Event Record Exporter

Event Record Exporter

Dataset: Event Data

Description: Aimed at advanced users - searches all quarter-billion event records using Google Big Query and returns matching records, allowing rapid compilation of subsets of the full event dataset for analysis and visualization.

Components: PERL, Google Big Query

More Information: Expediting Extraction and Exporting

The EVENT Record Exporter allows you to rapidly export small subsets of data from the GDELT Event Database that match your search criteria. You simply specify a set of criteria for the event type and actors involved, along with an optional date range, and the system will automatically search the entire GDELT Event Database for all matching entries and export matching records as a CSV file. While you will still need programming experience to be able to use these exported results further, this tool allows you to rapidly export small subsets of data from the complete quarter-billion-record database. Currently searches will only return the first 20,000 matching results to conserve server resources - use the date range search boxes to break your query down into smaller periods of time if you exceed this limit. Your results will be emailed to you when complete, usually within 10 minutes, depending on server load. Selecting "Nigeria" as the "Event Location", "Material Conflict" as the "Event Quad Class", and "Civilian" as the "Recipient/Victim (Actor2) Type" will generate a timeline of attacks and other conflict against civilians in Nigeria.

Note that this tool is designed ONLY for advanced users who need to export a small subset of records for further processing and analysis. Between 57 and 58 fields are output for each record (see the GDELT Event Database file format) and require extensive cross-referencing against the GDELT codebooks to understand the various numeric values of each field, so this tool is most likely of greatest interest to advanced users that need to rapidly subset a small number of records from the complete event database.

IMPORTANT NOTICE

This service has been generating extreme interest, exceeding hundreds of terabytes per day (in some cases exceeding 50 terabytes in the first few hours of each day) and may automatically shut down during periods of peak load until we release a new version of the service later this summer. For very large queries for academic research, please contact us.

Your Email Address

Creating these results can take several minutes depending on server demand - please provide the email address that the results should be sent to.

Email Address

Date Range

Limit the time period of analysis. The earliest allowable date for event data is currently January 1, 1979 and the latest date allowed is the current day.

Start Date
 End Date
  

Search Criteria - Actors

Select the specific actors involved in the event. The CAMEO taxonomy used by GDELT codifies an "event" as an action performed by one entity (Actor1) onto another (Actor2). GDELT codifies an array of 58 fields of information about each event. Using the form below you can restrict your search to just those events initiated by a specific country and/or type against another country and/or type. For example, to select all attacks on civilians in Nigeria, you would specify "Civilians" using the "Actor2 Type" dropdown below, "Nigeria" using the "Event Location" dropdown below, and then violence-related event types using the next section. To select all protests in Nigeria, you would leave the Actor section below blank, and select protest-related event types from the following section and "Nigeria" as the "Event Location."

Initiator (Actor1) Country:

Initiator (Actor1) Type:

Recipient/Victim (Actor2) Country:

Recipient/Victim (Actor2) Type:

Search Criteria - Event

Select the specific type and/or location of events you are interested in. The full CAMEO taxonomy defines over 300 specific categories of events, but to simplify things, the search interface below lets you search only for the 20 root categories under which those other event types fall, or you can select by "Quad Class", which groups the 20 root categories into 4 "super categories".

Event Code:
     OR     
Event Quad Class:

Event Location:

Outputs

The following output files will be generated:

  • Matching Event Records Returns the raw CSV Event records that matched your search criteria - it can generate extremely large files, but is useful to filter down the entire quarter-billion event dataset to just the records matching your needs.
    NOTE: To conserve server resources, only the first 20,000 records will be returned.