1. RDM in Canada: National Context
CAUL RDM Forum
February 26, 2018
Jeff Moon, Director, Portage

2. What is the Portage Network?
“Portage is a national, library-based research data management network that coalesces initiatives in research data management to build capacity and to coordinate activities better”

3. RDM in the news… CBC Spark
Collars collect data on temperature, position of Caribou heads, 10-second bursts of video every 30 minutes, and GPS data.
Same episode talked about ways of making human genomic data public…

4. Drivers in the RDM Ecosystem
Emerging
Tri-Agency Policy on RDM
But through our Expert and Working Groups, also aiming to address other gaps and needs in the RDM ecosystem…
But also trends in
journal publishing
open science
international initiatives
best practices

5. Goals of the Portage Network
Build a community of practice for research data management (RDM)
Engage and advocate for research data management with stakeholder communities
Facilitate and provide leadership in the development of RDM infrastructure

6. Building a Community of Practice
Researchers
Institutions
Liaison Librarians
IT Specialists
Unversity Research Offices
Ethics Boards
Other stakeholders
Network of Experts
The Portage network of over 110 Experts (RDM Specialists/Librarians) work closely with other stakeholders at our home institutions.
RDM Specialists/Librarians 6
Infrastructure Platforms

7. Building a Community of Practice
Researchers
Academic
Government
Others
Institutions
Liaison Librarians
IT Specialists
Unversity Research Offices
Ethics Boards
Other stakeholders
Network of Experts
These experts and their institutional partners reach out to and support researchers in meeting their RDM needs.
RDM Specialists/Librarians 7
Infrastructure Platforms

8. Building a Community of Practice
Researchers
Academic
Government
Others
Institutions
Liaison Librarians
IT Specialists
Unversity Research Offices
Ethics Boards
Other stakeholders
Network of Experts
Underpinning all of this is a growing array of RDM infrastructure platforms, including an online Data Management Planning system (the DMP Assistant) and repository options such as Dataverse and the Federated Research Data Repository (FRDR).
RDM Specialists/Librarians
DMP Assistant
Federated Research Data Repository
Dataverse 8
Infrastructure Platforms

9. Portage Network of Experts
110+
Portage now has over 100 volunteers serving on our
Expert and Working Groups – many on multiple groups!
Experts come from across the country, with strong representation from each of our four Regional Library Consortia
Experts
40+
Portage Experts come from over 40 different institutions and/or organizations, including CARL and non-CARL Libraries and a range of other organizations.
Portage now has over 110 volunteers
Organizations

10. Eastern Canada: 9 people, 6 organizations

11. Portage Network of Experts: Expert & Working Groups
Expert Groups
Data Management Planning
Curation
Data Discovery
Preservation
Training
Research Intelligence
Working Groups
Dataverse North WG
FRDR Service Model WG
Ethical Treatment of Sensitive Data WG
FRDR Discovery Service WG
Institutional RDM Strategies WG
Focussing on both
PRACTICAL SOLUTIONS & POLICY DEVELOPMENT

12. Stakeholder Engagement
LOCAL
REGIONAL/ PROVINCIAL
NATIONAL
In the realm of Canadian higher education, RESEARCH DATA MANAGEMENT is a distributed activity involving the collaboration of many players, including researchers, librarians, university administrators, at local, regional/provincial, and national levels.

13. Local Stakeholders Researchers Libraries Graduate Studies IT
Research Services
Ethics
Graduate Studies
Researchers
On a local scale, the Canadian context resembles that of other countries.
Canadian Campuses have a network of players who have a stake in providing and supporting RDM.
Researchers and research groups on campus are engaged in the development of solutions to meet their own RDM needs, and are often supported by their broader research-domain community.
Libraries are engaged in supporting the RDM needs of researchers and students on their campuses through instruction and outreach, providing DM platforms and other tools.
Graduate students are learning the habits and techniques of RDM from their supervisors, colleagues, and librarians on campus.
Research offices, including vice-presidents of research, offices of sponsored research, and research ethics boards set institutional policy guidelines and requirements
Meanwhile computing services, which includes everything from IT departments to the CIO, are responsible for technical coordination, security and compliance.
Aspects of this will be discussed further by Steve Cundy. 13

14. Regional Stakeholders
Canada’s four regional library consortia
Portage has signed Memoranda of Understanding (MOUs) with all four Regional Library Consortia in Canada. This connection helps Portage reach both CARL and non-CARL Libraries across Canada. We have implemented monthly teleconferences with our Regional partners, to improve communication, collaboration, and coordination of efforts in RDM.
Council of Prairie & Pacific University Libraries
Ontario Council of University Libraries 14

15. Digital Research Ecosystem
Researchers
Tri-Council
Institutions/
Organizations
CFI
Society
Federal Departments & Agencies
Support
Use
SBDA
Open Science
Policy
DIGITAL RESEARCH ECOSYSTEM
Provinces
ISED
Against this institutional backdrop, there is a broader Digital Research Ecosystem that Portage is engaged with.
This ecosystem model is framed in four quadrants: Servics, Support, Use, and Direction.
CARL
Portage
Services
Direction
LCDRI
CANARIE
Compute
Canada
Research
Data Canada
CASRAI
Adapted from CFI DRI submission

16. Digital Research Ecosystem
Researchers
Canada Foundation for Innovation
Tri-Council
Institutions/
Organizations
Science-based Departments & Agencies
CFI
Society
Federal Departments & Agencies
Support
Use
SBDA
Open Science
Policy
DIGITAL RESEARCH ECOSYSTEM
Provinces
ISED
Some of the acronyms are defined here.
CARL
Portage
Innovation
Science &
Economic
Development
Services
Direction
LCDRI
CANARIE
Compute
Canada
Research
Data Canada
Leadership
Council for
Digital Research Infrastructure
CASRAI
Adapted from CFI DRI submission

17. Digital Research Ecosystem
Researchers
Canada Foundation for Innovation
Tri-Council
Institutions/
Organizations
Science-based Departments & Agencies
CFI
Society
Federal Departments & Agencies
Support
Use
SBDA
Open Science
Policy
DIGITAL RESEARCH ECOSYSTEM
Provinces
ISED
  Portage is involved with all of these stakeholders.
CARL
Portage
Innovation
Science &
Economic
Development
Services
Direction
LCDRI
CANARIE
Compute
Canada
Research
Data Canada
Leadership
Council for
Digital Research Infrastructure
CASRAI
Adapted from CFI DRI submission

18. RDM Support & Infrastructure
Portage is doing a lot of work
providing RDM support and infrastructure

19. RDM Support & Infrastructure
Portage is doing a lot of work
Providing RDM support and infrastructure

20. External Training Resource Library

21. RDM Support & Infrastructure
Portage
Institutional RDM Strategy Working Group

22. Institutional RDM Strategy: Template
Raise awareness:
… need to raise awareness within the research community about the benefits of and best practices for good data management, as well as impending policy requirements.
2. Assess institutional readiness:
… aware of the location, condition, estimated growth, and value of data sets.
…review the data landscape on campus, using one of a number of existing tools.
3. Develop a policy or statement:
… providing a framework to help researchers & stakeholders understand their roles and responsibilities around managing research data.
4. Define a roadmap:
… to help institutions build capacity for research data management over the medium term.
… incorporate best practices in research data management to promote research excellence, greater efficiency and greater transparency of research.
Associated Guidance

23. RDM Support & Infrastructure
Portage
Data Management Planning Expert Group

24. RDM Infrastructure Platforms & Portage
Data Management Planning Assistant
Data collection
Documentation & metadata
Backup & storage
Preservation
Data sharing & reuse
Responsibilities & resources
Ethics & legal compliance
Both a tool & a template

25. RDM Support & Infrastructure
Portage
Federated Research Data Repository
Dataverse North

26. RDM Infrastructure Platforms & Portage
Research Data Repositories
Federated Research
Data Repository
Regional & Institutional
Instances of Dataverse
Portage partnership with
Compute Canada
Portage Dataverse North Working Group
Main Features:
Mature Platform
Widely adopted
User-friendly
Brandable
Main Features:
‘Big Data’ upload/download
National Discovery Platform
National Repository Option
Provides Preservation Pipeline

27. Federated Architecture
Portage supports the development of a national ‘Federated Architecture’ for RDM, with the primary goal of supporting Researchers…
Council of Prairie & Pacific University Libraries
Ontario Council of University Libraries 27
Researchers

28. Federated Architecture
Federated Research Data Respository (FRDR)
Portage
Portage: Dataverse North
Regional/Institutional
instances of
Regional/Institutional
Repositories
Discipline-specific Repositories
Researchers are already using existing repositories to deposit their data, code, and metadata.
FRDR provides an option that supports the deposit of ‘big data’, filling a gap in the existing repository landscape (i.e. Dataverse, for instance, can only handle files smaller than 2 Gb).
BIG data
Research data
&
metadata
Deposit
Researchers

29. Federated Architecture
Federated Research Data Respository (FRDR)
Portage
Portage: Dataverse North
Regional/Institutional
instances of
Regional/Institutional
Repositories
Discipline-specific Repositories
Data download is another important consideration in providing effective access. FRDR handles ‘big data’ download.
BIG data
Research data
&
metadata
Deposit
Download
Researchers

30. Federated Architecture
Preservation processing via Archivematica
National Discovery Layer
Metadata harvested into FRDR
Federated Research Data Respository (FRDR)
Portage
Portage: Dataverse North
Regional/Institutional
instances of
Regional/Institutional
Repositories
Discipline-specific Repositories
Further to this, metadata from over 30 Canadian repositories are being harvested into FRDR to provide a National Discovery Layer – one-stop shopping for Canadian Research Data, wherever it is housed.
Additionally, FRDR provides a ‘preservation processing pipeline’ using Archivematica.
BIG data
Research data
&
metadata
Deposit
Download
Researchers

31. Federated Architecture - Storage
Archival Storage
Network of Preservation Storage Providers
Repository Storage
Dataverse,
FRDR
&
Other repositories
Looking more closely at the different types of storage needed throughout the research life cycle, we can see there are three main types of storage:
Active Storage – where researchers store, access, and work with their data during the actual research project
2. Repository Storage – where researchers deposit data at the end of a project (after publication)
3. Archival Storage – where selected data and metadata are stored for long-term preservation purposes.
Research-level storage that facilitates actual research process
Active Storage

32. Data Storage Continuum
This graphic illustrates the Data Storage Continuum in terms of Access, Storage Purpose, and Use.
Note here that Archival Storage is not aimed to serve access or discovery needs, but rather to serve as the ‘copy of last resort’ in the case of failure at the ‘repository storage’ level.

33. Data Storage Continuum
Examples of each of the three types of storage are shown here. For Archival Storage, Archival Information Packages, or AIPs, are created and stored in one or more archives (run by preservation service providers).

34. Data Storage Continuum
And there are other RDM activities that happen along with ‘storage’
In addition to ‘storage’, other RDM-related activities take place during the research life cycle.
These include Data Management Planning and Data Curation…
DATA MANAGEMENT PLANNING
DATA CURATION

35. Portage Outreach: with Tri-Agencies
Jan 2018:
Vancouver
& Calgary
Sept 2017:
Montreal
Feb 2018:
Halifax
Portage has just completed a series of cross-country stakeholder consultations looking at the emerging Tri-Agency RDM Policy and how Portage is helping both researchers and institutions respond to these requirements.
Council of Prairie & Pacific University Libraries
Ontario Council of University Libraries 35
Jan 2018:
Toronto

36. Portage Outreach: Fall 2017
September:
Portage/RDA RDM Day
November & December:
2 DLI Training Sessions
December:
CODATA Canada webinar
Portage activities in the Fall of 2017 are shown here…
December:
Coalition for Networked Information
Washington

37. Portage Outreach: Winter/Spring 2018
February: 13th Annual International Digital Curation Conference (IDCC), Barcelona Spain
February: Meetings with LAC and NRC regarding RDM
March: CODATA Conference, Gottingen, Germany
March: Research Data Alliance (RDA) Conference, Berlin, Germany
And we’ve been busy in the Winter/Spring of 2018 as well!
April: BCNET 2018, Vancouver, BC
May: IASSIST 2018, Montreal, QC
June: Atlantic Provinces Library Association, Fredericton, NB

38. So Portage has been busy!
Highlights 2015 to Present
New Business Models
New Governance Model
Governance
CIHR Training Modules
OCUL MOU
Platforms/Services
SSHRC DMP Workshop
Dataverse North
Outreach
COPPUL MOU
CAUL MOU
Agreements
CSA -Life Sciences
LCDRI
Website Launch
Portage Day - Montreal
Compute Canada/FRDR
FRDR – Limited Production
DMP Assistant
This rather colourful slide shows a timeline of Portage progress since Key, I think, to this is the growth in the number of volunteers who make up our NETWORK OF EXPERTISE.
Second Portage Director
First Portage Director
Portage Day - Toronto
CARL Approval
BCI MOU
2015
2016
2017
2018
Volunteers 15 42 98
115

39. Jeff Moon, Portage Director
Questions?
portagenetwork.ca
Jeff Moon, Portage Director