In collaboration with Marc Van Coillie, from The European Institute for eLearning, the Rhizome project has developed The application profile of Europass CV based on HR-XML SEP (Staff Exchange Protocol) Candidate specifications and the extensions for Europass/Europortfolio CV application profile.

• The application profile of Europass CV based on HR-XML SEP Candidate specifications describes a XML binding of the Europass CV as defined at the European level. This work can be seen as a proposal for an e-portfolio binding of the Europass CV from CEDEFOP using HR-XML specifications. This application profile would allow creation of Europass CV XML based documents in order to allow import/export of simple XML profile (example: aggregation of CV from personal eportfolios to a HR system).

• The extensions for Europass/Europortfolio CV application profile, as the name indicates, describes several possible extensions for the HR-XML Europortfolio/Europass CV profile in order to better fit with ePortfolio interoperability requirements, such as extension elements for higher education, for language or competency based portfolio, etc.

This application profile allows the development and update of Europass CV, Resumes and ePortfolios web applications using the Europass CV data model and the HR-XML SEP candidate specifications.

The concrete benefits of using this application profile are the following:

• Conformance with both European Europass v2 CV data model and last HR-XML specifications;
• Ease of integration with HR systems while using common open and extensible specifications;
• Use of external references and attachments for annexes to complete the CV structure;
• Integration with other Europass and European initiatives, like the Europass Diploma and the Certificate supplement, the European Qualification Framework;
• Enable the capability to use external competency frameworks;
• Addition of extra elements to extend CV semantics in an ePortfolio approach (i.e. additional elements such as publications, speaking event history, referees, affiliations, experiences, etc.);
• Addition of a relationship layer to increase semantic dialogue between parts of CV/ePortfolio (i.e. experiences with competency, education background and Europass Diploma Supplement);
• Ability to test conformance while using a common interoperability framework;
• Cross interoperability between Europass CV and HR-XML schemas with the related transformation stylesheets;
• Interoperability with other CV/ePortfolio standards (IMS ePortfolio, Leap2a, LinkedIn hResume) and production of Europass CV documents (PDF, ODT, MS Office Doc) while supporting an online transformation web service.

The documents are downloadable here and also from the EifEL website. They are available under Creative Commons BY-NC-SA.

• Europass CV – HR XML Application Profile
• Extensions for the Europass CV – HR-XML Application Profile

1. User-centric. The CV builder employs a user-centric approach to personal data management by allowing individuals to control their personal information and digital self-representation. Individuals can decide where to store their data and have administrator rights to manage it. In this way data is not held with third-party web CV repositories or Job Board administered applications. The Europass CV Builder is fully integrated with WordPress, as a plugin application.
2. Interoperable. CVs are compliant with the latest HR-XML Staffing Exchange Protocol specification. By using a standards compliant CV format, individuals are able to establish a fluid exchange of personal information with eRecruitment, eLearning and Human Resources bodies.
3. Recognised. The builder produces CVs that comply with the widest European and internationally recognised standards for representation of personal data, qualifications and competencies. This allows the edition of a complete CV following the official Europass template and latest Europass XML specifications, recognised by audiences not limited by sector or geography.
4. Flexible. The CV Builder can produce flexible and fully modifiable views of CV content. Individuals can customise their CVs and target them according to their personal or professional needs and goals. To create a targeted CV, the user selects relevant content from the Master CV (the vault for personal information) and creates a View. This can be built using out-of the box templates or by creating new templates that can be customised with the addition of extra sections and fields as required. These fields may be outside of the Europass template but present in the HR-XML specification and therefore HR-XML compatibility is maintained. Allowing user-created fields will break standards compliance but this option is being considered to enhance customisability.
5. Multi-lingual. The entire interface is multilingual and content can be filled in by the user in any of the official languages of the European Union.
6. Multimedia. Text fields within the CV can be linked to any media (pictures, certificate, video or audio record); these can be added as evidence of performance alongside the tagging and aggregation of content from distributed locations. Support for WordPress ‘short codes’ allows content integration within blog posts and pages, adding ePortfolio-like capabilities.
7. Portable. Individual CVs are accessible via Internet and can be packaged, exported and moved from physical locations e.g. hosting services compliant with HR-XML specifications.  Users can also select the publishing format of their choice for each targeted CV or View, including: XHTML and HTML (integrated in blog pages), PDF, ODT, HR-XML feed and Europass XML feed.
8. Accessible. CVs are ergonomic, usable and any user, through compliance with accessibility standards such as WAI, can readily access content.
9. Secure. Stored personal data and CVs are secured for personal access via the WordPress authentication protocol. Individuals can set access permissions and the builder is granular enough such that portions personal data can be cordoned off. Publishing rights are available to allow both public versions of a CV for open consultation via the Internet and protected CVs held in a secure location. Each export of a targeted CV or View can be protected by an access code defined by the user.
10. Open. The CV is open and not related to any proprietary technology. Its online forms are built using XForms.