Notification platform developed by GDS goes to public beta for Whitehall with plans to go to local government by end of year
GOV.UK Notify, the Government’s platform for providing notification messages to the public, has been taken to a public beta phase for central government bodies following nine months private beta.
The Government Digital Service (GDS), which developed the service as part of its Government as a Platform programme, has said in announcing the move that the private beta involved sending 3.5 million messages within 32 live services.
“From watching how people and teams are using Notify, we’re confident now is the right time to make it available to the rest of central government,” it says a blogpost.
It has provided libraries for six of the most commonly used programming languages in government, which it says makes it as simple as possible to integrate the platform with web services and back office systems.
It also claimed there have been a lot of requests from local government to use Notify, and expects to start offering it to the sector by late 2017 when it is has developed a pricing model.
The development of the new platform has been subject to changes along the way. Initially GDS began to work on a status tracking platform, but this was dropped after discovery work led to a decision that notifications would meet most public needs.
The launch follows that of the GOV.UK Verify platform for online identity assurance in May of last year.
This article was amended on 2 March, based on additional information, to clarify the project is now in public beta.
Image from Cabinet Office
