We are delighted to announce that we have launched our new Uwazi website! And to demonstrate the many ways in which Uwazi can be used, we have built the new website entirely on Uwazi.
Uwazi means ‘openness’ in Swahili and is HURIDOCS’ flagship tool. It is an open-source web-based database application, designed for human rights defenders to capture and organise various types of information collections such as documents, media and evidence to advocate for positive change in the world.
Back in 2015, at Lake Naivasha in Kenya, we convened with various human rights actors to get a better idea of what their information management needs and challenges are. After two years of listening, ideating, collaborating, problem-solving, coding, and lots of coffee, we launched Uwazi in December 2017.
So far, it has been an incredible journey. Nearly five years later, we stand in awe at what our partners have accomplished while using Uwazi to manage and document their information, cases, complaints, collective memories and human rights violations. We are humbled by the positive response to Uwazi, and honoured to have been selected as a Google AI Impact Challenge grantee (2019), a winner of the CogX Peace and Justice Strong Institutions Award (2021), a finalist in Fast Company’s World-Changing Ideas Awards (2022) and recognised as a Digital Public Good (2022).
We are continuously improving the functionality of Uwazi, making sure that it is stable and reliable. Some of the most recent improvements to the tool include:
- Introduction of satellite views in maps
In addition to street-level map view, users can now switch to see the Satellite view of every map within Uwazi. The satellite imagery function is particularly useful as an additional layer of context to locations identified in the documentation process. - Improvement of synchronisation
We have improved data synchronisation between Uwazi instances which is a process that allows certain pieces of data to be shared between multiple collections. - Integration with the mobile app Tella
Tella makes it easier and safer to document human rights violations and collect data. We have worked with Horizontal so that their mobile app Tella connects to Uwazi, allowing users to send information via the secure app. It also allows users to collect and manage data offline and submit it when there is an internet connection present.
What is Uwazi?
Uwazi is a web-based tool designed for managing your data in one easy-to-search place. This open-source database application allows you to capture, organise and make sense of a set of facts, observations, testimonies, research, documents and more.
The entries in an Uwazi database can be made publicly available, completely private or somewhere in between. Different file types? Don’t worry—Uwazi accepts many formats, including pieces of text, PDFs, word processing documents, photos, images, video and audio.
What can you do with Uwazi?
Uwazi allows you to add and edit information easily, organise information precisely, find information quickly, take information with you, work across multiple languages, visualise information in different ways, collaborate effectively and keep information safe.
Take a look at Uwazi’s main features or view a showcase of some of the human rights databases we have built in collaboration with our partners across the globe. Do you need help with configuring your database, logging an issue or connecting to the Tella app? No problem. Simply head on over to the support page or take a look at some of our recorded videos.
Who uses Uwazi?
At the moment, more than 150 human rights organisations are using Uwazi as a database tool – some for more than one collection. That brings the total to more than 300 public and private Uwazi databases.
Request a free 30-day trial database
To get a feel for Uwazi, launch the demo and tap the sign-in power-off icon in the menu and log in with the following credentials:
- Username: demo
- Password: demo
If you would like to further explore Uwazi, you can request an Uwazi database of your own to test out free for 30 days. Simply fill in this form with your request and a description of what you plan to use Uwazi for.
After 30 days, if you wish to continue to use Uwazi, we offer hosting packages scaled to the data volume used in your collection. Groups who seek to use Uwazi for human rights-related collections enjoy free hosting services up to 100MB. More details are available on request. You can learn about the services that we offer to human rights groups on the HURIDOCS website.
Host your own Uwazi database
Uwazi is open-source software, and the source code is available on Github. It is free for anyone with the sufficient technical capacity to install and use on their own server. If you benefit from a self-hosted database of Uwazi, please consider donating to HURIDOCS to support its continued development and maintenance.
Security Audit
To ensure the safety and security of the data of our partners and users, we requested a security evaluation of Uwazi. The security audit was performed by Recurity Labs, and found that the application has a high-level of security. The assessment, which included manual and automated testing, identified four minor vulnerabilities which have since been addressed and patched.
Do you have a collection of human rights information that needs support? HURIDOCS would love to help. Get in touch!