DCAT-AP and its variations
Course details
This online course introduces DCAT-AP and its variations, a key standard supporting the publication and exchange of metadata for datasets and data services across Europe. Designed for a non-technical audience, the course explains how DCAT-AP enables interoperability by providing a common structure for describing data, while allowing flexibility through national, regional, and domain-specific profiles. The aim of the course is to provide a learners with a clear, practical understanding of DCAT-AP architecture, its governance, core components, and the role of its different variations in supporting cross-border and cross-domain data sharing in the European Union.
Target audience
Learning objectives
The course aims to enable learners to:
- Understand the role of DCAT-AP in supporting data sharing across Europe
- Become familiar with the core concepts and components of the DCAT-AP architecture (e.g. classes, properties, vocabularies)
- Understand how governance, versioning, and validation ensure consistency and quality of metadata
- Recognise the importance of controlled vocabularies and multilingual metadata in enabling interoperability
- Identify and differentiate between national, regional, and domain-specific DCAT-AP profiles
- Understand key interoperability challenges and how DCAT-AP variations address cross-border and cross-domain data exchange
Offered by
This content is offered by the European Commission. The European Commission is the European Union's politically independent executive arm. It is alone responsible for drawing up proposals for new European legislation, and it implements the decisions of the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union.
Schedule
- Chapter 1: Introduction and orientation
- Chapter 2: DCAT-AP structure
- Chapter 3: Existing DCAT-AP extensions
- Chapter 4: Quiz
