Technical problems, errors and troubleshooting 🆘

Metabolism of Cities Data Hub
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There is no central place where we can report technical issues that we are facing with sites and in some cases it doesn't make sense to create a separate task for it, so I figured to create this forum topic.
@Paul, since you are momentarily the main person addressing those issues, it would of course be great to know if you are ok with this "solution" or have a different system in mind?


Sure that sounds good to me! At some point we may want to use the task system and have people report bugs there. But let's try this to get started as it's easier to report here for people.


Ok, nice, thanks.

Let me start right away ;) There are two issues that I noticed today:

  1. For the stock data viz, the viz wheel is turning forever, e.g. https://data.metabolismofcities.org/library/33090/ - perhaps has to do with the bug that had been created for the flow visualisations as well?
  2. It seems the global analysis hub is down. See at this link https://data.metabolismofcities.org/hub/analysis/ it is just forever uploading the MoC page. The single analysis page of a city works however.

Thanks Carolin. The two issues were solved:

  1. This one was due to a lacking unit in the dataset. I've now made it so that even if units are lacking, the charts will open, but ideally we'll go through these datasets in the long term and add the right units.
  2. Seems like there was a new option added there for CityLoops, which caused this bug on the general data site. Sorted out now.

Thanks Paul.

  1. Oh, ok. At the moment, can people still upload datasets even if there is no unit column?
  2. Could be that it had to do with the "indicators" option that was added/activated. Thanks for sorting it out.

  1. No I think not but these were old datasets.
  2. Yes indeed.

Ok, thanks.


Hi Paul! It's nice there is one central place for any technical problems on the forum. I wanted to ask about the Brussels master map. For some reason it doesn't load or show anything. I was wondering if you knew why?


Oops I forgot to add the link to the master map https://data.metabolismofcities.org/dashboards/brussels/maps/overview/


Ahh I see --- was it working before? I think the boundaries need to be set here:
https://data.metabolismofcities.org/dashboards/brussels/hub/processing/boundaries/

Please try that and let me know if that doesn't solve it.


Thanks Paul, it was added now and it works!


👍 👍


Aris got to it before me haha thanks so much Paul it works!!


Hey Paul, I have a small thing that bugs me and I'm not sure if I'm doing something wrong.

So, when you're checking the network activity and are focusing on one row you can click on the user (column 1), on the dataset they did something on (column 2) or the action/details (column 3). The thing is that when I click on the dataset of column 2 it redirects me to the Library and not the Data Hub (eg. here, and when I click on a processed dataset when the detail says "Process Dataset" (column 3) it sends me to some place of the community hub of the Data Hub (eg. here.

But in both these cases I can't go to the dataset itself. To do so, I need to manually go to the dashboard of that city?

Is this how it was meant to be? Would it be preferable that it links to the dataset?


Hey Aris, the whole network activity thing was set up more as a quick and dirty internal tool to keep an eye on things. There was never a grand plan around how it should work and what it should do. I think it can be improved in a number of ways. If you like to see this done, I recommend you create a task and link it to the priority project (makes sense to sort this out as people start to use it more and more). I will then put it higher on my radar!


Ok thanks Paul, well noted!


Hey Paul, there is Lead missing from the EMP list (it should be EMP2.2.3). Could you let me know how I should add it?


Also in the same vein, could we change Heavy metals from EMP 2.3 to EMP 2.4 (and change Products mainly from metals to 2.3)so that we remain aligned with the MF categorisation? If I understand well Heavy metals were added by us?


Ok and lastly (sorry sorry for the spam) we don't have some of the following (Natural gas we have it as EMP 4.2.8).

MF.4.2.1 Crude oil, condensate and natural gas liquids (NGL)
MF.4.2.2 Natural gas
MF.4.2.3 Fuels bunkered (Imports: by resident units abroad; Exports: by nonresident units domestically)
MF.4.2.3.1 Fuel for land transport
MF.4.2.3.2 Fuel for water transport
MF.4.2.3.3 Fuel for air transport

And some other inconsistencies in our case Other products is EMP 6.9 and in the EW-MFA it is MF5

MF6 is Waste for final treatment and disposal and what we have EMP7.5

And then MF7 (which is the DPO is a bit scattered in different places). Should we have the same classification and then add our own after that so we don't mess up the consistency? Do you want me to write this up somehow?


Hi Aris,
Lead is already there no at EMP2.3.4 ?
Please note that the EMP list addresses some underlying problems with the MFA list, which is that it confuses materials and processes. Fuel = fuel, independently from how it is used. In our db, we have another place to store how things are used (by recording the process), so we do not store process information in our materials catalog. This is an intentional design choice, not a mistake. There might however be some numbering that is not consistent internally in the catalog, or missing elements, which I would be happy to fix.
There has been a back and forth between me and Rupert about this in a Google Doc on stafdb, maybe see if you can find it.
My general attitude is:
- If materials are missing let's add them
- We need to be very cautious about changing numbers as there is a ripple effect
- We need to evaluate our catalog at some point and restructure if need be, but that should be done as a comprehensive action and not ad-hoc
- The mixing of products/materials with processes/use types is a serious shortcoming in the MFA catalog and I would not want to replicate that in our main catalog.
- We could still add the MFA catalog verbatim if we really want, as a separate catalog, and if people want to use that and really want to steer away from ours, then they can use it.


Hey Paul,

Ah yes, thanks I just saw Lead, I was not looking there sorry (but it also did not appear when looking through the search bar somehow).
I do agree with you that MF is not very detailed and therefore sometimes not very helpful (especially for cities !!! but perhaps a little be less true for countries).
My thinking aligns with yours except from one point (and I can easily change my mind). I think that as our EMP catalogue stems from the MF catalogue, we should stick as much as possible to it (whenever it makes sense) and add on top (a bit like what we have for EMP8). This means in the case of Lead to keep the MF nomenclature and then for the rest of Heavy metals add subsequent numbers that do not exist in the EMP.

I'm saying this because there is a small issue as to how to link data from countries and cities if there are two different nomenclatures used (this will be especially true when we will try to downscale). Also more practically, when uploading MF data at country level should I therefore use an MF verbatim catalog or ours (the EMP)? Or only use ours and whenever there is no link not upload the data?

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