What is changing?

These changes will occur in the May 2021 and August 2021 product releases. There are no structure changes to the G-NAF dataset, rather, the changes are specific to the composition of data in some product fields. The affected fields are:

• legal_parcel_id (address_detail table)
• locality_pid (locality, address_detail, locality_alias, locality_neighbour, locality_point, street_locality tables)

Why are we making changes?

Geoscape is making changes to its data products aimed at making them easier to use and update. The G-NAF dataset contains data linkages to features in other datasets which will be changed. To maintain explicit connectivity between the different datasets, changes are necessary in G-NAF.

May 2021, Change #1 – Update to the legal_parcel_id composition

The core address_detail table contains a field called legal_parcel_id which includes the details of the land parcel that the address item relates to. The composition of the data in this field will change between the February 2021 and the May 2021 product releases.

The change is being made to support alignment between the national address and the new Geoscape Cadastre product being launched in May 2021. The new legal_parcel_id composition will make it easier to build linkages between addresses and the respective Land Registry datasets as the format will be the same as those in common use in each jurisdiction.  

As a consequence of the legal_parcel_id changing, the date_last_modified field in the address_detail table will also change for every record that is updated. In some jurisdictions (e.g. VIC), we expect this to be every record in the table. This change does not impact the address_detail_pid (sometimes referred to as the gnaf_id).

Examples of how the composition of the data inside the field is changing are available in this table downloadable here.

August 2021, Change #2 – Update to the locality_pid

The locality_pid is referenced in several G-NAF tables including the core address_detail table. The structure of the locality_pid will change between the May 2021 and the August 2021 product releases.

The data type of the locality_pid field will remain as varchar15, however, the composition of the identifier itself will change. The new composition of the locality_pid will consist of a 3-character product identifier (e.g. ‘loc’) plus a 12 character alphanumeric. For example, a new locality_pid from August 2021 will look like ‘loc12dfg01e7z2a’.

A linking lookup table, mapping old to new locality_pids is expected to be produced and released as part of the August 2021 Geoscape Locality dataset publication.

How will this impact other PIDs in G-NAF?

The name of a locality is a mandatory element of every address in G-NAF and so making a change to the locality_pid would normally change all other related address identifiers (such as street_locality_pid and address_detail_pid). Our aim through this transition is to minimise changes to these related PIDs in circumstances where the underlying object is not materially different. This will require some additional management during the August 2021 production cycle and we are committed to minimising disruption to G-NAF users through this change.

More information

We will provide further detail of these changes after the publication of the May 2021 G-NAF release.

Download this document and detailed table of changes here.

Any questions?

At Geoscape, we understand that these changes may represent a significant disruption for some users. If you have any questions about the proposed changes, please contact us at support@geoscape.com.au