of semantic documents in science

Our colleague Simon Worthington from the Open Science Lab at TIB Hannover explains in a blog post what the advantages of semantically excellent scientific publications are.

Also recommended reading is the post “The PDF is not enough: Why science needs open formats”, which will be published on this blog tomorrow.