Metadata For The Terrified

I think I could probably be a case study in a book called Metadata For The Terrified. Or Metadata For Dummies.
Over the last week or two I’ve been coming to terms with how the DSpace metadata works and relates to the input submissions form – the metadata is pretty good, I like how DSpace lets you add fields using a web form, but the submissions page is pretty dismal, IMHO. Using an idea from Mahendra in UKOLN, I’ve written out a spreadsheet listing which fields are needed for which item and come to the resounding conclusion that we need to customise the submission form to deposit by item type. A big ask, apparently, although some good examples out there, such as Hasselt University, who presented on submission based on document type at the DSpace User Group meeting in Rome in October.
Yes, I know, ePrints does this nicely. Point taken.

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Communities and deposit checklist

It’s the little things that sometimes take ages.. like deciding how to describe the communities and sub-communities for our repository installation. We’re a University, so the faculties and schools are easy enough, and I can put the research centres and institutes together but what about ‘the leftovers’? What is the collective noun for the administrative services and support units? Everyone I spoke with had a different opinion.. Well I’ve finally found a page on the University website that covers ‘Administrative and Central Services’, so that’s what it is.. for now..

I’ve also spent bits of the last day or so tidying up our deposit licence and notice and takedown agreement. It’s coming along, and I’m writing up a checklist of things to consider before depositing – this is what I have so far:

1 Are you the owner of the copyright for this item? If not, do you have your co-author’s permission to deposit? Asking them to agree to the Deposit Licence is sufficient, but as co-owners of the copyright you must have their permission. (Charles Oppenheim made a good suggestion in response to a question on this today on a mailing list – agree to allow authors to self-archive before publishing..)

2 If the item is a journal article, does the journal publisher permit self-archiving? Have you checked RoMEO? Alternatively, have you negotiated the right to self-archive a copy of your work? There is more information available on the OPuS wiki (or there will be!).

3 If the item was sponsored by industry, do you have permission to make a copy of the item publicly available? You may wish to embargo the item to meet sponsor requirements, or check with your supervisor or Research Support Unit to make sure you meet contractual obligations.

4 Do you intend to publish this content commercially for the purposes of making a profit? If so you may wish to reconsider your deposit. The Bath OPuS is designed to make material widely accessible, enhancing impact, not necessarily income.

5 Is the item in a file format that is readily recognisable? Unusual file formats may create preservation difficulties and it is wise to discuss this with the repository manager.

What else needs to go in? Hmm.

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Communities in DSpace

I met with Pete from UKOLN this afternoon to chat about communities and collections in DSpace. From the examples I’ve seen it seems most Higher Ed institutions use the communities and sub-communities to reflect the faculties and departments of the university, and the collections to describe the type of item, such as journal article, working paper, conference paper, etc.. I’m wondering if this is the best way to go about structuring the repository.

Pete had a different take on this – the communities reflect the administration requirements, so they’re structured from how you want people to administer them. This made sense at the time, and I expect to a large degree this overlaps with the departmental structure here, but it may help with deciding how to set out the tricky parts, like the Research Centres (which sometimes overlap departments).

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RSP ramping up events

The Repository Support Project has just advertised a suite of events for repository practitioners in the UK over the next few months. Topics for the Professional Briefing and Networking event series include: Repository developments; Metadata issues; Stakeholder roles & perceptions and more to be announced.
Additionally, here at Bath there will be a DSpace Technical day on November 12, 2007. This provides DSpace users a similar event to that held recently for ePrints, where there will be the opportunity to attend a DSpace Surgery and ask installation specific questions. Alongside this are basic and advanced tutorials. I’m really pleased to see the RSP getting these events up and running, and I’ve just discovered their website is becoming more fleshed out with information useful for repository start-ups.

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Out and About

I’ve been neglecting the blog about lately as I’ve had my attention diverted elsewhere. This week has been taken up with the Internet Librarian International Conference in London. It seemed to be a well-recieved conference (apart from lots of muttering under the breath about the ridiculous cost of wifi – I mean, honestly, in this day and age a hotel that charges £10-$20 per day for wifi!?), with lots of attendees from the UK, the Netherlands, Scandanavia and more.

There were a number of repository related events, including a pre-conference Masterclass on Sunday morning presented by Frank Cervone from NorthWestern University in Illinios in the States. Frank covered the whole gammit of repository development which was useful although he lost me a bit on the OAIS Model and Objects and Behaviours – that’s going to be homework..

If you’re interested, many of the presentations are available from the conference website, including the presentations from Brian Kelly and myself in the ‘Blogging Inertia and 2.0 Scepticism’ slot. Nice to see the conference wiki, which is a great place for finding all those clever people who were blogging or twittering throughout the event.

There are photo’s from the event collected via Technorati available here.

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