Use Cases

📢 Important Update: LINDAS is undergoing a major infrastructure migration to LINDASnext. The current Stardog-based system is being replaced with GraphDB EE. New contracts have been awarded in two lots for the period 2025-2034: Lot 1 (Infrastructure) to Cognizone and Lot 2 (Application Development) to Liip, Zazuko, and Adnovum with their respective partners. Services remain operational during transition. See LINDASnext for details.

LINDAS Use Cases

LINDAS supports a wide variety of use cases, demonstrating the platform's versatility for different types of data and applications.

1. RDF OLAP Cubes

OLAP (Online Analytical Processing) cubes enable multidimensional analysis of large datasets with "slice and dice" operations.

Applications by Federal Office

Office	Domain	Description	Volume
FOEN	Environment	Air quality, water resources, biodiversity data	Hundreds of millions of triples
SFA	Archives	Historical financial and budgetary data	Complex temporal data
FOE	Energy	Energy consumption, production, efficiency	Performance metrics
ElCom	Electricity	Electricity price analysis and market dynamics	High-frequency temporal data

Concrete Example: strompreis.elcom.admin.ch

• Application: Interactive map of electricity prices in Switzerland
• Data: RDF cubes stored in LINDAS
• Performance: Varnish cache to handle traffic spikes in September
• Queries: Complex SPARQL to generate the map dynamically

2. Taxonomies and Vocabularies

Structuring reference datasets using SKOS schema for hierarchical organization.

Data Types

Type	Examples	Usage
Reference Indices	Municipality index	Referenced by numerous datasets
Classifications	Pollutant lists	Thematic organization
Administrative Hierarchies	Cantons, districts, municipalities	Government structure

3. Transportation Data (SBB)

SBB, under the guidance of the Federal Office of Transport, shares several datasets as open data.

Available Datasets

Dataset	Format	Description	Specifics
DIDOK	RDF + others	Public transport stop points	Geospatial data
NOVA	RDF only	Public transport routes and operators	Tariff zones (Libero, ZVV)
Train Details	Mixed	Train information	Technical data

Query Capabilities

• Maximum distance between stops
• Tariff zone of a station
• Routes by operator
• Specialized spatial indexing

4. Statistical Reference Data (FSO)

Historical Municipality Register (FSO)

The most used reference dataset in Switzerland, with particular characteristics:

Characteristics

Aspect	Description
Widespread Usage	Referenced by many other datasets (Municipality numbers)
Temporal Complexity	Evolution over time requiring chronological modeling
Size	Rich in essential information but moderate volume

Technical Implementation

• Schema: version.link for version management
• Versioned Graph: Changes over time
• Identity Graph: Simplified version for most applications

Other FSO Datasets

• Districts and cantons
• Territorial units
• Statistical classifications

Application Examples

Applications Based on LINDAS

Application	Organization	Description	URL
Termdat	Federal Chancellery	Federal administration terminology database	termdat.bk.admin.ch
Infosm	FOPH	Animal disease reporting information system	infosm.blv.admin.ch
WebGRUD	Agroscope	Agricultural research application	-
Strompreis	ElCom	Electricity price visualization	strompreis.elcom.admin.ch

Linked Geodata

• Linked Data Service: geo.admin.ch/linked-data
• Integration: Semantically linked geospatial data