Old Release
This documentation relates to an old version of DSpace, version 4.x. Looking for another version? See all documentation.
This DSpace release is end-of-life and is no longer supported.
Work in progress
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Persistent Identifier
It is good practice to user Persistent Identifier to address items in a digital repository. There are many different systems for persistent Identifiers: Handle, DOI, urn:nbn, purl and many more. It is far out of the scope of this document to discuss the differences of all these systems. For several reasons the handle system is deeply integrated in DSpace and DSpace makes intensive use of handles. With DSpace 3.0 the Identifier Service was introduced that makes it possible to use external identifier services within DSpace.
DOIs are Persistent Identifier like handles are. But as many big publishing companies uses DOIs they are quite well-known by scientists. Some journals asks for DOIs to link supplemented material whenever an article is submitted. Beginning with DSpace 4.0 it is possible to use DOIs in parallel to the handle system within DSpace. By using DOIs we mean automatic generation, reservation and registration of DOIs for every item that gets published.
DOI Registration Agencies
To register a DOI one has to enter into a contract with a DOI registration agency that is member of the International DOI Foundation. Several such agencies exist. Different DOI registration agencies have different policies. Some of them offer DOI registration specially or only for academic environment, others only for publishing companies. Most of the registration agencies charge fees for registering DOIs, all of them have different rules describing for what kind of item a DOI can be registered.
DataCite is an international initiative to promote science and research and a member of the Internation DOI Foundation. The members of DataCite act as registration agencies for DOIs. If you want to register DOIs within DSpace for a scientific or academic repository, you can contact the DataCite member next to you and ask if the fit your purposes. Some DataCite members provide own APIs to reserve and register DOIs, others let their clients use the API from DataCite directly. Since version 4.0 DSpace supports using the API of DataCite directly and the API of the DOI registration agency named EZID, located in the U.S.
DSpace DOI Configuration
Identifier Service
'cron' Job for asynchronous reservation/registration
Command Line Interface
Limitations of DSpace DOI support
Adding support for other Registration Agencies