Resources



IBM® Bluemix™ is the IBM open cloud platform that provides mobile and web developers access to IBM software for integration, security, transaction, and other key functions, as well as software from business partners.

 read more

Open Data


What is Open Data?

The Government of Canada creates massive amounts of data to support services such as health, environment, agriculture and natural resources. Open Data is the practice of making machine-readable data freely available to anyone to develop all kinds of new and useful products and applications that surpass the initial value of the original data. Utilizing Open Data offers opportunities to spur innovation, fuel growth, and improve the lives of Canadians.

Data Sets


Government of Canada

Search Open Data that is relevant to Canadians, learn how to work with datasets and see what people have done with Open Data across the country.

IN ORDER FOR YOUR SUBMISSION TO BE ELIGIBLE, YOU MUST AT LEAST USE ONE OF THE DATASETS AVAILABLE VIA THE SEARCH FUNCTION ON CANADA’S OPEN GOVERNMENT PORTAL.

In addition to federal datasets you are encouraged to use others such as the following to add depth to your application and to make your application more useful than simply displaying a single dataset.

Provincial

From coast to coast to coast Canadian jurisdictions are joining the conversation on open government. Here you will find information and tools to about open government activities across the country, and to help get your jurisdiction engaged in open government.

World Bank Open Data

The World Bank collects and processes large amounts of data and generates them on the basis of economic models. They provide free and open access to data about development in countries around the globe.

Global Open Data Index

The Global Open Data Index measures and benchmarks the openness of data around the world, and then presents this information in a way that is easy to understand and use. This increases its usefulness as an advocacy tool and broadens its impact.

UN Data

The United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) launched a new internet based data service for the global user community. It brings UN statistical databases within easy reach of users through a single entry point (http://data.un.org/). Users can now search and download a variety of statistical resources of the UN system.

Data.gov

The home of the U.S. Government’s open data. Here you will find data, tools, and resources to conduct research, develop web and mobile applications, design data visualizations, and more.

Work with Data Sets


Working with Data Sets and APIs?

This site covers:

  • Structured Data - CSV, JSON, XML
  • Geo formats - GeoTIFF, Shapefile
  • Application programming interfaces
  • What is an API?
  • Open Government APIs
  • Connecting to an API - using CURL, using browser plugins, using programming languages
  • Best practices - caching data, error handling

Metadata Element Set

The Open Data Metadata Element Set was developed to support the Government of Canada’s Open Government Portal.

The metadata element set was based on the Dublin Core metadata properties as recommended by the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI) Usage Board. It also incorporates metadata elements selected from the North American Profile of ISO: 19115 2003 in order to align with the Mapping Information Branch subset of the North American Profile of ISO:19115 2003-Geographic Information-Metadata for the Earth Science Sector Geospatial Platform. International alignment is also achieved through a common core that matches the United States Government’s Common Core Metadata Schema for data.gov.

Mobile


Mobile application software developers have to consider a lengthy array of screen sizes, hardware specifications and configurations because of intense competition in mobile software and changes within each of the platforms. Here are some platform specific resources to help you out.

iOS


Apple is a leader in the mobile industry and has recently taken steps to encourage more developers to return to developing native iOS apps. Apple has released Xcode 6 and iOS 8 along with their new programming language Swift. If you are unfamiliar with developing apps for iOS, below are some links to help you get started.

Natasha the Robot

This site offers a comprehensive list of tutorials designed for you to get the most out iOS 8’s new features. Including using Playground (Xcode’s new interactive work area), HealthKit, iOS 8 navigation, and much more.

Designmodo

This site offers Swift tutorials for beginners. This will take you through the basics of building an app from scratch. Later tutorials include good architecture practices to make the most of your apps.

Lynda.com (Paid)

Lynda.com offers a wide variety of tutorials. To access all these tutorials you will have to become a member and pay a monthly subscription of $25.

Udemy (Paid)

Udemy has an extensive library of iOS courses. This site is pay per course, and you have access to a community of fellow developers.

Tutsplus (Paid)

Join over 5 million people using Tuts+ each month to learn new skills. Starting at $15/month.

Android


Android has emerged as a dominant force in the mobile industry. Developers love the freedom and quick to market approach that only Android offers. If you are unfamiliar with developing apps for Android, here are some links to help you get started.

Android Developers Training

This is the ultimate guide to Android development straight from the source. Whether you’re building your first app or looking for best practices you’ll find it here.

Vogella

This site offers a comprehensive list of tutorials. It starts with the most basic questions such as “What is Android?” and will take you all the way through to the submission process.

Lynda.com (Paid)

Lynda.com offers a wide variety of tutorials. To access all these tutorials you will have to become a member and pay a monthly subscription of $25.

Udemy (Paid)

Udemy has an extensive library of Android courses. This site is pay per course, and you have access to a community of fellow developers.

Tutsplus (Paid)

Join over 5 million people using Tuts+ each month to learn new skills. Starting at $15/month.

Web Apps / Websites


Web applications and websites are popular due to the ubiquity of web browsers. It has become the easiest way to reach a mass audience. Here are some links to help you get started.

Frameworks

HotScripts
http://www.hotscripts.com/blog/top-10-frontend-development-frameworks/

Choosing the right framework for your website can save you a lot of time and effort. This site offers a breakdown of recommended frameworks that can help you accomplish your goals.

Here are some frameworks that we recommend:
Web Experience Toolkit (WET)
Foundation
Bootstrap
Ember.js
AngularJS

Markup Validator Service

This validator checks the markup validity of web documents in HTML, XHTML, SMIL, MathML and other modern standard based formats.

Firebug

Firebug integrates with Firefox to put a wealth of web development tools at your fingertips while you browse. You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page.

CSS Portal

This validator checks the markup validity of CSS.

jQuery

jQuery is a fast, small, and feature-rich JavaScript library. It makes things like HTML document traversal and manipulation, event handling, animation, and Ajax much simpler with an easy-to-use API that works across a multitude of browsers.

Modernizr

Modernizr is a JavaScript library that detects HTML5 and CSS3 features in the user’s browser.

Design Assets for Web Developers

Check out the links below for lists of fonts, icons, patterns and more.
Font Awesome (Icons)
Subtle Patterns
The Noun Project (Icons)
Google Fonts
Font Squirrel

Lynda.com (Paid)

Lynda.com offers a wide variety of tutorials. To access all these tutorials you will have to become a member and pay a monthly subscription of $25.

Udemy (Paid)

Udemy has an extensive library of Android courses. This site is pay per course, and you have access to a community of fellow developers.

Tutsplus (Paid)

Join over 5 million people using Tuts+ each month to learn new skills. Starting at $15/month.

Repositories


Repositories allow you to review changes, comment on lines of code, report issues, and plan the future of your project with discussion tools. This is a great tool for multiple person teams. CODE will require access to your repository to verify your application’s eligibility.

GitHub

Sign up for a free github account here. They also have a suite of tutorials to help you with set-up and advanced features.

GUI Clients for Git

This is a list of platform specific Git Clients that you can use.

Bitbucket

Sign up for a free bitbukcet account here. They also have a suite of tutorials to help you with set-up and advanced features.

UI/UX and Art


Enhance user satisfaction by improving the usability, ease of use, and pleasure provided in the interaction between the user and the product. Here is an array of resources to help make your application visually pleasing and easy to use.

Typography


Typography is the art and technique of arranging type to make written language most appealing to learning and recognition. In today's digital world this is an essential part of getting your users to absorb your message. Here are some great resources to help you with the typography of your application.

A Guide To Web Typography

This overview of typography explains all of the basic concepts and is a great starting point for anyone who has limited experience in this area.

On Choosing Type

This site will give you a few basic guidelines you should follow and explains when and why you should follow them.

Dafont

Here you can download a wide variety of fonts.

Grid


The grid serves as an armature on which a designer can organize graphic elements (images, glyphs, paragraphs) in a rational, easy to absorb manner. Here are some great resources to help you apply a grid system to your design.

Five simple steps to designing grid systems

This is an easy to follow guide on how to use grid systems while designing for UX.

Grid-Based Design 101

This is a great starting point for everything you wanted to know about grid-based design.

Color Theory


In the visual arts, color theory is a body of practical guidance to color mixing and the visual effects of a specific color combination. Here are some great resources to help you make the most of your application.

Introduction to Color Theory

Color can be your most powerful design element if you learn to use it effectively. This site will give you everything you need to get started.

Color Psychology

Want to understand why you respond the way you do to certain colors? This site gives an overview of color psychology.

Graphic Design


Graphic design is the methodology of visual communication, and problem-solving through the use of type, space and image. Below are some resources for you to get started.

Want to know how to design?

This website has an overview of basic design concepts. It also has several links to more resources, for anyone who wants to go a little more in depth.

Graphic Fundamentals

This site is a simple overview of design, focusing on graphic fundamentals.

UX & Usability


Usability is the ease of use and learnability of anything we interact with. UI plays a critical role in usability in the digital landscape. Here are some resources to ensure your application is user friendly.

10 Useful Techniques To Improve Your User Interface Designs

This site offers simple ideas that you can easily implement into your design.

35 Awesome User Interface Design

A comprehensive list of tutorials for all you UI design needs.

Art


Art can enhance your application and catch everyone’s attention. Be sure to checkout these resources.

Adobe Photoshop Tutorials Best Of

A list of tutorials that will help you get the exact style you are looking for.

40 Quality Photoshop UI Design Tutorials

This is a list of tutorials focusing on implementing Photoshop techniques to help your design.

Audio


Audio can be instrumental in enhancing your apps’ user experience. Here are some resources to help get you started.

Audacity

Audacity is a free, open source, cross-platform software for recording and editing sounds.

Audacity Tutorials

This page is a collection of tutorials giving step-by-step guidance on performing various tasks using Audacity.

Free Sound

Free sounds are available on this site.

Free Audio Editor

This is a free, windows-only audio editor.

Best Free Audio Editors

Here’s a list of the best free audio editors.

Data Science + Data Visualization


R Studio

RStudio IDE is a powerful and productive user interface for R. It’s free and open source, and works great on Windows, Mac, and Linux.

R Studio: Resources

RStudio's website provides a number of resources for getting started with R Programming.

Try R

Try R is a free R Programming tutorial created by CodeSchool.

DataCamp

DataCamp offers a number of free and paid courses for learning data analytics, including a free Introduction to R course.

Getting Started With Python For Data Science

Python is becoming more and more popular within the Data Science community. Kaggle provides a nice tutorial on getting Python setup for data analytics.

Highcharts

Highcharts is a charting library written in pure JavaScript, offering an easy way of adding interactive charts to your website or web application.

Google Charts

Google Charts provides a perfect way to visualize data on your website. From simple line charts to complex hierarchical tree maps, the chart gallery provides a large number of ready-to-use chart types.





Open Data (fr)


What is Open Data?

The Government of Canada creates massive amounts of data to support services such as health, environment, agriculture and natural resources. Open Data is the practice of making machine-readable data freely available to anyone to develop all kinds of new and useful products and applications that surpass the initial value of the original data. Utilizing Open Data offers opportunities to spur innovation, fuel growth, and improve the lives of Canadians.

Data Sets


Government of Canada

Search Open Data that is relevant to Canadians, learn how to work with datasets and see what people have done with Open Data across the country.

IN ORDER FOR YOUR SUBMISSION TO BE ELIGIBLE, YOU MUST AT LEAST USE ONE OF THE DATASETS AVAILABLE VIA THE SEARCH FUNCTION ON CANADA’S OPEN GOVERNMENT PORTAL.

In addition to federal datasets you are encouraged to use others such as the following to add depth to your application and to make your application more useful than simply displaying a single dataset.

Provincial

From coast to coast to coast Canadian jurisdictions are joining the conversation on open government. Here you will find information and tools to about open government activities across the country, and to help get your jurisdiction engaged in open government.

Work with Data Sets


Working with Data Sets and API’s?

This site covers:

  • Structured Data - CSV, JSON, XML
  • Geo formats - GeoTIFF, Shapefile
  • Application programming interfaces
  • What is an API?
  • Open Government APIs
  • Connecting to an API - using CURL, using browser plugins, using programming languages
  • Best practices - caching data, error handling

Metadata Element Set

The Open Data Metadata Element Set was developed to support the Government of Canada’s Open Government Portal.

The metadata element set was based on the Dublin Core metadata properties as recommended by the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI) Usage Board. It also incorporates metadata elements selected from the North American Profile of ISO: 19115 2003 in order to align with the Mapping Information Branch subset of the North American Profile of ISO:19115 2003-Geographic Information-Metadata for the Earth Science Sector Geospatial Platform. International alignment is also achieved through a common core that matches the United States Government’s Common Core Metadata Schema for data.gov.

Mobile (fr)


Mobile application software developers have to consider a lengthy array of screen sizes, hardware specifications and configurations because of intense competition in mobile software and changes within each of the platforms. Here are some platform specific resources to help you out.

iOS


Apple is a leader in the mobile industry and has recently taken steps to encourage more developers to return to developing native iOS apps. Apple has released Xcode 6 and iOS 8 along with their new programming language Swift. If you are unfamiliar with developing apps for iOS, below are some links to help you get started.

How to create a developer account with Apple

This is a step-by-step guide on how to become an Apple Developer.

Developpez.com

This site offers basic tutorials for Swift and on developing iOS 8 apps.

Android


Android has emerged as a dominant force in the mobile industry. Developers love the freedom and quick to market approach that only Android offers. If you are unfamiliar with developing apps for Android, here are some links to help you get started.

Open Classrooms

This is a tutorial for creating applications for Android.

Make me Droid

Includes tutorials, demonstrations, and resources on the design and generation of the application.

Web Apps / Websites (fr)


Web applications and websites are popular due to the ubiquity of web browsers. It has become the easiest way to reach a mass audience. Here are some links to help you get started.

Open Classrooms

This site has a list of resources for multiple web languages.

Markup Validator Service

This validator checks the markup validity of web documents in HTML, XHTML, SMIL, MathML, etc.

Firebug

Firebug integrates with Firefox to put a wealth of web development tools at your fingertips while you browse. You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page.

CSS Portal

This validator checks the markup validity of CSS.

jQuery

jQuery is a fast, small, and feature-rich JavaScript library. It makes things like HTML document traversal and manipulation, event handling, animation, and Ajax much simpler with an easy-to-use API that works across a multitude of browsers.

Design Assets for Web Developers

Check out the links below for lists of fonts, icons, patterns and more.
Font Awesome (Icons)
Subtle Patterns
The Noun Project (Icons)
Google Fonts
Font Squirrel

Repositories (fr)


Repositories allow you to review changes, comment on lines of code, report issues, and plan the future of your project with discussion tools. This is a great tool for multiple person teams. CODE will require access to your repository to verify your application’s eligibility.

GitHub

Sign up for a free GitHub account here. They also have a suite of tutorials to help you with set-up and advanced features.

Pro Git

This is a digital version of the Pro Git book.

UI/UX and Art (fr)


Enhance user satisfaction by improving the usability, ease of use, and pleasure provided in the interaction between the user and the product. Here is an array of resources to help make your application visually pleasing and easy to use.

Typography


Typography is the art and technique of arranging type to make written language most appealing to learning and recognition. In today's digital world this is an essential part of getting your users to absorb your message. Here are some great resources to help you with the typography of your application.

Typographie & Civilisation

This site is dedicated to the history of writing, printing and typography.

BlogDu Webdesign

This article offers a list of resources for anyone looking to delve deeper into typography.

Dafont

Here you can download a wide variety of fonts.

Grid


The grid serves as an armature on which a designer can organize graphic elements (images, glyphs, paragraphs) in a rational, easy to absorb manner. Here are some great resources to help you apply a grid system to your design.

Collectiv

This is a great starting point to learn about grid-based design.

Color Theory


In the visual arts, color theory is a body of practical guidance to color mixing and the visual effects of a specific color combination. Here are some great resources to help you make the most of your application.

Profil-Couleur

This site will give you an overview of color theory. It also has great links if you’d like to learn even more.

Color Theory

This video gives an overview on color theory.

Para

This site offers a practical guide to color theory.

Graphic Design


Graphic design is the methodology of visual communication, and problem-solving through the use of type, space and image. Below are some resources for you to get started.

Renders-Graphiques.fr

This is a forum where you can find discussions on the best tutorials. It also allows you to engage in a community of like-minded individuals.

Theorie Design Graphique

This site discusses a variety of topics that encompasses graphic design including typography, history, image analysis, rhetoric of the image, technique, and more.

UX & Usability


Usability is the ease of use and learnability of anything we interact with. UI plays a critical role in usability in the digital landscape. Here are some resources to ensure your application is user friendly.

UX Design

This site offers an overview of UX design and is great for beginners.

The 10 Commandments of UX

This site gives you UX/UI guidelines to help make sure your application is a success.

UX-FR

This article addresses the question “What is user experience?”.

Art


Art can enhance your application and catch everyone’s attention. Be sure to checkout these resources.

Blog Du Webdesign

This site offers 30 free tutorials to discover and master Photoshop.

Tuto

This site offers over 350 Photoshop tutorials. You can search by Photoshop versions or categories to find just what you need.

Audio (fr)


Audio can be instrumental in enhancing your apps’ user experience. Here are some resources to help get you started.

Audacity

Audacity is a free, open source, cross-platform software for recording and editing sounds.

Soundbank

More than 20,000 sound effects, sounds, music, free loops, and recorded, sorted, optimized for professional quality.

Sound Fishing

Sound effects and music illustration downloads.

Mailing List

Sign up to be notified for all our announcements and updates.

Please enter a valid email.

Success! Thanks for signing up. Check your inbox for a confirmation email.