Planning for a University of Guelph Institutional
Repository:
DSpace Implementation
Helen Salmon &Ron MacKinnon
Presentation to Information Services CommitteeMay 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UG
Agenda Institutional Repository Introduction to DSpace Easy to add/find content in DSpace Building Online Communities Q&A
ISC: May 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UG
Institutional Repository… what is it? An initiative sponsored and supported by the
research library community: An institutional repository (IR) is a digital
collection of a university’s intellectual output. Institutional repositories centralize, preserve, and make accessible the knowledge generated by academic institutions. IRs also form part of a larger global system of repositories, which are indexed in a standardized way, and searchable using one interface, providing the foundation for a new model of scholarly publishing.
Canadian Association of Research Libraries
ISC: May 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UG
Institutional Repository An ecology Institution-based Scholarly & Teaching material in
digital formats Institutional memory and stewardship Cumulative and perpetual Open source and interoperable
ISC: May 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UG
Synergy of sharing and making visible the intellectual effort of an institution
Potentially new publishing models
Provides faculty & University with long-term storage of research data, publications, teaching and learning repositories
… and More…
ISC: May 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UGInstitutional Repository
Philosophy Lots of digital material is already lost Most digital material is at risk Better to have it, do bit preservation
than to lose it completely Need to capture as much information as
possible to support functional preservation
Cost/benefit tradeoffs
ISC: May 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UGDigital Preservation
Communities Departments, Labs, Research Centers, Programs,
Schools, etc. Localized policy decisions
Who can contribute, access material Submission workflow
Submitters, approvers, reviewers, editors Collections definition, management
Communities supply metadata & discipline expertise Library supplies knowledge management expertise,
guidance on Intellectual Property, metadata schema CCS supplies campus network and mass storage
backup, support for some delivery applications (e-learning, portal, video streaming)
ISC: May 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UG
Possible Institutional Repository Content
Articles Preprints, e-
prints Technical Reports Working Papers Conference Papers E-theses Audio/Video
Datasets Statistical,
geospatial Images
Visual, scientific Teaching material
Lecture notes, visualizations, simulations
Digitized library collections
ISC: May 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UG
Why Libraries?
Expertise Large-scale collection management
Assessment/collection policies preservation
Metadata Solid business practices
Commitment Long time frames Fits with Libraries’ mission and historical
role in society and within universities ISC: May 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UG
Why the U of Guelph Library? Support from Hewlett-Packard Research intensivity at U of Guelph Role of Strategic Plan of the
University and the Library in emphasizing the use of technology to support learning and research
Community demand It’s the “right time”
Digital Stewardship @ UG
ISC: May 5, 2004
What is DSpace? A specialized type of digital asset
management or content management system: it manages and distributes digital items, made up of digital files (or “bitstreams”) and allows for the creation, indexing, and searching of associated metadata to locate and retrieve the items.
@ UG
ISC: May 5, 2004
DSpace: Infrastructure:
Open source software developed by MIT & H-P: it’s free!
Potential “LARGE” storage requirements Java application, Unix environment Built on top of open-source tools, such as:
the Apache Web server Tomcat Servlet engine postgreSQL relational database system.
@ UG
ISC: May 5, 2004
DSpace: Open access philosophy
Inter operable with other software for specific applications (e.g. journal mgmt software, image database mgmt software)
Uses persistent identifiers, bitstream preservation
@ UG
ISC: May 5, 2004
DSpace: Captures
Digital research material in any formats Directly from creators (faculty, libraries, others) Large-scale, stable, managed long-term storage
Describes Descriptive, technical, rights metadata Persistent identifiers
Distributes Via WWW, with necessary access control
Preserves Bitstream guaranteed
@ UG
ISC: May 5, 2004
Who’s Working with DSpace? MIT (developed with HP) Cambridge University Columbia University Cornell University University of Toronto University of British Columbia Université de Laval University of Washington… and many other universities
@ UG
ISC: May 5, 2004
Easy to Use Easy to add content
Easy to browse and search content
Permanent identifier for your content
@ UG
ISC: May 5, 2004
Guelph pilot projects
Pathology image collection (learning objects repository)
Critical Studies in Improvisation (ejournal)
Other UG published scholarly reports, journals, books, etc.
Digitized unique Library resources: photographs, audio recordings, manuscripts, diaries, etc.
ISC: May 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UG
Principles Open access, community-built rather than
centrally controlled Facilitates communities rather than
controls information Complements existing scholarly publishing
models, doesn’t replace Requires serious sustainable institutional
commitment because it will create expectations, dependencies
ISC: May 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UG
Issues: IR infrastructure planning and
implementation: IT hardware, software, system Human expertise: technical (sys admin);
service coordination & management Development / Governance Marketing
ISC: May 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UG
Issues: Choosing metadata (keywords,
descriptions) that facilitates search and retrieval but isn’t overly labour-intensive
Choosing metadata appropriate to the community
Updating community’s content with new research or learning objects
ISC: May 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UG
For more information…Go to:www.DSpace.org (MIT)www.carl-abrc.ca/frames_index.htm
(CARL) FAQs articles on DSpace case studies, business plans policies and standards for scholarly
communication, digital preservation … ISC: May 5, 2004
Digital Stewardship @ UG