Notes on improvements:
-need to insert lefthand links: demo, documentation, assumptions page, others?
-pictures/screen shots ok? others?
-diagram revisions in process - should we re-title this "How does DSpace work" - still need to create a Prezi for it (script from footnotes? All About DSpace webinar? other sources?)
-hungry for more section added - any other links and references? do we want this section to be a distinct yellow color box?
The content in this chapter has not been reviewed. |
Chapter 1: What is DSpace?
What is DSpace?
Example of a DSpace repository
DSpace is an open source repository application that allows you to capture, store, index, preserve and distribute your digital material including text, video, audio and data. DSpace provides a way to manage your materials and publications in a professionally maintained repository to give them greater visibility and accessibility over time.
There are over 1000 digital repositories worldwide using the DSpace application for a variety of digital archiving needs. DSpace is most often used as an institutional repository - a platform that provides access to research output, scholarly publications, library collections, and more.
It has three main roles:
- Facilitates the capture and ingest of materials, including metadata about the materials
- Facilitates easy access to the materials, both by listing and searching
- Facilitates the long-term preservation of the materials
The DSpace application has many customizable features and tools for managing digital content, enabling digital preservation and providing accessibility to your materials. As an open source application, there is a very active community of developers, researchers and users worldwide that contribute their expertise to enhance the DSpace application.
What can DSpace be used for?
DSpace can be used to store any type of digital materials, including:
- 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
- e-formatted digital library collections
- Learning objects
- Web pages
What are the benefits of using DSpace?
Example of DSpace's built-in organizational structure of Communities and Collections.
Because DSpace is a turnkey repository application it may be deployed "out-of-the-box" as an institutional repository. The majority of DSpace users do little to no customization of the application beyond adding local branding. DSpace allows you to:
- Organize, describe and store your content easily through the built-in structure
- Archive and distribute material you would currently put on your personal website
- Get your materials out quickly, to a worldwide audience through exposure to search engines such as Google
- Have a persistent network identifier for your work, which never changes or breaks
Additionally, DSpace allows institutional repositories to:
- Preserve reusable teaching materials that you can use with course management systems
- Store examples of students' projects (with the students' permission)
- Showcase students' theses (again with permission)
- Keep track of your own publications/bibliography
What does DSpace look like?
At a very high level, DSpace looks like this: (need new image) w/o 1-7 details)
- 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 parts of 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.
Hungry for more?
Need more general information before moving any further? Below is a list of materials that can help you learn more about DSpace.
General Information
Comparing/Evaluating Software Options
Repository Planning Guidance