CKAN in 2024: A Year In Review

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CKAN didn’t need to reinvent itself in 2024. It didn’t need hype, gimmicks, or buzzwords. What it needed – and delivered – was momentum.

Last year set the stage. 2023 was a landmark year, proving that CKAN is not just a tool but a movement. In 2024, as a Digital Public Good, CKAN continued to prove its reliability, scalability, and impact and that momentum turned into something even bigger.

Why? Because CKAN works.

In a world where technology’s trust is hard-earned, CKAN wasn’t chosen because of marketing. It was chosen because it delivers. CKAN stood as the obvious choice for open data infrastructure, reinforcing its position as the go-to solution for data transparency, accessibility, and collaboration. More governments, organizations, and institutions turned to CKAN not because it was the loudest option, but because it was the best one.

This wasn’t a year of radical overhauls.

It was a year of undeniable progress.

Adoption grew. Impact deepened.

The community strengthened.

And that’s what matters.

So, how did CKAN help shape the future of open data in 2024? Let’s take a look.

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Key Milestones in 2024

A Step Forward with the Release of CKAN 2.11

This year, CKAN took a significant leap forward with the release of CKAN 2.11. This new version came packed with performance enhancements and exciting features designed to improve usability and functionality. Among these is the highly anticipated Table Designer, a tool that simplifies the process of creating, validating, and publishing high-quality structured data. Alongside the CKAN 2.11 release, the team also rolled out CKAN 2.10.5, a critical patch that addressed security vulnerabilities and updated dependencies to ensure the platform remains secure and robust.

In line with CKAN’s commitment to maintaining a seamless upgrade process, the transition from CKAN 2.10 to 2.11 has been made easier than ever, with detailed documentation and step-by-step guides. However, this also marks the end of official support for CKAN 2.9, initially released four years ago. Organizations still using older versions are strongly encouraged to upgrade to take advantage of the latest features and improvements.

Table Designer: Redefining Data Publishing

A highlight of CKAN’s 2024 advancements is the debut of Table Designer in CKAN 2.11. This innovative, schema-first tool improves how structured data is created, validated, and published within CKAN. Instead of detecting errors after upload, Table Designer ensures data quality by rejecting invalid data at the point of upload or even earlier. Users can define fields, set constraints, and create primary keys through an intuitive web interface, making the process both accessible and precise. Beyond its ease of use, Table Designer leverages CKAN’s DataStore, providing extensive API support for developers and integrating with CKAN’s audit capabilities to track changes in real time. It guarantees high-quality data that users can trust. You can read more about this here: Taming Dynamic Data with Table Designer.

Advancing DCAT Support

This year also saw a significant upgrade to CKAN’s DCAT capabilities with the release of ckanext-dcat v2.0.0. This update brought support for DCAT-AP v3, ensuring compliance with the latest metadata sharing standards. The integration with ckanext-scheming allows site administrators to customize metadata schemas with ease, making DCAT implementation more flexible and accessible than ever. Further updates brought support for the DCAT-US v3 application profile and multilingual support. The team has ambitious plans to expand this functionality further, with built-in support for profiles like DCAT-AP-HVD or HealthDCAT-AP and new features to support Dataset Series.

CKAN’s enhanced DCAT support reflects its commitment to fostering interoperability and metadata sharing across global data portals. These advancements aim to position CKAN as the go-to platform for managing metadata in compliance with international standards. Read more: Enhancing DCAT support in CKAN (DCAT-AP v3, scheming integration, and more).

A more robust and secure packaging and release pipeline

Over this year the core team also took the opportunity to review the processes to package and distribute CKAN when there are new releases.

They identified steps that could be automated and hardened to increase the overall security and reduce the friction involved. This included anything from automated testing and publication of Docker images and Debian packages, automatic publication to PyPI of CKAN packages, enhanced monitoring of vulnerabilities in requirements, and much more.

This is an ongoing effort that will continue going forward, as we keep reviewing how releases are made and incorporate best practices.

UI Revamp

As part of the CKAN 3.0 release, the team undertook a significant project to modernize and improve CKAN’s user interface. This initiative addresses key challenges in the current frontend, reducing technical debt and enhancing customization options. The project is in its final stages of implementation and integration, with the team overcoming complex technical hurdles to deliver a polished product. The UI Revamp has been a community-centered effort, characterized by:

• Open collaboration on designs – the new CKAN UI revamp has been a truly collaborative effort, with design discussions happening transparently and openly, inviting feedback from everyone interested in shaping the platform's future.
• Public instance for tracking implementation – to ensure visibility and inclusivity, a public instance was set up, allowing community members to see the progress in real time and provide input as the new UI takes shape. 👉 You can experience the new look and check out the team’s progress on the public CKAN dev instance: CKAN Design Preview (Username: ckan | Password: preview)
• Community survey on the main color – even the smallest details, like the main color for the UI, were decided through a community survey, showcasing the commitment to making CKAN a product that reflects its diverse user base.
• Open code contributions on GitHub – the implementation process welcomed contributions from developers worldwide, who could submit code, report issues, and track progress on GitHub.

This open and inclusive approach not only strengthens the CKAN platform but also builds a sense of shared ownership among contributors. From those writing code to those offering feedback, every voice plays a vital role in shaping CKAN’s future.

Search Functionality Modernization

The CKAN 3.0 Taskforce began work on a proof of concept (PoC) to make the existing Solr integration more flexible and support pluggable search backends. This approach will allow CKAN to work seamlessly with search engines such as Elasticsearch, Typesense etc.

The project is ongoing and will be progressing in phases:

1. Initial work replicating the current Solr functionality, allowing indexing of datasets and other core entities, as well as querying and returning results.
2. Plans to integrate additional backends such as Elasticsearch and Typesense to provide flexibility for users.

The first phase is set to be completed by January 2025, paving the way for a more dynamic and scalable search experience.

A Thriving Community

CKAN has always been more than just software – it’s a vibrant ecosystem supported by a diverse and passionate community.

CKAN Monthly Live events

Key to these efforts is CKAN Monthly Live, a recurring monthly event that has become a hub for the community to share insights, and discuss challenges, bringing together contributors, adopters, and advocates from around the world.

CKAN Monthly Live 2024 featured a range of impactful sessions, reflecting the vibrant contributions of our community. Among the standout projects were depositar, a public research data repository developed by Academia Sinica in Taiwan, which set a benchmark for FAIR data sharing and reproducible research; the India Data Portal, exemplifying CKAN’s role in advancing government transparency through open data; and the SSEN Open Data Portal, the first platform to publish detailed smart meter consumption data, showcasing CKAN's influence in energy data accessibility.

Complementing these projects were groundbreaking features such as DataPusher+, enhancing metadata automation for streamlined workflows, and TableDesigner, simplifying data management for users worldwide.

These highlights are just a glimpse of the incredible work shared by the community this year. As we continue in 2025, we invite you to be part of the journey. If you'd like your project to be showcased in CKAN Monthly Live, please reach out to yoana.popova@datopian.com.

Conference Highlights

CKAN was proudly showcased at two major events this year: the Canadian Open Data Summit , attended by Ian Ward, and the CLARIN Annual Conference in Barcelona, Spain, attended by Adrià Mercader. These events provided an invaluable platform to demonstrate CKAN’s capabilities, engage with a diverse audience, and explore new opportunities for collaboration.

CLARIN Annual Conference

The conference featured its first Industry Track session, connecting academics, research experts, and industry leaders to foster collaboration and innovation. Adrià Mercader highlighted CKAN’s flexibility as a community-driven open-source data management system, demonstrating its use in government data publishing, research, and humanitarian projects.

Adrià emphasized the benefits of private sector involvement in CKAN’s development, showcasing how industry-funded contributions bring fresh perspectives, technologies, and scenarios to the table. However, he also underlined the importance of maintaining CKAN’s mission to democratize open knowledge, advocating for continued efforts to balance industry influence with community-driven goals. This includes addressing challenges like asymmetrical contributions and licensing to ensure that CKAN remains accessible and inclusive.

Canadian Open Data Summit

At the Canadian Open Data Summit, Ian Ward delivered a compelling presentation on data publishing workflows using CKAN. He outlined how CKAN empowers organizations to create structured workflows that prioritize data quality, maximize accessibility and discoverability, and ensure compliance with legal and other standards. Ward ’s session showcased CKAN’s flexibility in meeting diverse publishing needs, illustrating how open-source tools like CKAN can transform data management practices across sectors. His presentation reinforced CKAN’s role as a comprehensive, reliable, and adaptable solution for publishing high-quality data efficiently. Reflections from Ian:

Ian Ward shared his reflections from recent open data conferences, noting the widespread appreciation for CKAN as a core tool in the open data ecosystem. Many discussions centered around addressing challenges like the housing crisis, particularly with geo-data, highlighting an opportunity for CKAN to enhance its geographic data capabilities. Ian also observed that open data teams tend to be small, making it vital for CKAN to offer simpler tools and onboarding processes to empower these teams without requiring deep technical expertise. These insights will undoubtedly shape future CKAN improvements, further cementing its role as a cornerstone of open data initiatives.

Marketing Efforts

As CKAN evolves, so do its marketing initiatives. The CKAN newsletter, a cornerstone of these efforts, consistently delivers updates, showcases new features, and highlights community achievements. Looking ahead to 2025, we are excited to expand our outreach even further through enhanced newsletter, updates, blog posts, and social media campaigns, ensuring the CKAN community remains informed, engaged, and inspired. Subscribe here

To amplify these efforts, we plan to establish a Marketing Working Group. This group will play a key role in shaping and executing marketing strategies to promote CKAN’s capabilities and share its success stories with a broader audience. If you’re passionate about CKAN and want to be part of the Marketing Working Group, we’d love to hear from you. Please reach out directly at yoana.popova@datopian.com.

This year, we’ll allocate additional resources to promote CKAN’s capabilities and share success stories with new audiences. These efforts are essential for raising awareness, attracting fresh contributors, and growing CKAN’s global user base. By spotlighting the stories behind CKAN’s projects and the incredible people driving them, we aim to inspire others to join the movement and contribute to the future of open data.

Strengthening Open-Source Ecosystems

In recognition of CKAN’s global impact, the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded funding through its Pathways to Enable Open Source Ecosystems (POSE) program. This initiative aims to strengthen CKAN’s community engagement, streamline onboarding processes, and expand adoption strategies.

The core work officially begins in 2025, but momentum is already building. In our first kickoff meeting, the team outlined the roadmap and introduced Jamaica Jones as the new Community Manager for the POSE project.

This investment reinforces CKAN’s ongoing commitment to fostering collaboration and inclusivity in the open data space. It serves as a testament to CKAN’s value as a Digital Public Good and its role in driving open-source innovation. Learn more about this here: NSF Invests in Strengthening CKAN Open Data Ecosystem.

Thank You to Our Co-stewards

The progress we’ve made this year wouldn’t have been possible without the collective efforts of the CKAN community and the co-stewardship of Datopian and Link Digital. Their collaboration has driven both day-to-day improvements and ambitious initiatives like CKAN 3.0, which introduces a revamped UI and, soon, a powerful new search interface supporting multiple backends.

This year also saw the launch of the transformative "core work" initiative, bolstered by private funding from Steven De Costa, enabling focused contributions to CKAN’s technical foundations.

These collaborations reflect the essence of co-stewardship – bringing together resources, expertise, and a shared vision to ensure CKAN continues to empower open data communities worldwide. We are grateful to everyone involved for their dedication and look forward to welcoming even more contributions as the journey continues.

And to Our Contributors

Every step forward for CKAN is powered by the dedication and passion of our community. Behind every feature, update, and innovation are the people who bring their expertise and commitment to the table.

We extend our gratitude to every developer, contributor, and community member who has played a part in CKAN’s journey. Your collaboration, feedback, and hard work have been instrumental in building the platform we celebrate today.

Friendly blink

😛 While the diversity of contributors leaned more toward a core group of dedicated individuals this year, we know that some of our fantastic team members took well-deserved breaks. To those who’ve been away: we’ve missed you and can’t wait to have you back onboard! Your unique perspectives and contributions are the secret sauce that makes CKAN thrive, and the community is ready to welcome you back with open arms (and maybe some pull requests waiting for your magic touch).

The Future of Open Data Is Ours to Build

Data isn’t just numbers on a spreadsheet. It’s the raw material of truth.

It tells us what’s working, what’s broken, and what needs to change. It fuels decisions that shape economies, policies, and everyday life.

But what happens when data is locked away? When knowledge becomes a privilege instead of a right?

We’ve seen this story play out too many times. Decisions made in the dark. Policies shaped by a handful of insiders. Progress slowed by gatekeepers who decide who gets to know and who doesn’t. And we know where that road leads: less trust, more inequality, fewer opportunities for those who need them most.

Now flip that story.

Imagine a world where data is open – where anyone, anywhere, can access the facts, ask better questions, and create something new. A world where governments don’t just claim to be transparent, but actually are. Where businesses solve real problems, not just chase profits. Where researchers, journalists, and everyday citizens have the same access to the raw materials of truth as the most powerful institutions.

This isn’t a dream.

This is something we can build together.

Because in a world where information drives everything – from policies to economies – open data isn’t just a convenience. It’s a responsibility. A moral imperative.

It’s not just about publishing data

Let's be clear. This isn’t just about governments publishing datasets. That’s not enough. Open data isn’t about ticking boxes or following trends. It’s about a global movement – one that breaks down silos, fuels innovation, and holds institutions accountable.

CKAN has never been about flashy marketing or empty promises. It thrives because it delivers. Because it empowers. Because it transforms how the world shares knowledge. CKAN is a refusal to accept that valuable information should be locked behind paywalls, bureaucracies, or corporate interests. It’s a tool for governments that want to be accountable, for researchers who need better data, for journalists uncovering the truth, for entrepreneurs creating solutions, and for communities demanding change.

But here’s the real question:

Who keeps it open?

Technology doesn’t maintain itself. Progress doesn’t just happen. The most important ideas – the ones that truly change the world – don’t survive because they’re useful. They survive because people fight for them.

Because people care enough to show up, to build, to maintain, to push forward – even when it’s easier to let things slip into the hands of a few.

And here’s the reality: open data doesn’t advocate for itself. It needs people who believe in it.

It needs stewards, builders, defenders.

It needs people who don’t just use open data, but protect it. Who contribute, support, and advocate for it. It needs people like you – those who see beyond the status quo and recognize that progress is a choice. A conscious choice.

Everything CKAN achieved this year didn’t happen by accident. It was built.

By people who showed up.

Who contributed.

Who believed in the power of open data and defended it.

By people who know that open data isn’t just a buzzword or an industry trend. It’s the foundation of transparency, innovation, and progress.

The question is not whether open data matters. It does. The question is: How will you contribute to making it stronger? Will you help build what’s next?

• Use it.
• Contribute.
• Advocate.
• Defend the idea that data should be open, accessible, and free for all.

Now is the time to step up. Support CKAN. Shape the future.

Be part of something bigger.

Contact us

Don't hesitate to reach out on one of our community channels if you have any questions, comments, or feedback.