What's the point of XCRI-CAP? This has been a cry for quite a while, even amongst some of the projects in the JISC funded Course Data Programme. Well, this is a story about how I've found it useful.

Many years ago I left ECCTIS 2000, the UK's largest courses information aggregator and publisher, having been technical lead there for 8 years. Over that period of 8 years, during which we moved our major platform from CD-ROM (remember them?) to the web, we established a state-of-the-art course search system with integrated data picked up from:

• course marketing information (keyed, classified and QAed by Hobsons Publishing),
• text files from professional bodies (keyed by them, but marked up by us),
• advertising copy and images (also keyed by the supplier and marked up by us),
• subject-based statistics from HESA,
• vacancy information (at appropriate times of the year) from UCAS,
• and so on.

We used a new-fangled technology called Standard Generalised Markup Language (SGML) with our own bespoke markup.

The technology allowed us to produce separately versioned searchable products for three flavours of CD-ROM (Scotland, rest of UK, international), the web and for printed publications, all from the same integrated data set. Our system enabled us to aggregate data received from multiple sources, including huge data sets of well-structured text (from Hobsons), quite large statistical sources (HESA), and smaller 'freestyle' text items from advertisers and other organisations that we marked up ourselves. Shades of XCRI-CAP Demonstrator projects, but 20 years ago. ECCTIS 2000 was a major aggregator, and probably *the* major UK courses information aggregator of the time. Our development built on some highly innovative work carried out by The Open University in the 1980s, including seminal developments in CD-ROM technology, but that's another story.

Much of my career to date had been centred on the development of standard methods for managing course marketing information as an aggregator. Quite a bit of my freelance career was to be on the other side of the fence, helping HEIs to manage courses information as providers, though I've always had some involvement in the aggregating organisation field.

APS Ltd, my small company, was fortunate enough to gain a contract from The Open University to act as their agent for disseminating course marketing information to the wider world of the emerging course search sites on the web. The main ones from the OU's viewpoint at that time were the British Council, Graduate Prospects, the learndirect services in the countries of the UK. I also set up, for UCAS, its 'data collection system' through which UCAS obtained the courses data not used in its application system, but supplied on to third parties (such as learndirect, newspapers, Hotcourses and others).

Most of these small acts of data collection and dissemination were carried out by what are now seen as 'traditional' methods: re-keying from prospectuses, keying directly into a supplier's web form. However, in a few cases (not nearly enough in my view) we were able to obtain electronic files from HEIs - for example, as I was managing the OU dissemination and the UCAS data collection input, it seemed sensible to me to provide the data electronically and to import it automatically. No problem.

At that point, it occurred to me that if I could do this for the OU data, why not for many other HEIs? One reason was lack of standards, the other main one was the chaos in course marketing systems (where they existed) in HEIs - understandable as most were desperately trying to come to terms with new internet technologies, particularly websites, and how these related to their paper prospectuses.

My initial solution was to use SGML (XML being a twinkle in someone's eye at that time) to create a 'lowest common denominator' structure and format for courses information, convert data into that format, then write a suite of programmes to create bespoke outputs for course information aggregrating organisations. There ensued a 'happy time' of 3 to 4 years during which we would acquire the OU data in a convenient database format, carry out a swathe of well-documented software-driven and mainly automatic processes, produce a range of output files (Access databases, spreadsheets, CSV files) and fling them around the country for up to ten or so aggregating organisations to import. For learndirect Scotland, to take just one example, we would produce a series of CSV files, email them off and they would load them into their database. Time taken: maybe 5 minutes for the automatic processing, 30 minutes for checking.

I stress here that our supply of OU data to learndirect Scotland before 2007 took us about 35 minutes, 90% of that simply checking the data. We would supply updates five times per year, so our total annual time specifically on the learndirect Scotland update would have been significantly less than half a day. However, in a re-organisation, learndirect Scotland disappeared, and in place of their system that imported the OU data, the replacement organisation implemented a new one called PROMT. Ironically, this new system was anything but, from our perspective. With no import mechanism, we were required to key everything from scratch into their bespoke and somewhat eccentric client software - our task went from 35 minutes to 2 to 3 days (the OU had over 1,200 presentations), and the annual task leapt from less than half a day to about 12 days. A double irony: behind their clunky client software was XML and various other interoperability techniques, completely unavailable to those supplying the data.

This was the situation in 2007, and our 'happy time' ended, as everyone rapidly stopped taking bulk updates and moved to the 'easier' method of forcing HEIs to re-key their data into bespoke web forms. Our time to update the OU data more than doubled - so much for new technology! There was much grinding of teeth (and not just from APS, but from colleagues across the sector).

By now, you should be able to see where I'm coming from in respect of XCRI-CAP.

So, what's the point of XCRI-CAP? My final illustration: Skills Development Scotland has now done us proud. In addition to their PROMT software (now improved over the years), they have set up an excellent bulk import facility for providers to use to supply XCRI-CAP 1.0 or 1.1 data (and I'm sure we can persuade them to use 1.2 soon). APS is now using this facility, coupled with The Open University's XCRI-CAP 1.1 feed, to get back to our 'happy time' again; only better, because now everyone can have 'happy times' if more aggregators use XCRI-CAP.

XCRI-CAP: turn 12 days of keying into 3 hours of checking.

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APS has also produced a 'value added' XCRI-CAP 1.2 feed for any aggregator to use: http://www.alanpaull.co.uk/OpenUniversityXCRI-CAP1-2.xml. As we are able to tweak this feed in response to specific aggregator requirements, please get in contact with , if you would like to use this feed, or to discuss how APS might help you with your courses information dissemination. We also have a range of services through the XXP Platform.

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