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For Content Providers

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Guides for Content Providers

OpenAIRE Guidelines for Literature, Institutional, and Thematic Repositories

Update the compatibility level of your repository to get onboard the EOSC catalogue

  • Introduction

    Open science is the movement of making research outcomes and its disseminations openly available to everyone. It promotes transparency and collaboration in scholarly research, allows the reproducibility of the results and disseminates knowledge through scholarly communication. Ultimately, the goal of open science is to make scholarly research accessible to everyone, and to increase its impact on society.

    Linked Open Science is an extension of the Open Science movement that emphasizes the use of linked data and semantic web technologies to enable the sharing and reuse of scholarly information. It takes Open Science a step further by making research outcomes more interconnected, interoperable, and reusable by leveraging the power of the web to link and integrate data from different sources in a standardised way. Linked Open Science is a promising approach that has the potential to revolutionize the way scholarly research is conducted, by facilitating greater collaboration, interoperability, and reuse of data across different domains and disciplines.

    The European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) is one of the European Research Area initiatives that aims to build a cloud-based infrastructure for scientific research in Europe. The EOSC aims to promote the principles of Open Science and Linked Open Science by providing a platform for researchers to share and access data, tools, and services. The ultimate goal of the EOSC is to foster collaboration among researchers across Europe and facilitate the creation and dissemination of new knowledge.

  • Why upgrade?

    Improved interoperability

    To meet latest IT and repository standards: your content is more contextualised (links and relationships to other types of research outcomes and entities, such as PIDs), more flexible (different and improved vocabularies). More embedded in the R&I ecosystem (alignment with Open Science mandates and standards and support for well-established metadata schemas, namespace abbreviations).

    “FAIR”

    If you are compliant with the latest version of the OpenAIRE Guidelines you are also FAIR enough! This is your road to FAIRness.

    EOSC

    OpenAIRE is your entry/gateway to EOSC. If you are compatible with the versions 3.0 or 4.0 of the OpenAIRE Guidelines, then you will be onboarding the EOSC Portal Catalogue and Marketplace integrated platform.

  • How to upgrade?

    If you are not registered in the OpenAIRE PROVIDE Dashboard service.

    1. The first thing you need to do is to set up an OAI-PMH interface in your repository to enable harvesting via OAI-PMH for the records you want to be harvested by OpenAIRE.
    2. Then you have to expose your repository's metadata records through the OAI-PMH interface, to comply with the OpenAIRE Guidelines v4.0. “What do you need to do?”
    3. The next step is to assess your repository’s compatibility with the OpenAIRE Guidelines through the OpenAIRE Metadata Validator service.
    4. If validation succeeds then the repository can be registered for regular aggregation and indexing in OpenAIRE. "How to register?"
    5. Once you have finished the registration, the OpenAIRE Aggregation team will validate the information and verify the compatibility level of your repository.
    6. We will contact you if we need further information.
    7. Your repository will join the OpenAIRE infrastructure and your content will be regularly aggregated and indexed to the OpenAIRE Graph.

    If you are registered in the OpenAIRE PROVIDE Dashboard service but you are not compliant with the OpenAIRE Guidelines.

    1. You have to expose your repository's metadata records through the OAI-PMH interface, to comply with the OpenAIRE Guidelines. “What do you need to do?”
    2. Assess your repository’s compatibility with the OpenAIRE Guidelines through the OpenAIRE Validator service.
    3. In the PROVIDE dashboard at the “UPDATE -> UPDATE INTERFACES” tab, update the Desired compatibility level to the latest OpenAIRE Guidelines.
    4. Once you have finished the update of the interface, the OpenAIRE Aggregation team will validate the information and verify the updated compatibility level of your repository.
    5. We will contact you if we need further information.
    6. Your content will continue to be regularly aggregated and indexed to the OpenAIRE Graph.

  • What skills do you need?

    Very good technical knowledge of the software platform of your repository.

    Accustomed with current standards and metadata schemas OpenAIRE Guidelines use (eg. Dublin Core, Datacite) and have knowledge of XML / XPATH / XSLT and XSD schemas.

    Collaborate with all the people involved in the operation of the repository (eg. librarians, developers).

  • How long will it take you?

    There are many factors that play a key role in answering this question. From the skills that are required, the people involved in the operation of the repository to the software platform that you use.

  • Supported Platforms

    DSpace

    Eprints

    PURE

    • Expose your metadata records via the “oai_openaire” or “oai_dc” metadata format.

  • Your interaction with us

    We are here to assist you either from our technical team or in collaboration with your NOAD on all aspects of the upgrade process by providing guidance via email and/or via scheduled meetings.

  • Assess your repository’s compatibility with the OpenAIRE Guidelines

    1. Login to the PROVIDE dashboard by using your institutional account.
    2. Go to the top left menu and select: Validator > Validate
    3. Select the data source type (literature repository) you want to validate.
    4. Select “enter new” and enter the base OAI-PMH URL of your repository.
    5. Select the “OpenAIRE For Institutional and Thematic Repositories (OpenAIRE 4.0)” to test the compatibility of your repository
    6. Select parameters
      • You may define an upper limit on the number of records tested. This is highly recommended for first time users, or when re-checking after the implementation of automated changes.
      • Select one of the data source exposed sets (optional).
      • You may also group your results by a specific field. This is quite useful when validating an aggregator and you know in advance which is the field that distinguished among data sources.
    7. Finish the compatibility test and wait for the results by email or check the Validation History menu.

  • How to register?

    1. Register your repository in OpenDOAR, Re3data or FAIRsharing.
    2. Login to the PROVIDE dashboard by using your institutional account.
    3. Go to the top left menu and select: Register
    4. Select the data source type (Repository) you want to register.
    5. Fill in the form with the requested information, according to your data source type, as follows:
      1. Select data source
        Select your Repository from the list, starting by identifying the origin country.
      2. Register data source
        Fill in or update, if necessary, the basic information of your Repository. Note: the pre-filled information has been collected from OpenDOAR, Re3data or FAIRsharing.
      3. Register interface
        Register the base OAI-PMH URL of your Repository as well as the desired compatibility level with the OpenAIRE Guidelines. Since you have performed all the aforementioned steps you should select “OpenAIRE 4.0”. Choose an OAI-PMH records set if you have exposed a specific records set in your OAI-PMH for OpenAIRE. If no set is chosen, all records will be harvested.
      4. Terms of Use
        Select the desired options regarding the Terms of Use.
      5. Finish
        Select the option “Finish” to conclude the registration process.

  • What do you need to do to expose your repository's metadata records to comply with the OpenAIRE Guidelines v4.0?

    1. Follow the instructions for all the fields and populate all the mandatory fields and attributes.
    2. Populated Persistent Identifiers (eg. DOIs, handles for your research output).
    3. Populated ORCID iDs for authors/creators of the research products.
    4. Get funding data from OpenAIRE. Provide us information on Funders for your research products to see if they are incorporated into the OpenAIRE Graph. If not we get in touch with them to initiate the process.

  • About FAIR

    FAIR principles describe how the research outputs should be organised and structured so they can be more easily accessed, understood and reused. The crowning achievement of the FAIR principles is to optimise the data “FAIRness” through machine actionability with none or minimal human intervention.

    Nowadays many guidelines, tools, systems and even policies have been developed to promote and incorporate FAIR into the ordinary workflow of a researcher, a repository, a data source in general. But there are different stakeholder perspectives regarding the FAIR workflow that most of the time making your data FAIR becomes a complicated process. Whether you are a researcher, a repository, a research performing organisation, a funder you have different approaches in the so called FAIR workflow, which simply translates to “what do I need to do to have FAIR data?”.

    The OpenAIRE guidelines are based on the Open Science mandates and standards and support well-established metadata schemas, namespace abbreviations and controlled vocabularies aligning with the FAIR Principles. The OpenAIRE guidelines requisite the metadata to enhance and support FAIRness:

    Findability

    • by requiring the existence of Persistent Identifiers as long as rich metadata (eg. creator, title, publication date, publisher)

    Accessibility

    • by the required “Access Rights” rule that obliges the metadata to contain information on how the user can access the data (open, embargoed, restricted, closed access).

    Interoperability

    by:

    • using FAIR compliant vocabularies (COAR, CC-licenses),
    • including references to other metadata of related research products (eg. linking of Projects to research outputs, linking of publications to other publications, and linking of publications to datasets).

    Reusability

    by:

    • providing plurality of accurate and relevant attributes by requiring licensing information and the type of the resource,
    • Including provenance information by required rules (eg. creator, title, date, publisher),
    • complying with a community standard (eg. Dublin Core, DataCite metadata schemas).

  • Support

    Need support or guidance on updating the compatibility level of your data source?
    Contact the OpenAIRE support team by email or use the contact button below.

Updated date: April 17, 2023
Publication date: January 30, 2023

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Guides for Content Providers

Making your repository Open

An Open Science checklist on how to license repositories

This guide, is a companion Open Science (OS) checklist for Content Providers, about how to license repositories, meant to offer a state of the art, legally advanced, but still manageable set of rules, guidelines, and resources to enable the full potential of OS in the EU research field with a view to addressing copyright and related rights issues.

Guides for Content Providers

  • How to validate and register your repository

  • How to enrich research artifacts

  • How to track the usage activity of your repository

  • Making your repository Open

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1.1. One of the best licenses you can use for your repository is a CC BY 4.0 license, specifying that “unless otherwise noted, this repository is under a CC BY 4.0 license”.

We recommend using a CC BY 4.0 license as a repository license for the following reasons:

  • Creative Commons licenses are internationally recognised, well-established, and both human-readable and machine-readable;
  • CC BY 4.0 licenses meet the definition of “open access” as defined in the Budapest, Bethesda, and Berlin declarations on open access;
  • CC BY 4.0 is one of the most compatible licenses for interoperability purposes.
Legal Sources:

The following declarations and statements provide definitions of Open Access:

The following sources from Creative Commons and OpenMinTeD provide details on compatibility between licenses (both generally and for the purposes of text and data mining): See the following source by Creative Commons UK for details on both how and why you should be interested in making your work open access:
Examples

Creative Commons provide guidance on how to select the most appropriate license for your work (depending on your sharing preferences), as well as how to mark your work once your appropriate license has been identified:

1.1.1. If you follow point 1.1 it means that the license applies to all “works” or other subject matter in the repository.

This includes:

  • The repository as a copyright protected database (in case it qualifies);
  • The repository as a suis generis database right protected database (in case it qualifies);
  • The elements composing the database which can be:
    • Not protected, such as a database of temperature measurements. In this case, as these data are not protected in themselves you don’t need a license. CC licenses are written in a way that you only have to accept them if you need permission to use something.
    • Protected (e.g. a database of journal articles)

For University repositories, it is likely that several of these elements co-exist, but it could also well be that the repository is not a protected database. In either case CC licenses are a good choice because (avoiding technicalities) they only regulate the use if that use requires a permission. Under this point of view it could be said that CC licenses are self-contained to when permission is necessary.

Legal Sources:

See the following source for further details on the EU legislation regulating the legal protection of databases:

For confirmation of same see:

1.1.2. However, this could become problematic, when, as in the case of University repositories, the owner of the repository (the University) and the owner of the journal article (the author unless they transferred the copyright) are different people.

Therefore, by using the recommended “unless otherwise noted” wording, you clarify that the elements that belong to third parties (e.g. journal articles) are distributed under their own license terms (which as you will see later, ideally is a CC0 or a CC BY).

It is important to license the repository as a database under an open access compliant license. This is because when a user uses aggregated data (such as in data analytics, text and data mining, etc.) in order to crawl, scrape or analyse the database, authorisation (e.g. a license or an exception if it exists) is often necessary. But if you have applied a CC BY to your repository this is already taken care of!

Legal Sources:

In order to meet the definition of open access as provided in the Budapest Declaration, users must be able to crawl the database:

See also recommendations made to data and e-infrastructure providers in the source below which confirm CC BY 4.0 is the most appropriate license for data access:
Examples:

OpenAIRE provides a tool which tests online repository compliance with Open Science guidelines: Validator service.

1.2. The CC BY 4.0 license should be incorporated into the terms of service of the repository.

Legal source:

Terms of service are general rules about how a service, such as a website, can be used. These may include a multitude of conditions, such as privacy policies, limitations of liability, and codes of conduct. All users of the service have to agree to the terms of service.

Examples:

Creative Commons provide guidance on how to integrate their licenses within your terms of service:

1.2.1. The CC BY 4.0 license exists as a separate legal document from the terms of service.

As such, it must be incorporated by reference into the contractual, and broader terms of service which govern all uses of the repository. Creative Commons provide guidance on how to incorporate the CC BY 4.0 license into the repository terms of use.

Examples:

Creative Commons provide guidance on how to integrate their licenses within your terms of service:

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6.1. Uploaders should be offered all possible guidance and explanation with regards the various licences open to them, and the degree to which these are compatible with open access principles.

Legal source:

6.1.1. This can be done by incorporating some form of ‘Licence Selector’ tool into the upload process. The tools featured here offer examples of how this can be achieved.

Legal sources:

6.2. CC-BY 4.0 may be considered as a default standard licence, except in the case of data and datasets.

However any default licence provided should always be accompanied by a selection of alternative licences and comprehensive explanations about the function of each.

The CC-BY 4.0 licence is often considered the ‘gold standard’ open access licence, since it is the least restrictive and allows people to use the licensed content as they choose, provided attribution is provided, and is fully OA compliant. As a note of caution, however, it should always be the uploader who makes the final licence selection.

Legal source:

6.3. Where uploaders select a licence which is less compatible with open access/science requirements, this should be made clear to them.

This is particularly relevant where uploaders choose Creative Commons licences with NC (non-commercial) or ND (no derivatives) conditions. These licences have been described by Creative Commons as failing to promote ‘free culture’.

Legal source:

6.4. In the case of software, application of a GNU GPL or BSD/ Apache style licence is recommended.

These licences are:

  • The most well-established public licences for free software, and
  • The most interoperable licence both in terms of general use and for TDM purposes.
Legal sources:

6.5. In the case of public sector information, application of an Open Government Licence is mandated by the UK Government Licensing Framework (UKGLF) for all public sector information.

Legal source:

6.6. Ultimately, however, the final decision with regards which licence is applied should rest with the uploader.

Legal sources:

6.7. The resources featured here offer comprehensive discussion regarding the benefits of open access principles, and provide an example of how these might be expressed to uploaders.

Legal sources:

6.8. Account must be taken of any external limitations on the uploader’s choice of licence.

This may be as a result of funding body stipulations or publishers’ requirements.

Legal source:

6.8.1. The resources featured here, including the European Commission H2020 guidance, provide an example of possible funding body stipulations, with regards making work open access and how this should be done.

Legal sources:

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Suggest which license should be chosen to meet OS requirements, but let the uploader choose.

5.1. Give the uploader the possibility to choose the license.

You can indicate which licenses are better for OA/OS, but don’t choose for them.

To avoid ambiguity, uploaders should be expected to apply a license at the point of upload. Failure to apply a license at upload results in ‘All Rights Reserved’, which generally means people are unable to use, re-use, modify or data-mine the unlicensed content, without authorisation.

Legal sources:

5.2. Repositories may play an important role in educating uploaders with regards open licensing.

Legal source:

5.2.1. The importance of making their work open access, should be explained to uploaders prior to upload.

The benefits of open access work include: Researchers and their institutions benefit from having a wider audience Open access allows use of text and data mining tools, without legal barriers. Funders receive a greater return on their investment when results of research can be utilised by more people and at an earlier date.

Legal sources:

5.2.2. The Sparc Europe resource offers a useful summary of the benefits of making work open access.

Legal source:

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