Looking for government data in Canada and having trouble finding it?

While Americans have Data.gov and the British have Data.gov.uk, Canadians don’t yet have an official portal offering easy access to data generated by their federal government.

A group of open-data advocates isn’t waiting for Stephen Harper’s Conservative government to jump on the bandwagon.

They’ve created Datadotgc.ca, in hopes of showing the powers that be how it “could and should” be done.

Launched in April by David Eaves and other volunteers, the Web site offers links to and information about hundreds of data packages published on-line by various federal departments and provincial governments.

The site invites the public to add more open data and information to its catalogue.

What qualifies as open data? According to Datadotgc.ca, it’s data that is “freely available to everyone, without restrictions from copyright, patents or other mechanisms of control”.

Eaves, a public-policy consultant who sits on the executive of Vision Vancouver, helped draft the motion that resulted in the City of Vancouver endorsing a year ago the principles of open data, open standards, and open-source software.

In September, Vancouver launched its open-data catalogue, making data about community centres, drinking fountains, and more available on the Web.

You can follow Stephen Hui on Twitter at twitter.com/stephenhui.