Module 1 introduction of Dspace

Editor's Notes

• #3: This module will introduce DSpace, its history, and the DSpace Foundation. The module will introduce what DSpace is and what it can be used for. It will then describe the development of DSpace over time, and talk about DuraSpace, which now oversees the running of DSpace. The open source development model used by DSpace will also be described.
• #4: We will talk about the different file formats, indexing and preservation efforts later one. DSpace is a platform that allows you to capture items in any format – in text, video, audio, and data. It distributes it over the web. It indexes your work, so users can search and retrieve your items. It preserves your digital work over the long term. DSpace provides a way to manage your research materials and publications in a professionally maintained repository to give them greater visibility and accessibility over time. DSpace is typically used as an institutional repository. It has three main roles: Facilitate the capture and ingest of materials, including metadata about the materials Facilitate easy access to the materials, both by listing and searching Facilitate the long term preservation of the materials
• #5: Getting your research results out quickly, to a worldwide audience Reaching a worldwide audience through exposure to search engines such as Google Storing reusable teaching materials that you can use with course management systems Archiving and distributing material you would currently put on your personal website Storing examples of students’ projects (with the students’ permission) Showcasing students’ theses (again with permission) Keeping track of your own publications/bibliography Having a persistent network identifier for your work, that never changes or breaks No more page charges for images. You can point to your images’ persistent identifiers in your published articles.
• #6: DSpace can be used to store any type of digital medium. Examples include: Journal papers Data sets Electronic theses Reports Conference posters Videos Images
• #7: At a very high level, DSpace looks like this: Web-based interface makes it easy for a submitter to create an archival item by depositing files. DSpace was designed to handle any format from simple text documents to datasets and digital video. Data files, also called bitstreams, are organized together into related sets. Each bitstream has a technical format and other technical information. This technical information is kept with bitstreams to assist with preservation over time. An item is an "archival atom" consisting of grouped, related content and associated descriptions (metadata). An item's exposed metadata is indexed for browsing and searching. Items are organized into collections of logically-related material. A community is the highest level of the DSpace content hierarchy. They correspond to partsof the organization such as departments, labs, research centers or schools. DSpace’s modular architecture allows for creation of large, multi-disciplinary repositories that ultimately can be expanded across institutional boundaries. DSpace is committed to going beyond reliable file preservation to offer functional preservation where files are kept accessible as technology formats, media, and paradigms evolve over time for as many types of files as possible. The end-user interface supports browsing and searching the archives. Once an item is located, Web-native formatted files can be displayed in a Web browser while other formats can be downloaded and opened with a suitable application program.
• #8: The DSpace project was initiated in July 2000 as part of the HP-MIT alliance (Hewlett Packard / Massachusetts Institute of Technology). The project was given $1.8 million USD by HP over two years to build a digital archive for MIT that would handle the 10,000 articles produced by MIT authors annually. Software releases Releases of the DSpace software have taken places as follows: DSpace version 1.0- 8th November 2002 DSpace version 1.1 -8th May 2003 DSpace version 1.2 –13th August 2004 DSpace version 1.3 –3rd August 2005 DSpace version 1.4 –26th July 2006 DSpace version 1.5 –25th March 2008 DSpace version 3.1 – 2012 DSpace version 4.0 – 2013 Give a brief overview of the most current version.
• #9: The DSpace Foundation was formed in 2007 as a non-profit organization to provide support to the growing community of institutions that use DSpace. The foundation’s mission is to lead the collaborative development of open source software to enable permanent access to digital works. In 2009 the DSpace Foundation joined forces to become DuraSpace. This is a not-for-profit organization which combines the DSpace Foundation amd the Fedora Commons organization. These were two of the largest providers of open source repository software for managing and providing access to digital content. DuraCloud is a new service and open source technology for managing content in the cloud that was launched by DuraSpace in 2011. DuraCloud makes use of commercial cloud infrastructure to provide organizations with tools for archiving content across multiple cloud providers to ensure that documents, imagery and videos are always backed-up. DuraCloud features built-in compute services for digital preservation, data access, transformation, and sharing. DSpaceDirect is a low-cost, turnkey hosted repository service. DSpaceDirect can be used to preserve and provide access to academic faculty and student papers, projects, and research. DuraSpace also offers professional development opportunities which include “Hot Topics” web seminar series based on current topics of interest curated by community experts. Informal “Brown Bag” tutorial sessions offer participants interactive sessions about technology innovations as well as a chance to ask questions. In addition, their courses provide a way to build professional expertise through a dynamic learning process that takes place over several months.
• #10: DurSpace Mission: DuraSpace is an independent 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization providing leadership and innovation for open technologies that promote durable, persistent access to digital data. We collaborate with academic, scientific, cultural, and technology communities by supporting projects and creating services to help ensure that current and future generations have access to our collective digital heritage. Our values are expressed in our organizational byline, "Committed to our digital future."
• #11: Open source software DSpace is open source software. That means that you can download, use, and modify DSpace for free. The software is shared under a BSD (Berkeley Software Distribution) licence. The development model The code for DSpace is kept within a source code control system (http://dspace.svn.sourceforge.net/viewvc/dspace/). This system allows code to be added or modified over time, whilst maintaining a track of all changes and a note of why the change was made and who made it. This assists with the development of the software and ensures the quality and traceability of the code. Any past version of DSpace can be downloaded from the system in an identical state as originally distributed. Control of the source code repository is delegated to a small group of ‘committers’ (http://wiki.dspace.org/index.php/DspaceContributors). Only the committers have the ability to change the code and release new versions. The committers work with the wider community of DSpace users to fix bugs and improve the software with new features. Anyone who wants to is welcome to submit big fixes, new features or feature requests. The can all be done through the SourceForge administrative system (http://sourceforge.net/projects/dspace/). Support is provided on an informal basis via email lists (http://sourceforge.net/mail/?group_id=19984). There are three lists: 1. Dspace - Tech for technical support 2. Dspace -General for general questions and announcements 3. DSpace-Dev for discussing development issues For full details of support options see the module ‘How to get Help’.