DSpace 3-5 Year Vision and High Level Roadmap Meeting - May 9 & 10, 2013

Logistics

• Meeting Location: UIC Campus, Richard J Daley Library, Room 1-470 (Floor 1, Room 470)
  
  • Walking directions from Crowne Plaza Hotel to Richard J Daley Library (801 S Morgan St): http://goo.gl/3uZOX
    
    • Daley Library is located mid-way between Harrison and Taylor streets.  It has a large west entrance on Morgan Street.
  • You can also take the #8 Halsted bus (runs every 10mins or so) for $2.25 (they accept dollar bills & quarters). See CTA schedule: http://www.transitchicago.com/riding_cta/busroute.aspx?RouteId=167
  • If you are coming direct from an airport, the "UIC Halsted" stop on the CTA Blue Line train is the best option. From there, you can follow the walking directions and continue south on Halsted (~5 minute walk)
    
    • From O'Hare airport, just take the Blue Line directly to the UIC Halsted stop (No transferring).  From there, you can follow the walking directions and continue south on Halsted (~5 minute walk)
    • From Midway airport, take the Orange Line to downtown Chicago.  Transfer (for free) to the Blue Line at the "Clark & Lake" stop (descend two flights of stairs from elevated tracks to subway).  Take the Blue line towards Forest Park. Get off at the UIC Halsted stop. From there, you can follow the walking directions and continue south on Halsted (~5 minute walk)
• Meals
  
  • Lunch & Dinner on Thurs will be provided for all attendees
  • Breakfast on Fri will also be provided

Attendees

• Jonathan Markow, DuraSpace
• Tim Donohue, DuraSpace
• Allan Bell, U of British Columbia
• Sandy De Groote, University of Illinois at Chicago
• Doug Goans, Georgia Tech
• Sue Kunda, Oregon State
• Amy Lana, University of Missouri
• Jim Ottaviani, University of Michigan
• Sarah Potvin, Texas A&M
• Monica Rivero, Rice University
• Robert Sandusky, University of Illinois at Chicago
• Sarah Shreeves, University of Illinois (at Urbana-Champaign)
• Tito Sierra, MIT
• Maureen Walsh, Ohio State University

Preparatory Reading

• Summary from DuraSpace Summit discussion (March 2013 in Baltimore)
  
  • http://duraspace.org/looking-future-dspace-and-fedora
  • More Details from "DSpace Breakout" session: http://bit.ly/YcEri5
• Summary of "DSpace Futures" virtual discussions (Fall 2012)
  
  • http://www.duraspace.org/dspace-futures

Contributions from Others

• Leonie Hayes (University of Auckland) was unable to attend, but provided slides summarizing their institution's viewpoint: DSpaceVision2013UniversityofAucklandcontribution.pdf

Agenda

Day 1: Thursday, May 9, 2013, 12:00PM – 5:00PM

1. Lunch (12-1 PM)
2. Introductions
3. Expected Outcomes.
   
   1. What do we hope to achieve by the end of these planning sessions?
   2. What happens next?
4. Sidebar.
   
   1. Diversity in the DSpace community
5. Vision and Product Placement.
   
   1. What is unique about DSpace?
   2. What important niche does it fill for you?
   3. What about it provides value to your institution?
   4. What is your vision for DSpace over the next five years?
6. Pain Points.
   
   1. What has been most frustrating about the use of DSpace at your institution?
   2. What characteristics of DSpace stand in the way of fulfilling your vision for the product?
7. Brainstorm: Use Cases and Associated Features.
   1. What Use Cases are important for your institution over the next five years?
   2. What are the associated features that need to be supported?
   3. What kind of content needs to be supported?

Dinner out – 6:30 PM

Day 2: Friday, May 10, 2013, 8:30AM – 12:30PM

1. Light breakfast (8:30AM – 9:00AM)
2. Prep work on Vision Statement / High Level Roadmap
3. Prioritize Use Cases
4. Plan Next Steps
   
   1. Volunteer assignments

Notes

• Do we need two platforms? DSpace & Fedora
  
  • Need to see if the 3-5 yr "visions" overlap for the platforms. Think of as a venn diagram - may be a lot of overlap or little
  • Would be important to the University Librarians - need a message as to why give to one or both. Show that we've analyzed whether merging platforms is worthwhile
• Types of DSpace institutions
  
  • Institutions who are essentially happy with DSpace as out-of-the-box IR
  • Institutions who are stretching the boundaries of DSpace
    
    • Faculty wanting something easier to use, "flashier".  Even building their own tools, using other (non-preservation) system
  • "In between"  - like the simplicity but want "flashier" interface, similar
• Is there a common vision for DSpace? (even amongst our small group)
  
  • In many ways it has morphed from it's initial use case that is was built for
  • Should it be a generic digital repository, or concentrate on solving just IR / preservation repository?
• Institutional Visions / Use Cases
  
  • Institution #1 - Lots of integration points & access - less about preservation
    
    • DSpace is free, relatively robust.  Large User community.
    • End user deposit. published & unpublished content
    • Managing diverse research output (ORCIDs).  Data with access controls. Digital Collection & Mgmt)
    • Research info mgmt systems.  Needs good integration points
    • Integrates into a different digital preservation.
    • Streaming server, stats module were added as they went
    • "Killer App" = E-Theses.  Harder stuff is images/video.
  • Institution #2 - Started small and simple, constantly expanding
    
    • Initial decision was it is open source. Philosophy to support OS
    • Capturing university output
    • Getting to streaming servers
    • "In between group" - like ease of use. Small library - students used to do input
    • Migration of some content from ContentDM to DSpace.  Having requests to extend DSpace to add some ContentDM features
    • Feeding publications (university publishing) direct to DSpace
    • Getting data in and out easily
    • Went with Islandora for a Digital Library solution (better "Digital library" product than DSpace).
      
      • Question has come up whether to use Islandora instead of DSpace for some content
      • Possibility: Using DSpace as a true "preservation repository" and feeding content to Islandora (or similar)
    • Positives outweigh the negatives at this point.  But, how many systems can they really support amongst digital library / IR services?
  • "DSpace with a lot of 'hooks' on it" - could solve a lot of use cases with good integration points. But, shifts focus to integrating and supporting a larger suite of software. - Tito