Using an Open Source Institutional Repository Software Susan Gibbons Assoc. Dean, River Campus Libraries University of Rochester AIM: susanlgibbons

Case Study University of Rochester –7,800 FTE –Research I Institution –Undergraduate, Graduate, Medical & Music DSpace –Open source software –Developed by Hewlett Packard & MIT Libraries –Worldwide user-base of approx. 150 institutions

Getting Started Provost encouragement & support 2002 landscape –ePrints –Greenstone –DSpace –Vendor products DSpace most robust institutional product at the time

Start-up Personnel Hired full-time Java programmer Project manager- 25% librarian –Understanding IRs and Users –Liaison with university –Liaison with IR community –Coordinate creation of policies and procedures System Administrator- several weeks –Install DSpace and associated software

Start-up Personnel (cont.) Graphic designer- 1 week Committees- various durations –Policies –Procedures –Legal issues –Metadata –Authentication

Ongoing Personnel Java Programmer- 75% Reallocated existing staff –Project Manager: 10% librarian –DSpace Manager: 33% librarian Deposits materials Education of library staff Marketing –5% bibliographers Listening for opportunities Conduit to faculty

Ongoing Personnel (cont.) System Admin- 10% Unix admin –Updates –Backups As needed- –Cataloger –Graphic designer

Equipment Costs Web server, data storage & backup –Approximately $30K Development server with limited data storage –Approximately $12K No “testing” allowed on the live site!

Pros of Open Source Significant alterations to the source code Significant customization of the UI We decide development priorities Relatively few unexpected costs –Licensing increases, i.e., course mgmt systems No danger of vendor going out-of-business

Cons of Open Source Significant technical expertise needed to go beyond “out-of-the-box” No one to call or blame Code development branches are lonely Limited documentation Difficult to know where community is going

2450 items 29 communities 900+ downloads/day Over 310K downloads since Jan 2005 Pre-/post-prints, audio, video, images, theses, e-journals, music scores, technical reports, white papers- 90% library submitted 15% of faculty

Conclusion Most barriers to faculty adoption have nothing to do with open source/commercial decision Maturation of IRs means more alternatives –Hosted open sources solutions –Consortial opportunities –Locally hosted vendor solutions

Questions?