Digital Repositories : 2019-02-04 Meeting notes

5min

Recap

David

• The need for multi-tenancy

  • Our other systems all use some kind of multi-tenancy

    • Alma, Primo, apps developed by the CO

  • DSpace

    • In the beginning: Separate instances, lots of problems

    • Now: Atmire-developed custom multi-tenant DSpace

  • Samvera Hyrax

    • Hyku was meant to fill this role

      • Overdue, still in-development

      • Upgrades after customizations would be difficult (compared to Hyrax)

    • Aaron’s model: Separate front-end instances, consolidated back-end

      • 25 prod servers + equal number development servers

      • Complex AWS, version control set-up

      • More flexibility than what we’ve previously had

      • Separate design, metadata, configurations

        • Some of this can be copied between instances, with attending overhead

• Single instance alternative – see demo.

  • Pros:

    • Simpler set-up, can focus limited resources on this one instance

    • Uniform design, metadata, authentication

    • Improved discovery

      • But what about locally hosted campus repositories?

    • More easily accommodate systemwide initiatives?

      • Academic technology projects

      • AB 2192

  • Cons

    • Little flexibility for local metadata

    • Little to no flexibility for branding, institutional identity

      • Was listed as very important by campuses

    • Unknown scaling issues

      • likely addressed by AWS

    • Unknown issues around third-party integrations if not all campuses participate

      • e.g., DOI minting

    • Requires consensus on most decisions

      • Scope of the repository (see next issue)

        • Too narrow and we exclude content unnecessarily

        • Too broad and we swamp the search results with potentially irrelevant content

      • Metadata

• Group is leaning toward single instance

  • But a more formal governance structure (before launch) and scope are critical

  • What voices are we not capturing in this discussion?

30min

Single vs. separate campus instance discussion (cont’d)

• Group is leaning toward single instance

  • With caveats about the need for a more formal governance structure before launch

    • Scope of content is important in terms of hitting the ground running

    • Metadata is important here too

      • even more so in the digital archives

        • scope is broader

    • Should sketch out some ideas for governance

• If Hyku were available, would we use it?

  • Are we leaning toward a single instance because of current technical / resource limitations?

  • Or are there good reasons to prefer a single instance over any type of multi-tenant option?

  • Can’t wait for Hyku

• Are there good reasons to exclude any of the content currently in DSpace?

  • Institutional documents

  • Digitized historical materials?

  • Do we need a second instance for this other type of content?

20min

Secondary systems: Faculty profiles, open access publishing

David

• Scope

  • Faculty profiles

    • VIVO (or other?)

    • Bespoke application?

  • Open access publishing

    • OJS now

    • Monographs?

    • Conferences?

  • Exhibits

    • Hyrax has a collections / exhibits collection

    • Spotlight another option

• What are the costs associated with all these things?

  • We are under-resources centrally, so let’s not put too much on the CO plate