I don't have more to add than the other great points already mentioned, but
I am confused how you are having so much trouble with DSpace. I manage our
DSpace repository with only a singular systems librarian who works on
supporting all our systems and we have had minimal trouble with DSpace.  We
haven't modified it much so it is largely out of the box.  Plus our
institution is only about 6,000, which is half of what you guys have.  So
I'm confused how you are having so much trouble with it.

On Thu, Oct 26, 2017 at 11:11 AM, Aaron Collier <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:

> > The technology needed for an IR is
> pretty simple: a place to put files, a way to discover files, a way to
> submit files, a way to describe files. It's the kind of thing that a
> university's in-house IT department could put together pretty easily with
> some web forms.
>
>
> While certainly true on the surface, I think the real issue is going to be
> the maintainability and sustainability of such a project that is
> essentially already solved with a platform like DSpace. Rolling your own,
> in such a piecemeal way is likely to introduce loads of uncertain
> complexity.
>
>
> On Thu, Oct 26, 2017 at 8:06 AM, Jason Bengtson <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
>
> > Hi Josh,
> >
> > Yes and no. Certainly a lot of work has been done in separating the
> layers
> > of activity/service so that stacks could be built that would be uniquely
> > useful to a particular organization. Here at K-State we've done a little
> > investigating of using blacklight as our presentation layer and having it
> > interact with DSpace through its extremely useful RESTful API, but given
> > our other workload we haven't had much time to pursue that. We're seeing
> > variations on Blacklight, Hydra, and Fedora based stacks out there . . .
> I
> > haven't worked with those tools but I'd like to. However, all of these
> > approaches still seem to bundle a particular set of services together as
> an
> > IR. As others have pointed out, that certainly isn't essential, at least
> > hypothetically, as long as those services are served to users in a way
> that
> > either brands them together relatively seamlessly, or delivers the
> overall
> > service set of an IR successfully through other modalities.
> >
> > Best regards,
> >
> > *Jason Bengtson*
> >
> >
> > *http://www.jasonbengtson.com/ <http://www.jasonbengtson.com/>*
> >
> > On Thu, Oct 26, 2017 at 9:53 AM, Josh Welker <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> >
> > > Jason,
> > >
> > > To your knowledge, have any libraries approached IR as a set of
> services
> > > divorced from a particular software platform? In my albeit limited
> > > experience, the IR and the platform used to host the IR are used almost
> > > synonymously. That is perhaps a barrier to entry for smaller libraries
> > who
> > > could do the service work of collecting objects, creating metadata,
> etc,
> > > but do not have the resources to invest in DSpace or Digital Commons.
> > >
> > > Joshua Welker
> > > Information Technology Librarian
> > > James C. Kirkpatrick Library
> > > University of Central Missouri
> > > Warrensburg, MO 64093
> > > JCKL 2260
> > > 660.543.8022
> > >
> > >
> > > On Thu, Oct 26, 2017 at 9:27 AM, Jason Bengtson <
> [log in to unmask]
> > >
> > > wrote:
> > >
> > > > Josh,
> > > >
> > > > If you have funds (or you anticipate saving enough funds by ending
> > local
> > > > dspace support), a SAAS platform like what Tom suggests is worth
> > > > considering, so it's worthwhile to throw contentDM into the mix. I'll
> > be
> > > > honest; I never cared for it (the platform lacked flexibility to me),
> > but
> > > > we had it at one library I've worked at, and, if your needs are
> modest,
> > > it
> > > > might meet them. It's completely hosted, so the local hosting
> overhead
> > is
> > > > eliminated. There's also Digital Commons, although I've also found
> them
> > > too
> > > > limited for my uses in the past, and since their recent change in
> > > ownership
> > > > I would regard them dubiously. The thing I would be most careful
> with,
> > > for
> > > > both of those products, would be having a plan in place to migrate
> your
> > > > data out of them should circumstances change. I've heard of some
> > > challenges
> > > > on that front in Digital Commons (although I have no direct
> experience
> > in
> > > > that area, and things may have improved since I heard that feedback),
> > and
> > > > I'm not sure what the migration options look like in contentDM.
> > > >
> > > > Here at K-State we use DSpace, but we host our instance on Amazon Web
> > > > Services rather than through local physical or virtual boxes. My
> > systems
> > > > folks have been very happy with this move, which, while keeping us in
> > > full
> > > > control of our boxes, has eased some aspects of their management and
> > > > provided us with enhanced reliability.
> > > >
> > > > All that having been said, I really like what you, Jonathan, and Tom
> > have
> > > > said about looking at looking at an IR as a set of services and
> > > > 'interrogating' what that means and how those services might be
> > > delivered.
> > > > I think we, as a profession, need to do that for a variety of
> products,
> > > > including IRs and catalogs.
> > > >
> > > > Best regards,
> > > >
> > > > *Jason Bengtson*
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > *http://www.jasonbengtson.com/ <http://www.jasonbengtson.com/>*
> > > >
> > > > On Wed, Oct 25, 2017 at 1:51 PM, Josh Welker <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > 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
> > > > >
> > > >
> > >
> >
>