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The distribution of information is one of the core tasks of the provincial authorities. That is why the government of the province of Vlaams-Brabant wants to make its electronic resources accessible in a controlled manner. They called upon Belgacom as a webservice specialist.

The provincial government of Vlaams-Brabant is an intermediary governmental  body: it forms the link between the Flemish Community and local authorities. The regional approach of the provincial government is an asset in many policy areas: economy, culture, tourism, education… A team of 25 employees provides the ICT-support for this policy. The team is responsible for the ICT-infrastructure for project development. Karl Pottie, head of computer systems for the provincial government of Vlaams-Brabant, explains: “It’s a challenge to offer the available information to the appropriate parties in a secure way.” The ICT-department had previously carried out projects for making the province’s data resources available securely but the product with which they started the project was no longer supported. What’s more, in recent years, there has been dramatic evolution in the area of webservices. The department thought it was high time for a new solution.

Communicating via webservices

The provincial government of Vlaams-Brabant issued a public call for tender for a two-part assignment. On one hand there needed be a new gateway for managing the access to the data resources. This gateway had to provide security for a range of web applications that communicate over the Internet on the basis of webservices. On the other hand, the supplier also had to be able to offer best practices concerning webservices. “We did not feel it was feasible to arrive at this information any other way - and in such a short period of time,”  says project leader Wim Van Gelder from the department of projects and development. When the proposals were evaluated, Belgacom scored the highest for both aspects. “Belgacom’s expertise also proved a real advantage afterwards,” according to Karl Pottie. “Webservices and SOA (Service Oriented Architecture)  are now really coming into their own and more and more projects are overlapping each other to some extent: document management, ERP, GIS, you name it. In order to be able to link these systems to one another, webservices have become indispensable.”

Inevitable evolution

Concretely, Belgacom proposed using a business ready XML-firewall based on an XML-gateway from Vordel. This gateway supports the current XML-standards and also offers the necessary guarantees for the security of the webservices. Wim Van Gelder: “Vordel turned out to be one of the most user-friendly solutions. At the same time, Belgacom’s project based approach has worked out well here.” The Vordel XML-gateway is installed on the firewall and works as a sort of sentinel station. Karl Pottie: “An ordinary firewall allows two parties to communicate with one another. Vordel goes a step further: depending on the function of the user, the gateway enables access to a data source.” In the first place, the gateway regulates access to data resources for the provincial government’s own web applications. Ultimately, external governmental authorities will also be able to access specific data resources in the same way. Karl Pottie: “That is an inevitable evolution. Governments will need to share increasing amounts of authentic data sources .” This fall, a project is being launched to allow external governmental authorities - as well as citizens - to consult geographical information.

Company profile

Vlaams-Brabant is the youngest province in Belgium and the smallest province in Flanders. It was created in 1995 when the unitary province of Brabant was split. The province has a workforce of approximately 800 employees who are active in 36 policy areas.

Business benefits

-    Better and better controlled distribution of information from the data resources
-    Future proof solutions for more and better use of webservices

More info?

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