1. The Repository now contains more than 3,700 research output records, with 30% available as Open Access full text. A report on outputs published during Q3 of 2011 was submitted to the RIEC committee in March 2012.
2. The list of University departments on the Repository has recently been updated to reflect the new college structure[1]: future quarterly research output reports will reflect this change.
3. An outline plan for technical development of the Repository (to ensure a ‘REF ready’, stable platform for integration with other University Research & Enterprise services) has been submitted to the PVC for Research.
4. The Library will be taking a subscription to SciVerse Scopus[2], the citation data service which is to be used in the REF[3]. Scopus data will be integrated into Repository records.
5. Individual authors’ Repository publication lists are now displayed on individual web profiles in the staff directory[4] and on the University website. This is helping to improve the quality of Repository metadata as authors request corrections and additions to their web profiles.
6. There have been a number of recent public statements in support of Open Access to published research outputs, from: the Department for BIS (speech by David Willetts)[5]; the Guardian[6]; Harvard University[7]; RCUK[8]; STM[9]; UK Council of Research Repositories[10].
7. The Lincoln Repository team can be contacted on: eprints@lincoln.ac.uk

1. http://library.lincoln.ac.uk/ (i.e. the ‘bare’ library subdomain: this isn’t used at the moment, but we intend that it will become the Library’s ‘root’ web presence)
2. http://www.library.lincoln.ac.uk/ (currently used for our SirsiDynix Horizon Information Portal OPAC, which we intend to move to catalogue.library… in order to free up www for our web pages hosted on WordPress)
3. http://catalogue.library.lincoln.ac.uk/ (the future home of the library catalogue)
4. http://findit.library.lincoln.ac.uk/ (a launch point for our new Discovery system, still to be announced, and with a name yet to be decided!)
5. http://lists.library.lincoln.ac.uk/ (Talis Aspire reading lists, currently being developed)
6. http://archives.library.lincoln.ac.uk/ (Axiell Calm archives and special collections software)
7. http://jerome.library.lincoln.ac.uk/ (Jerome is our innovation platform and a home for experimental search services, being re-developed as part of the CLOCK project)
8. http://auth.library.lincoln.ac.uk/ (OpenAthens LA v2.1 authentication software)
9. http://proxy.library.lincoln.ac.uk/ (EZProxy authentication software)

We also have two core systems which aren’t on the library subdomain:

1. http://eprints.lincoln.ac.uk/ (the Lincoln Repository on EPrints – it’s appropriate that this isn’t on library, as we’ve always managed the Repository as a shared/collaborative project between CERD, ICT services, the Library, and the Research Office)
2. http://ill.lincoln.ac.uk/ (CLIO inter-library loans software)

As always, we’ve used the list of faculties and schools on the corporate website as our source of canonical information about the names of divisions of the University. We also managed to find a diagram of the new College structure to help us. At the top level of the Lincoln Repository there are now three colleges:

• College of Arts
• College of Sciences
• College of Social Sciences

The top level also includes a division for the Faculty[?] of Agriculture, Equine and Food (apparently not part of a college for the moment), plus a ‘professional services‘ placeholder division. Each college is then divided into faculties and schools (with all but two schools belonging to a faculty). Clear?

The EPrints software, which runs the Lincoln Repository, provides a powerful set of ‘edit subject’ functions for manipulating this hierarchy/tree of divisions. One ‘node’ can be made the child of another node; a node can moved from one parent to another by adding it to its new parent (then ‘unlink‘ing it from its old parent); redundant nodes can be deleted – all without affecting the Repository items themselves.

The new divisions structure should now accurately reflect the current structure of the University of Lincoln*. You can see the tree of divisions at:

• http://eprints.lincoln.ac.uk/view/divisions/
  

*Well, almost accurately. The new School of Life Sciences is a merger between two old schools (Biological Sciences and Natural and Applied Sciences). There’s still some tidying up to do here. Fixed in double-quick time by BJ!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

P.S. The reference to “Vogon poetry” in the title of this blog post comes from the wonderful confirmation messages which EPrints serves up in return for carrying out changes to the divisions tree. Who couldn’t fall in love with language like this?

• “Linked the existing subject node “The Library” as a child of this subject node.”
• “Created new subject node with ID “col_prof”. Please now enter a subject name and set the subject to be depositable, if applicable.”
• “No. (In which case it should probably have some children.”
• “Oh freddled gruntbuggly/thy micturations are to me/As plurdled gabbleblotchits on a lurgid bee.”

As I mentioned in my presentation to library managers last week, it’s turning out to be a nice example of how new web applications can be spun up quickly at Lincoln using our existing [open and non-open] data sources (in this case, HR staff data, BuddyPress social profile data, Repository feeds, Gravatar images, and our OAuth authentication framework/Common Web Design), plus a bit of developer magic.

You can search our staff profile directory (still in development) at: http://phone.online.lincoln.ac.uk/

There is a growing tendency for universities in all groupings—certainly for the research-intensive universities—to publish the entirety of an author’s publications to their web profile as embedded content from their repository and/or Current Research Information System (CRIS). Here are a few examples of staff profiles on other UK universities’ sites which incorporate publication lists derived from their repositories or CRISes:

• University of Brighton (non-inscrits) [scroll down to 'Recent Publications']
• University of Bristol (Russell Group)
• University of East Anglia (1994 group) [click on the 'Publications' tab]
• University of Edinburgh (Russell Group)
• University of Glasgow (Russell Group) [click on the 'Publications' tab]
• University of Huddersfield (University Alliance) [click on 'Publications and Other Research Outputs']
• Imperial College London (Russell Group)
• University of Kent (non-inscrits) [click on 'Publications']
• Kingston University (Million+) [scroll down the page]
• London School of Economics (Russell Group)
• University of Northampton (Million+) [click on 'Publications', then 'View NECTAR records']
• Open University (University Alliance)
• Queen’s University Belfast (Russell Group)
• University of Reading (1994 group) [scroll down the page]
• University of Southampton (Russell Group) [click on the 'Publications' tab]

We’re pulling the publication details from the Lincoln Repository for each author into their web profile (example), using a search on their University of Lincoln staff ID (which forms part of their standard HR data profile) – e.g. http://lncn.eu/ep/000157. We can then get at the Repository data in almost any format we want (BibTeX, JSON, XML, RSS, etc.). I’m also keeping a close eye on the development of the EPrints Shelves plugin, which might be an interesting tool for giving authors more flexibility and control over how their Repository publication list(s) are displayed on their web profile.

1. Discovery selection & implementation;
2. JISC Orbital project (0.3FTE) – based mainly in CERD until March 2013;
3. Possible JISC-funded Jerome follow-on work;
4. Development of the Lincoln Repository – working closely with the Library Institutional Repository Officer (BJ), the Research & Enterprise Office + the subject librarians on the following areas:
   • Metadata workflow and service development
   • Advocacy/training
   • Building a “Research Showcase”
   • CRIS-like development, bibliometrics, and supporting the REF
   • Developing staff profiles on the University’s website
   • E-theses
   • Helpdesk integration (…possibly)

The following are projects—part of the current Library I.T. strategy—that I’ll contribute to but probably won’t lead, and/or work that’s going on in the background that I need to stay abreast of:

1. Reading list development (project);
2. Authentication (project);
3. Participation in various JISC working groups as well as UKCoRR and LISN;
4. Working with the Acquisitions team on new team rôles/areas of work;
5. Monitoring and guiding e-resource management (ERM), authentication, and responding to user problems (this area of work will be looked after day-to-day by the Library (E-resources) Assistant (EV), supported by other staff, as part of the cover for my JISC project work);
6. Supporting the subject librarian for technology in a review of the Library’s presence on the University Portal;
7. Supporting the subject librarians in promoting and supporting the use of RefWorks 2.0;
8. Supporting the HELS in administering copyright/digitisation services and the use of Blackboard.
9. Initiating a new CALM user group.
10. Co-ordinating LIG (the Library Innovation Group).
11. Participating in the work of LNCD.

G’won then: what have I forgotten about?

Your publications can be found at the following short link (edit: URL updated 29 September 2011):

• http://lncn.eu/ep/XXXXXX

Where ‘XXXXXX‘ is your staff ID: the six-digit number you use to log in to the SafeCom printing system. For example, my own list is at: http://lncn.eu/ep/000947 (Any UoL students who have items on the Repository can use their normal 8-digit student account ID in the same place).

You can also get the same list of publications as an RSS feed, using the same staff ID number at:

• http://lncn.eu/eprss/XXXXXX

Again using your staff ID. For example: http://lncn.eu/eprss/000947

As well as subscribing to the list in an RSS feed reader, the RSS version of your publications list can also be embedded in a web page using Feed2JS to generate a bit of embeddable HTML code.

(Technical note: these short links are now possible because we’ve started using Lincoln staff/student IDs as unique identifiers for named authors in EPrints publication records. In future, we’ll be able to use these unique identifiers to create browsable lists of institutional authors, and to link lists of publications to staff profiles on other University systems. Thanks to EPrints Services at Southampton for putting this fix into place. The short URLs themselves were created using the [hidden] namespaces feature of lncn.eu – speak to Nick Jackson for a demo!)

Her enthusiasm and persistence has paid dividends to which I can’t do justice in this short post; instead here’s a feed of Rosaline’s own blog posts from the past year. Thank you, Rosaline.

As I’ve already mentioned, the University of Lincoln’s Repository hit 3,000 records late last month.

The tradition now appears to be that each Repo millennium is marked by cake.

Repository Rhubarb Fairy Cakes

The following recipe can be re-used, adapted and shared under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.

Ingredients (metric equivalents are approximate):

• 8 oz (200g) butter
• 8 oz (200g) caster sugar
• 8 oz (200g) self-raising flour
• 1 heaped teaspoon cornflour
• Pinch of salt
• 2 large eggs
• Syrup left over from poaching rhubarb

Buttercream icing:

• Approx. 2 oz (50g) unsalted butter
• Approx. 4 oz (100g) icing sugar
• Syrup in which rhubarb has been poached
• Hundreds ‘n’ thousands

Method:

1. Pre-heat the oven to Gas Mark 4 (180°C; 350°F)
2. Line a fairy cake pan with paper cases
3. Cream the butter and caster sugar together in a bowl
4. In another bowl, sift the flour, cornflour, and salt together
5. Blend the flour mixture and the eggs into the butter/sugar, a bit at a time
6. Spoon the mixture into paper fairy cake cases
7. Bake for approx. 35 minutes in the middle of the oven
8. While still hot, spoon a couple of teaspoonfuls rhubarb syrup over each cake and let it soak in

Icing the cakes:

1. Beat together the unsalted butter and icing sugar until creamy and smooth
   (You might need to adjust the quantities to get the right consistency)
2. Mix in about 10 teaspoonfuls of the rhubarb syrup
3. Once the cakes are completely cool, spread a spoonful of the icing on top of each one
4. Hundreds ‘n’ thousands are compulsory.

This is being advertised on the internal staff daily alert email, with a banner image:

The next report, for Q4 2010, will be generated from the Repository on 31 March 2011.