Josh,

 None of those pieces is an IR, but do you think
that when taken as a whole they could comprise an IR?

Yes. I think it’s very healthy to think of the IR as a set of services, rather than a single software product. And I really like the idea of using your catalog as the discovery environment. (That’s what we do…) That said, I have to say that...

a. your approach doesn’t sound like less work overall (and in fact it might be more?)
b. it raises the question of how your institution might support this over the longterm

It might still be viable, especially if it jibes with your institutional technology strategy and staff capacity.

Have you also considered moving to a cloud IR, such as DSpaceDirect<http://dspacedirect.org/> or hosting from Atmire<https://www.atmire.com/services/dspace-hosting>?

- Tom



On Oct 25, 2017, at 2:16 PM, Josh Welker <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:

Hi Bryan,

I agree that a repository is more than documents, and in this model we
would still do metadata, indexing, etc. It would just be handled by a
different piece. Instead of having one system that does it all (like
DSpace), we'd use the library catalog for metadata and indexing, backup
tools for preservation, and this homegrown solution just for hosting
publicly accessible files. None of those pieces is an IR, but do you think
that when taken as a whole they could comprise an IR?

Joshua Welker
Information Technology Librarian
James C. Kirkpatrick Library
University of Central Missouri
Warrensburg, MO 64093
JCKL 2260
660.543.8022


On Wed, Oct 25, 2017 at 3:59 PM, Bryan Brown <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:

Josh,


Theres nothing wrong with what you are describing if its all your
institution needs, but I would be careful about promoting that as an IR. An
IR is much more than a bunch of documents. The metadata modelling,
preservation features and indexing that you want to leave out are what
makes it a repository. Also, the infrastructure you are describing may lack
flexibility in the future if you decide you want to add new features to it.


Bryan J. Brown

Repository Developer

Technology & Digital Scholarship Division

Florida State University Libraries

________________________________
From: Code for Libraries <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> on behalf of Josh
Welker <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>>
Sent: Wednesday, October 25, 2017 2:51:34 PM
To: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
Subject: [CODE4LIB] Lightweight IR infrastructure

We're a mid-sized university library (10,000 fte) trying to get an IR off
the ground to showcase student and faculty research. We've had a DSpace
instance running for several years, but we use so few of its features that
DSpace ends up being more trouble than it is worth. In particular, it's
very frustrating to deal with metadata editing, file management, the Handle
URL system, and HTML/CSS theming.

I am considering leaving the DSpace model in favor of our "IR" just being a
glorified FTP site that MARC records in our catalog can point to. I might
even build a tiny frontend using some scripting language to add IP
authentication, URL redirect stuff, or a Google Scholar interface, but
that's really it. No metadata modelling, no preservation features, no
indexing.

Does anyone have experience using a very small, file-based (as opposed to
database-driven) application as a foundation for an IR? Are there any
problems I should anticipate?

Joshua Welker
Information Technology Librarian
James C. Kirkpatrick Library
University of Central Missouri
Warrensburg, MO 64093
JCKL 2260
660.543.8022