Connection of new operator with OCPI

Question
1

Hi!
My name is Albert, I’m an Engineering leader in ITcharge.
We, as a company, would very much like to share our data with the open charge map project and will dedicate the next two to how many needed weeks to doing so.

I scrolled some old topics and gathered the https://openchargemap.org/site/about/datasharing link for connecting with you, but some parts are not clear to me.

  1. do you need a token of A or C level as a “Data Feed Credentials”
  2. What are the minimal requirements, OCPI modules-wise, for connecting with you? Credentials and Locations module with CPO role?
  3. We will start with minimal requirements, but maybe there are the preferred ones so that your users can get as much value as they can. Can you list or direct me to them
2

Hi Albert,

I’m not an OCPI expert but regarding credentials in OCPI language we need a CREDENTIALS_TOKEN_C credential that ideally doesn’t expire.

Our system will not be attempting to authenticate via the credentials module, it will just call your locations endpoint and pass the token you have given us as an HTTP header.

In general we assume you are already using OCPI, so we don’t really expect you to be producing OCPI just for us but in the data feeds we currently have they vary between expecting an http header for Authorization : <token value> or apiKey : <token value> but according to the spec at https://github.com/ocpi/ocpi/blob/master/transport_and_format.asciidoc this is actually expected to be Authorization: Token <token value> so I would suggest accepting that format.

Our current basic OCPI import reads using this code: https://github.com/openchargemap/ocm-system/blob/97957ee7975566cb61ebc5cf675e70134e588488/API/OCM.Net/OCM.API.Model/OCPI/OCPIDataAdapter.cs#L44

And we use the following OCPI OpenAPI definition to produce our OCPI client code that parses the OCPI feed: https://github.com/openchargemap/ocm-docs/blob/master/Model/schema/ocpi-2.2-openapi-spec.yaml - this can also be used or adapted to create your own OCPI locations model or client/server. This definition is an adaption that does not strictly follow a particular version of OCPI as we use it to read feeds of varying levels and slightly loose interpretations of the spec.

You can see some of the test data we use: https://github.com/openchargemap/ocm-system/tree/master/Tests/OCM.API.Tests/Assets

To provide a useful feed the location information needs:

  • a code to identify the operator that we will map to our own database of network operators
  • static reference IDs for equipment and locations so we can cross reference updates when repeating the import.
  • As complete as possible approximate address information, and very accurate location information.
  • the lit of EVSE at each location and this must include the id, status, connector type and max_electric_power in watts (not kW, we convert that ourselves) but feel free to supply as much information as possible

The key point with importing data into OCM is that it will then be published as Open Data globally. This is great for promoting your network but it is also irrevocable, you can stop providing data but we can’t unpublish anything once it exists on the internet.

You can message me via this forum if you would like us to try out a feed/export and give you early feedback.

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