The Web-Based Information System of Italian Population Census

1. The Web-Based Information System of Italian Population Census Maura Giacummo Leonardo Tininini Marina Venturi Antonino Virgillito

2. Introduction • The 15thItalianPopulationCensus • 24,700,000 households with 60,000,000 individuals • 100,000 operators • Several important innovations were introduced • Supported by a web-based information system

3. 15thItalianPopulationCensus: MainInnovations • Use and analysis of local population registers • Information basis of the census • Comparison and re-alignment of the data on citizens, collected by the Census, with those stored in registers • Involvement of local municipality departments in the entire census process • Use of multi-channel data collection techniques • Traditional paper-based data collection and online electronic questionnaire

4. The Census Web-BasedInformation System • Integrated web architecture for the management and the online data collection • Designed and developed in Istat • Based on open-source software and platforms • Web hosting service was outsourced

5. The Census Web-based Information System • Accessible from both the Census office operators and Istat personnel • Allows operators to manage and follow all the phases of data collection • Distribution of workload among Istat and municipalities • 70 functions implemented, organized in 8 areas SGRManagement System QPOPOnline questionnaire Common database RETEDocumentationportal

6. SGR Monitoring of Questionnaires • SGR allowed operators to follow the evolution of every single questionnaire, in every phase • “Census tract agenda” control panel • Questionnaires were initially sent to families using population registers data • Under-coverage was handled through enumerator field works • Questionnaires could be collected in different ways • Web • Manual return to municipality • Post shipping • Collected by enumerator

7. SGR Census-Register Comparison • Operator could monitor the differences between the population registers and the census result, producing at the end a balance sheet on families and individuals at municipal level • All the inconsistencies were revealed in SGR dashboard and could be processed by operators

8. The Census Web-based Information System • Web application that citizens could use to fill up their questionnaire • Assisted in compilation through rule checking • Completed questionnaires immediately available in SGR • Could also be used by Census office operators for performing data entry SGRManagement System QPOPOnline questionnaire Common database RETEDocumentationportal

9. QPOP MainFeatures • All the three types of paper questionnaires were reproduced online • questionnaires for households in long and short version • questionnaire for cohabitations • Access credentials • User ID is tax code of reference person for the household • password printed on the paper questionnaire • Assisted input with real-time error checking • Only pre-checked data were inserted in the database • High quality of collected data • Multi-language support • State-of-the-art software design

10. QPOP Software design qualities • Scalability • No performance bottlenecks • Sophisticated technical solutions were adopted for controlling the database load even in presence of high number of concurrent users • Robustness • Severe test phase • No application errors • Security • Redundant access controls for avoiding data corruption and intrusions • Redundant data control for guaranteeing consistency

11. QPOP Metadata-based Design • All the text for the questions, response modalities and application messages is stored in specific metadata tables • Avoidance of redundant source code for the three questionnaires • Rapid adaptation to changes in the specifications • Also the questions flow (“questionnaire graph”) is stored as metadata • Preserves the consistency of saved data • All the metadata is cached in memory for ensuring fast access and saving database resources

12. QPOP Text SearchEngine • QPOP includes a sophisticated mechanism for automatic encoding of textual responses • Used within the question on highest educational qualification • Dictionary with 6,000 distinct items • The user enters a list of words describing her full title of educational qualification • The system replies by proposing a list of titles taken from the available dictionary ranked according to their similarity to the search keywords • The user must select one of the proposed items • Pre-processing of the dictionary for optimizing response times

13. Results • 8,250,000 questionnaires were filled on the web • 33% of total • Peaks of 300 questionnaire saved per minute • Severe service outage on the first day • Due to inaccurate server tuning by the hosting company • Recovered the day after • Census-Register comparison completed for the 96% of the population (as of March 31st)

14. Advantages of the Integrated Web Platform • Decentralized management of the network • Real-time monitoring of multi-channel collection • Efficient and effective census-register reconciliation • Both implemented systems will be reused for the forthcoming Industry and Services Census

15. Thank you