Past Meetings of the UK & Ireland DSpace User Group

The UK & Ireland DSpace user group has held the meetings in the past:

The first official meeting of the UK & Ireland DSpace user group was held on Wednesday 17th May in London. The event was kindly hosted by BioMed Central. The meeting took place between 10am and 4pm, but did not get into full swing until 11am to allow people who lived some distance away to arrive.

Notes from the sessions are shown below.

Agenda
10.00 - 10.10 Welcome from BioMed Central (Matt Cockerill)

10.10 - 11.00 Refreshments and chat with informal discussion on the purpose, aims and future of the UK&I user group (facilitated by Amy Hale)

11.00 - 12.30 IRRA talk and discussion (Claire Knowles) See abstract below

12:30 - 13:30 Buffet lunch

13:30 - 13:50 DSpace update from HP (Nick Wainwright)

13:50 - 14:15 Discussion about the DSpace federation, and the way ahead (chaired by Stuart Lewis)

14:15 - 14:45 DSpace 2 - vision and issues (Jim+Downing)

14:45 - 15:30 Discussion about JISC funding and potential collaboration (chaired by Peter Morgan)

15:30 - 16:00 Informal 'networking' time (participants may leave early if they need to)

Venue
The venue was:
Globix Corp. Prospect House, 80-110 New Oxford Street, London, WC1A 1HB, UK Map

Presentation abstracts
Technical Overview of the IRRA Implementation for DSpace
As part of the JISC IRRA project on the use of Institutional Repositories for Research Assessment Edinburgh University has been developing a web application for the RAE in 2008 which utilises DSpace. The IRRA software is designed to hold all information required for the RA2 Research Outputs for submission to the RAE for an institution. The aim of this presentation is to discuss the technical aspects of the project and how to install and implement the software in your institution including:

Deployment of the IRRA web application

Database setup

Use of SRW to search DSpace

METS patch for Dspace 1.3.2 to return files

Import of publications into DSpace

Import of data into the IRRA web application

Authentication

This will be followed by a discussion on the use of Institutional Repositories for Research Assessment.

Participants
Philip Adams, DeMontfort University
Fereshteh Afshari, Imperial College London
Clare Allan, University of Stirling
Theo Andrew, The University of Edinburgh
Jon Bell, University of Wales Aberystwyth
Eddie Boyle, University of Edinburgh
Gary Brewerton, Loughborough University
Matt Cockerill, BioMed Central
Jim+Downing, University of Cambridge
Mark Ellingson, University of Bristol
Tom George, Imperial College London
Clive Gould, Bromley College
Amy Hale, HP
Ravinder Kalsi, Brunel University
Claire Knowles, The University of Edinburgh
Marie Lagerwall, London School of Economics
Stuart Lewis, University of Wales Aberystwyth
Liam Lynch, BioMed Central
Sandy MacKenzie, Imperial College London
Matt Martin, University of Birmingham
Elena Menendez-Alonso, University of Plymouth
Mark Merifield, BioMed Central
Peter Morgan, University of Cambridge
John Murtagh, Brunel University
Satu Nieminen, University of Bradford
Keith Nockels, University of Leicester
Martin Price, Swansea University
John Rae, BioMed Central
Barry Spencer, Bromley College
Graham Triggs, BioMed Central
Nick Wainwright, HP Labs, Bristol
Colin Watt, University of Edinburgh
Mike Whyment, University of Aberdeen

Notes

Notes from initial session (taken by Nick Wainwright, HP): Many views on how often to meet.

Quarterly / Six monthly / Yearly - with sub-meetings and phone/video conferences on specific topics

Where to meet

Move around

Scotland / N. Ireland / (no one mentioned Wales, but I assume Stuart will host us in Aberystwyth - (He glady will!))

Who should attend?

Technical (developers, architects)

Users

Project managers/policy makers

Need to ensure agenda addresses their (different) needs What should be on the agenda

Case studies of what people / institutions are doing

Early thoughts on what you (we) are planning on doing/developing in the future

Technical topics

Demonstrations of capabilities and extensions that have been developed

Discussion of integration with other platforms

How to drive 'use' (getting content in repo's)

Standards (for x, y, z - not specified)

Business models for repositories

UK specific copyright issues (some discussion of whether this was the right forum for this)

(this isn't an exhaustive list!)

Co-location

Yes, this could be a good idea.

Specific suggestion - co-locate with Fedora, Eprints!

What would we want to achieve

To have created a forums to address important 'functional areas' in DSpace

To have a forum for f2f dialog about key topics (technical and other areas)

To provide guidance and information for 'newcomers' to DSpace

To be able to address UK&I specific topics

To allow technical folk and developers to meet face to face

To build a 'support network' so we know who to call when we need help or support

To facilitate 'loose coordination' of projects and to identify and motivate collaborative development

To articulate needs of the DSpace users (projects, institutions, and UK community)

To share and influence DSpace development roadmap

To identify and agree upon shared 'standards'

Advocacy for DSpace adoption, development, and funding to funding bodies and institutions

To get to know each other

Notes from final session (taken by Jon Bell, UWA):

The DSpace Federation will bring into being a small Working Group (WG) to steer core development of DSpace 2.

The relationships between the Working Group, the community and the users were discussed. It was noted that the community was decentralised, meaning different people were using different version to save updating their adaptations. The UKIUG was happy with the idea of the working group.

Approaches to funding the federation were discussed, one possibility was getting old of "Framework 7" funding. Another approach was a subscription model, but support for this would be sensitive to the amount of the subscription.

It was asked whether the federation should be a formally constituted legal entity, allowing it to apply for funds. The federation would oversee core development. It was felt that the UKUIG might have a role as a conduit for discussions between user and the working group. Requirements can be discusses in the UKUIG and the level of support (and possibly their feasibility) considered before being brought to the WG.

There was some thought of setting up UKUG working groups. These might include representation from the people who have invested most in DSpace core activities.

The role of committed and informal developers (who can make less time available) was discussed. The WG could manage and co-ordinate these efforts.