Noark and blockchain ... a bit of info ...

Thomas Sødring thomas.sodring at hioa.no
Tue Apr 4 14:07:04 CEST 2017


Hi,

Just to follow up on a discussion, here is some information about the
work I'm trying to do to integrate Noark 5 with block chain.

1. Why look at blockchain integration with Noark?
After a workshop hosted by Riksarkivet and Politdirektoratet, I took the
job upon myself to answer the question "How can Noark 5 be integrated
with a blockchain technology?". So the point is that it should use a
distributed ledger. A further fact is that there is a wish to create an
application to RFF Hovedstaden [1] for blockchain technology used in the
public sector and this work can be a basis. So that's why it's important
that it's based on blockchain.

There is an element of blockchain as a buzzword in this, but I think
it's interesting to explore the use-case.

2. What will we write to the ledger and why?
Basically I want to see if I can reproduce the arkivstrutur within a
blockchain technology and at a minimum write the systemID and timestamp
of what has been created, updated or deleted. This could then at a later
stage be verified against an extraction sent to an archive institution.
So at some point it becomes a data quality tool to ensure that no
records are accidently deleted.

Ideally I can create chains of chains and this would allow us to easily
identify things like a saksmappe and journalposter. This would also be
useful for Freedom of Information requests.

3. How do we want to do this.
Spring supports application events [2]. So I can create an event each
time an object is created, updated or deleted and publish an
asynchronous event to update the public ledger.

4. What have we done.
The spring events stuff should be OK. I have paid for one of baeldungs
courses and it's detailed there so there is no problem getting the event
stuff up and running. I tried to install openchain [3], but it's based
on .NET and I quickly had problems with the install. Even the example
commands to get it up and running are not in sync with github. So I
guess it's just a showcase project to see if it can attract attention. I
tried hyperledger today [4], and while it's supported by the Linux
foundation and promising I think it might be a little early to play
around with it. I spent a few hours but was not able to get an instance
up and running. I also looked at ethereum [5], but felt that it was more
about a currency than a generic ledger.

So to deliver on the "bestilling" I need to find a distributed
blockchain implementation, that will allow me write, at a minimum,
systemId and a timestamp for CUD events.

In many ways using blockchain is about exposing what is happening inside
government, without exposing any private details. It makes the archive
more "public" in that its internals are exposed in a trusted verifiable
manner.

 - Thomas

[1]
http://www.regionaleforskningsfond.no/prognett-hovedstaden/Utlysning/RFFHSTAD/1253961814142
[2] http://www.baeldung.com/spring-events
[3] https://www.openchain.org/
[4] https://www.hyperledger.org/


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