VITAL – an Open Source/Proprietary Source Solution for Institutional Repositories built on a unique funding and partnership model. The JISC/CNI Meeting July 6, 2006 York, UK Vinod Chachra, PhD CEO, VTLS Inc.

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VALET – How it began? VTLS was participating in Open Source activities for a long time In 2004: started Institutional Repositories Project – VITAL. Decided to build on existing infrastructure and architecture. VTLS examined all the available open source software and selected Fedora as a base to build on. VTLS established a partnership with Fedora. ARROW had similar ideas in 2004 – selected Fedora and VTLS to create the IR infrastructure with a very unique partnership. This presentation discusses the unique partnership; the unusual funding model and the results achieved.

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Presentation Outline Who are the players and why they joined the game? VITAL … a VTLS proprietary software product FEDORA … open source software project ARROW … Government funded higher education consortia How was the project assembled? What results were achieved? Relationships between open source and proprietary source Where do we go from here?

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Who is VTLS? VTLS is rooted at Virginia Tech, Virginia s largest University VTLS is the first spin-off corporation from Virginia Tech VTLS in business for over 20 years VTLS has agents and offices in countries around the world. VTLS does business over 40 countries VTLS is opening an office in the UK in 2006 National Library of Wales and Oxford University are Virtua and VITAL customers.

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Corporate Headquarters Blacksburg, Virginia USA

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VTLS Products MainVTLSOther In Beta Test ProductsVTLS Products Related to Virtua: 1. FRBR 2. Union Catalogs & Consortium Databases

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VTLS Institutional Repository

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions What is Fedora? Flexible Extensible Digital Object Repository Architecture

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions History of Fedora 1997-Present – –DARPA and NSF-funded research project at Cornell (Conceptual framework developed by Sandra Payette and Carl Lagoze) – –Reference implementation developed at Cornell – –University of Virginia digital library prototype (Thornton Staples and Ross Wayland) 2002-Present Andrew W. Mellon Foundation gave Virginia and Cornell a large grant to develop a production-quality Fedora system Fedora was developed and released 2003 as Open Source under the Mozilla public license agreement and continues to be enhanced.

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Fedora Advantage Extensible digital object model Repository exposed by Web services APIs Management (Creation, Deletion, Maintenance, Validation) Access (Search, Disseminations) Scalable, persistent storage for content and metadata Content can be local and/or remote Content versioning Open source solution

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Fedora Digital Object Architecture Globally Unique Persistent ID Public View: access methods for obtaining disseminations of digital object content Internal View: metadata necessary to manage the object Protected View: content that makes up the basis of the object Persistent ID (PID) Disseminators SystemMetadata Datastreams EAD, TEI, DC, MARC, VRA Core, MIX, etc. Images, E-books, E-journals, Music, Video, etc.

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Create Complex Digital Objects Digital Object DC EAD Datastreams Admin Metadata Admin Metadata EA D

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Fedora Repository Web Service Exposure Layer

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Reasons to base VITAL on Fedora The Flexible and Extensible aspects: Flexible – The development can be in any programming language because the API is based on Web services Extensible – We can write workflow tools that facilitate different types of workflows XML Submission and Storage – Digital objects are stored as XML- encoded files that conform to an extension of the METS schema Focuses on Object Repository model and not how the repository will be used Native OAI-PMH support Open Source – VTLS is active in the open source movement

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Reasons to base VITAL on Fedora Extensible digital object model (architecture) allowing for complex objects Repository exposed by Web services APIs Management (Creation, Deletion, Maintenance, Validation) Access (Search, Disseminations) Scalable, persistent storage for content & metadata Content can be local and/or remote Content versioning There is a community developing other add-ons to Fedora that will add value and services for adopters Low cost procurement for customers

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Vital Manager FEDORA VITAL Fedora Relationship Valet Access Portal Indexes Web services Batch Loading Tool

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Workflow tools that simplify the creation, modification, submission and dissemination of digital objects Web Service Interfaces (API s) Management Service (API-M) Ingest – XML-encoded object submission Create – interactive object creation via API request Maintain – interactive object modification via API requests Validate – application of integrity rules to objects Identify – generate unique object identifiers Security – authentication and access control Preserve – automatic content versioning and audit trail Export – XML-encoded object formats How does VITAL work with Fedora?

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Fedora is conveniently located 2 ½ hours north of VTLS at the University of Virginia. VTLS needed some basic services (that belonged in Fedora but were not available) and started working together with Fedora with the understanding that some parts of VTLS developed modules would become open source like Fedora. Fedora agreed to let VTLS provide installation and support services for Fedora users that needed these services. VTLS announced VITAL Enter Fedora- VTLS partnership

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Enter ARROW - What is ARROW? Australian Research Repositories Online to the World Project funded by the Australian Commonwealth Department of Education, Science and Training, under the Research Information Infrastructure Framework for Australian Higher Education. (Funding ends December 31, 2006)Department of Education, Science and Training Consortium of Monash University (lead institution), National Library of Australia, the University of New South Wales, and Swinburne University of Technology.Monash UniversityNational Library of AustraliaUniversity of New South Wales Swinburne University of Technology The ARROW project will identify and test software or solutions to support best practice institutional digital repositories comprising e-prints, digital theses and electronic publishing.

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions ARROWs view … Why partner with VTLS? Partnering for success, support and survivability ARROW needed to partner with a developer who could not only produce the software but could provide ongoing user support and development after December 31, 2006 Why VTLS Inc.? VTLS wanted to be a development partner Had begun work on a repository solution already Familiar with library sector Willing to produce a combination of a proprietary solution, Fedora and other Open Source software

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions ARROWs view … Why Fedora? ARROW s primary requirements a robust, well architected underlying platform Support for a flexible object-oriented data model Persistent identifiers down to the level of individual datastreams, accommodating its compound content model Ability to version both content and disseminators (think of software behaviors for content) Clean and open exposure of APIs with well-documented SOAP/REST web services.

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions ARROW/VTLS - Project Timeline June Partnership contract signed. January Version 1.2 delivered. April Version 1.3 delivered. June Contract extension signed. September VALET for ETDs put into open source. ARROW consortia install Fedora/VITAL. Count = 4 October VTLS contributes more open source to FEDORA. November Version 2.0 delivered. March Four universities implement Fedora/VITAL. Count = 8 May Version 2.1 delivered and another university implements Fedora/VITAL; Count = 9 June Five additional universities join ARROW; Count = 14

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions ARROW/VTLS – Funding Model ARROW started as a demonstration project to prove feasibility of IRs ARROW partnered with VTLS-VITAL and ended as a operational IR VTLS developed software in close co-operation with Fedora & ARROW. The funding model: ARROW provided funding to VTLS against some deliverables The VTLS development project was required to coordinate and synchronize with Fedora developments. As a part of the funding agreement, VTLS would place certain modules in open source for all Fedora users whether they were VITAL users or not. The initial ARROW consortium would get the VITAL/Fedora software; but would be required to pay for installation, training and support services Additional members could buy in at advantageous prices for a predefined period

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VITAL / Fedora Open Source (through VITAL Version 4.0)

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VITAL/FEDORA Platform(s) Server LINUX or SOLARIS Databases MySQL (recommended) McKoi Oracle or Oracle XE Client PC Windows 2000 or XP Browser IE Firefox

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Key Features/Benefits to VITAL (1) Some key benefits of VITAL include: Storage and management of any content format, including rich-media, due to VITAL's repository object architecture Integration with existing systems through open, standards-based protocols Search full-text content of PDF, DOC, RTF and other document formats Display high resolution imagery, multi-page documents and specialized data formats (MARC, EAD, TEI, etc.) Automatically capture preservation metadata and create long-term, citable DOIs Storage of content in native XML provides support/validation against any metadata schema Support for aggregation of like-content in collections Automatic metadata extraction and validation (facilitates preservation)

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Key Features/Benefits to VITAL (2) Additional benefits of VITAL include: Web-crawler indexing and exposure (Google, etc.) Language support and UNICODE compliance Support for custom index creation for resource discovery SRW/SRU Interface for exposure of repository content Tracking content changes through versioning Robust facilities for batch ingest of content Support for link resolving against an institutions OpenURL server Support for dynamic creation/export of content citations (EndNote, text) Facilities for web-based self-submission of diverse content types (VALET) Integration with Fedora repository architecture allows for extensibility

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VITAL Components VITAL Manager VITAL AccessPortal VITAL Access Administration VITAL Access Indexing Options & Content Models Oracle9i, McKoi, or MySQL Database VITAL Advanced Server Fedora Server Apache Web ServerApache Tomcat Web Server VALET Self-Submission Tool

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions editor Ingesting using VALET submitter VALET web – form captures objects one by one

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Ingesting using VALET Web-based form For self service or assisted submission Can be customised for your look and feel Currently 7 basic ARROW defined content models Can be extended to include more models User specified review processes Number of review stages is fully configurable Can specify different reviewers for different stages e.g. metadata, copyright –

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VALET for ETDs A subset of VALET that is supplied with VITAL. A complete standalone application. Bundled with Fedora TM Digital Object Repository Is a free, open-source solution for web self-submission of Electronic Theses & Dissertations. A best of breed solution for web submission of ETDs that builds upon our collaborative experience with: NDLTD Project at Virginia Tech ADT Program ARROW Project

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Where does VALET for ETDs fit? VITAL Manager VITAL AccessPortal VITAL Access Administration VITAL Access Indexing Options and Content Models Oracle9i, McKoi, or MySQL Database VITAL Advanced Server Fedora Server Apache Web ServerApache Tomcat Web Server VALET for ETDs VALET Self-Submission Tool

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VALET for ETDs ( Examples)

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Login Screen

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Deposit Form

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Deposit Form (cont.)

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Field Requirements/Validation

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Customizable Help Files

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Preview

Preview (cont.)

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Upload Files Select Files Access Authorization

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Verify Deposit

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions ETD Deposit Completed

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Reviewer Login

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Review Stages

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Review Stage 1

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions View/Modify data

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Add Reviewer Note

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Approval Confirmation

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Review Stage 3

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Publish Confirmation

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions ETD Publish Complete

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Expose -- the VITAL Access Portal ARROW Discovery Service OAI-PMH SRU/SRW Google, etc

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Always work closely with the source of your open source VTLS staff/customers are active in Fedora community: Carl Grant, VTLS President sits on Advisory Group ARROW Technical Architect sits on Advisory Group Joe Liversedge, VITAL Lead Developer sits on Development Group. ARROW staff sit on Development Group VTLS/ARROW coordinating development of content models. VITAL builds on XACML features of FEDORA. Work together to minimize overlap and maximize coordination. VTLS contributes back open source components. Observation (1)

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Your selected support vendor needs to be able to demonstrate influence points within the open source community. This influence is critical since the vendor needs to have the ability to fix problems in such a way that changes are incorporated into the primary source.. Martin, Fink, The Business and Economics of LINUX and Open Source, Prentice-Hall, 2003 Observation (2)

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Build add-on software (like VITAL) only on released versions of the open source platform (like Fedora) All software projects take longer than expected. Fedora does not have paying customers and so software development schedules have a greater tendency to slip. When VTLS builds VITAL releases on anticipated Fedora features and capabilities, which for some reason get delayed, then VTLS has to write the capability OR wait till it becomes available. New policy: build only on released versions of Fedora. Observation (3)

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions There is an important role for for profit businesses to participate in open source solutions to provide continuity, service, and value over time. ARROW started with a demonstration project goal and ended with a production IR system due to the partnership. ARROW protected itself and its users by involving VTLS in the project. Observation (4)

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions It is possible to run a project among partners spread all over the globe, as long as everyone commits to good communications. Regular phone (Skype) meetings. Lots of documentation – s, project plans, concept papers. Frequent travel. Commitment to a common goal. Accountability for all. Observation (5)

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VITAL Release 3 and 4 available in 2006 with added functionality (see later slide) 25 committed users In the UK – National Library of Wales & Oxford University Seven content models supported, more coming Project with a life and a future Current Status – June 2006

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions ARROW Beyond 2006 –Funding request for ARROW Supporting the RQF (Research Quality Framework) Creative development of institutional repositories Supporting Australian engagement with institutional repositories Building partnerships to further enhance repositories Identifier Management Infrastructure for e-Research Resources

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VITAL - What are you buying? A product that builds on top of the open source foundation, a product that provides: VITAL Manager VITAL Portal VITAL Access Portal VALET - Web Self-Submission Tool VTLS Batch Loader Tool Handles Server (CNRI) Google Indexing and Exposure SRU / SRW Support Most importantly: Service Support Sustainability !

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VITAL - What are you buying? Service: New versions containing: Enhancements Bug fixes Upgrades Documentation Training 24x7 emergency support and telephone support VINES - A community of users and experts

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VITAL - What else are you buying? You re buying into a concept, a product and a vendor that: Believes that Open Source software helps to provide a lower cost solution for libraries. Openly and visibly demonstrates support for the Open Source movement and has become part of the Open Source community. Contributes back to the Fedora open source solution as a result of our customer partnerships. Provides commercial support, training, documentation & hosting services for open source solutions - assuring long term sustainability of the solution. Works with other commercial entities to provide essential tools/services needed to make repository services successful at your institution.

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VITAL – What is coming? Upcoming VITAL Versions: Improve Authentication/Authorization Services. XACML (Policy enforcement) Create Additional & Enhanced Content Models. Provide Usage and access statistics. Improve User configurable interfaces. Move towards Web Based Staff Client -- replacing the present windows based client. Support for OAI sets. Integrate 3rd party components like federated searches.

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions VITAL – What else is coming? VTLS is working on the following – Provide a method to link your VITAL repository to bio pages for staff & faculty of your institution. Allow you to prime your repository by loading metadata for works published by your staff and faculty. In some instances, depending upon licenses, allow loading of published papers & works. Provide a connection to a citation formatting tool that supports 100 s of formats.

Visionary Technology in Library Solutions Thanks To the conference organizers for inviting me here To all of you for being here Parting thought Go as far as you can see for you will be able to see farther when you get there Source unknown