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DSpace accepts all manner of digital formats. Some examples of items that DSpace can accommodate are: documents

• Documents, such as

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• articles, preprints, working papers, technical reports, conference papers

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• Books
• Theses
• Data sets
• Computer programs
• Visualizations

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• , simulations, and other models

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• Multimedia publications
• Administrative records
• Published books
• Overlay journals
• Bibliographic datasets
• Images
• Audio files
• Video files
• eformatted digital library collections
• Learning objects
• Web pages

What are DSpace Communities and Collections?

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Yes. Currently DSpace supports exporting digital content, along with its metadata, in a simple XML-encoded file format. The DSpace developers are working on migrating this export capability to use the METS standard, but are waiting for some necessary extension schemas to emerge (such as one for qualified Dublin Core metadata, and one for minimal technical/preservation metadata for arbitrary digital objects).

Can I import items into DSpace in batch mode?

Yes. See overview.

Will DSpace interoperate with other systems running at my organization?

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Do I have to name my service "DSpace"?

No. With the release of DSpace version 1.3, it has become much easier to We suggest you create a unique name for your repository. All the language in the user interface resides in one file, to make it easier to modify and translate. You just need to replace "DSpace" with the name of your respository repository in the file, config/language-packs/Messages.properties. Note: You must be running DSpace 1.3 or higher to use this solution.

How do I add an administrator through the admin UI?

To make someone an administrator, go into the admin interface and click 'groups'. Then click 'Edit' next to the 'Administrator' button, then click 'Select E-people', find the person you want to make an administrator, click 'Add' next to their name, then close the pop-up and click 'Update Group' on the Edit Group page.

What kinds of DSpace services are other institutions building?

Research institutions worldwide use DSpace to meet a variety of digital archiving needs:

• Institutional Repositories (IRs)
• Learning Object Repositories (LORs)
• eTheses
• Electronic Records Management (ERM)
• Digital Preservation
• Publishing
• and more

Where can I find information on Digital Preservation?

There are several good resources available. Start by reading Paul Wheatley's article "A way forward for developments in the digital preservation functions of DSpace : options, issues and recommendations".

• http://www.digitalpreservation.gov/ has some good specifics about formats.

DSpace Content

What kind of content does DSpace support?

DSpace accepts all manner of digital formats. Some examples of items that DSpace can accommodate are:

• Documents, such as articles, preprints, working papers, technical reports, conference papers
• Books
• Theses
• Data sets
• Computer programs
• Visualizations, simulations, and other models
• Multimedia publications
• Administrative records
• Published books
• Overlay journals
• Bibliographic datasets
• Images
• Audio files
• Video files
• eformatted digital library collections
• Learning objects
• Web pages

What copyright do I own? What is a license? And what is a Creative Commons license?

If you have original works that you have created, including photos you have taken, you can overcome traditional copyright restrictions by selecting a 'license' that tells other folks what they are or are not allowed to do with the works. US Copyright restricts the use of materials by others unless the user hunts you down and explicitly asks you for permission to use your content. Creative Commons is a group founded by lawyers in academia (Stanford, Duke and other universities) that has defined alternative licenses whereby you retain the copyright but you attach the license to your content so people know what they can or cannot do with it. That way they don't have to go find you and ask permission each time. They still have to give you credit for the content whenever/however they use it or they violate the license agreement and are subject to legal recourse. But if a professor at another institution wants to use some of your photos or descriptive works in his/her course or a musician wants to include your photo on his/her album cover they can do so if your license says it's ok AND they give you attribution for the work (e.g. image by <your name goes here>). You select different options when you assign a creative commons license to a work and, based on the options you select, a license is generated. Here's a link to the license descriptions that can be generated based on your selections:
Meet the Licenses.
You can get to the full legal explanation through a link, but it's usually only lawyers who are interested in this . The most open license is the 'Attribution' license. With this, you receive the greatest exposure for your work since it can be distributed anywhere or modified to someone's specific needs while still giving you credit for its creation.
In DSpace, we assign the copyright license to the work at the time we submit it. There's a creative commons form built into DSpace that allows you to identify the license to be used with the item so people can know what they're allowed to do with it. Here's a link to the same form on the Creative Commons web site, with additional links that give you further explanations:
License selection.
So while you're traveling around the world, take LOTS of pictures! You, then, can make them available for others to use so people don't have to keep paying image dealers for pictures. Education will improve since these assets will be available to people who can't afford to buy these images and people will LOVE you because they'll see that you're the person who's letting them use the image. You don't lose the copyright, you don't sign it over to anyone, but you make the work available to folks within the terms you identify for the license. You can put them in your DSpace so that they're managed in appropriate collections, have metadata assigned to them, and can be found by search engines like google when people are looking for images of, say, the colosseum.

Interoperability

Can I import items into DSpace in batch mode?

Yes. See overview.

Can I export my digital material out of DSpace?

Yes. Currently DSpace can export digital content, along with its metadata in a simple XML-encoded file format or METS.

Will DSpace interoperate with other systems running at my organization?

Yes, DSpace has documented Java APIs you can customize to allow interoperation with other systems an institution might be running (for example, a department's web document system auto-depositing in DSpace, or a campus data warehouse).

What sort of persistent identifiers does DSpace use?

DSpace uses the Handle System from CNRI to assign and resolve persistent identifiers for each digital item. Handles are UN-compliant identifiers. The Handle resolver is an open-source system used in conjunction with DSpace.
The developers chose to use handles instead of persistent ULs to support citations to items in DSpace over very long time spans - longer than we believe the HTTP protocol will last. Handles in DSpace are currently implemented as ULs, but can also be modified to work with future protocols.

What metadata standards does DSpace support? Can I create metadata using the SCOM/VA/FGDC/MAC or myOwnSchema?

In this context support for a given metadata schema means that metadata can be entered into DSpace, stored in the database, indexed appropriately, and made searchable through the public user interface. This currently applies mainly to descriptive metadata, although as standards emerge it could also include technical, rights, preservation, structural, and behavioral metadata.
Currently DSpace supports only the Dublin Core metadata element set with a few qualifications conforming to the library application profile (see DSpace Metadata). The DSpace team hopes to support a subset of the IMS/SCOM element set (for describing education material) in the coming year.
HP and MIT also have a research project called SIMILE, which is investigating how to support arbitrary metadata schemas using DF as applied by the Haystack research project in the Lab for Computer Science and some of the Semantic Web technologies being developed by the W3C.

Does DSpace support OAI?

DSpace supports the Open Archives Initiative's Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH) v2.0 as a data provider. OAI support was implemented using OCLC's OAICat open-source software to make DSpace item records available for harvesting. DSpace@MIT is registered as a data provider with the Open Archives Initiative. Other institutions running DSpace may choose to turn on OAI or not, and to register as a data provider or not.

Does DSpace support JSR-170?

Currently JSR-170, which is a standard Java API, isn't implemented anywhere in DSpace. We've looked at JSR-170 from two perspectives. One is where DSpace itself acts as a JSR-170 repository, and other apps can use the JSR-170 interface to store and retrieve things in DSpace. Since JSR-170 is a Java API and not (yet) a network API (or "Web Service") we haven't implemented that; the closest is probably the Lightweight Network Interface which should be appearing in DSpace 1.5, or SRW/U for search. If you want another app to interface to DSpace, these are probably the best way forward right now.

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that file.

What kinds of DSpace services are other institutions building?

Research institutions worldwide use DSpace to meet a variety of digital archiving needs:

• Institutional Repositories (IRs)
• Learning Object Repositories (LORs)
• eTheses
• Electronic Records Management (ERM)
• Digital Preservation
• Publishing
• and more

Where can I find information on Digital Preservation?

There are several good resources available. Start by reading Paul Wheatley's article "A way forward for developments in the digital preservation functions of DSpace : options, issues and recommendations".

• http://www.digitalpreservation.gov/ has some good specifics about formats.

For More Information

Still have questions? For general questions about DSpace and DuraSpace, you can search the DSpace-General mailing list archives or post a question to the DSpace-General mailing list.

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