1. mEDRA project: multilingual European DOI (Digital Object Identifier) Registration Agency Kerkira, 23 May 2003 www.medra.org mEDRA Gabriella Scipione Cineca

2. www.medra.org mEDRA CINECA is the largest scientific comupting centre in Italy and one of the largest in the European Union Point of contact for academia, reasearch and industry

3. Cineca: Statutory aims  To promote the use of the most advanced information processing systems in order to support public and private scientific and technological research  To provide all the Consortium members, the MIUR (Ministry of Education, University Research) and other Ministries with specialized computer processing services  To extend the use of the available resources to other public and private bodies www.medra.org mEDRA

4. Cineca: main activities  High Performance Computing: The Division promotes and supports the utilization of these resources. VIS.I.T. (VISual Information Technology): inter- disciplinary laboratory equipped with powerful and supercomputers for graphical treatment. This division enabled Cineca to take part to numerous E-projects  Services for Ministry (MIUR): e-vote system for the election of the members of the judging commission for the university appointment (secret and anonimous online election); service for online enrolment at the university  Value added Internet services for several public institutions: create and maintain several portals, provides for the Foreign Affair Ministry the software infrastructure that allows embassies (worldwide distributed) to exchange documents securely, for the Ministry of Justice offer a free and unified access service to juridical material - national and European – situated on public institution Internet sites.  Administrative services for the Universities www.medra.org mEDRA

5. HPC C.I.N.E.C.A. facility

6. Summary Part I: what the DOI is 1.DOI is a standard identifier 2.DOI: interoperability 3.DOI is an alphanumeric string 4.DOI can integrate other standard identifiers 5.DOI is a tool to describe the identified entity 6.DOI is “actionable” in the Internet 7.DOI is a persistent identifier 8.DOI system is based on a designed social structure Part II: what the mEDRA project is Part III: concrete applications of DOI Voluntary deposit system Persistent citation system Tracking relations between IP entities www.medra.org mEDRA

7. What the DOI is 1. DOI (Digital Objects Identifier) is a new standard for identifying digital objects particularly adopted in the publishing community Applied to any type or format of object: text, music, film, video, photographs, software, database record, certificate… Two aspects: 1. Uniquely Identifies the Object - therefore enables computers to interoperate about it and execute transactions of all kinds. 2.Provides Linking to the Object Itself (or to any related objects, transactions or services). These links are: Permanent www.medra.org mEDRA

8. DOI: Interoperability DOI has a similar role for e-content trade like the Bar code has in commerce of tangible goods: it facilitates interoperability between the information systems of parties. www.medra.org mEDRA

9. The DOI syntax 2. DOI is an alphanumeric string, divided in two parts: a prefix and a suffix www.medra.org Identify that this string is a DOI Identify the registrant: publisher or imprint, content producer in general 10.abc123 / def456 Identify the Digital object: it is under the registrant’s responsibility Prefix Suffix mEDRA

10. DOI and other standards 3. DOI can integrate other standard identifiers, creating a common framework ISBN also applies to electronic publications, but with a scope limited to monographs (under definition in ISO working group for the revision of ISBN) ISSN (or other systems to identify articles) only applies to continuous resources www.medra.org mEDRA

11. The DOI Metadata DOI = string + set of metadata Each DOI has a minimum set of metadata (kernel metadata)… … and additional metadata appropriate for the application profile. These last includes “descriptive metadata” (related to the genre of the resources) and “service and administrative metadata” (related to applications). XML Schemas are used to collect metadata 4. DOI is a tool to describe the identified entities www.medra.org mEDRA

12. DOIs are actionable in the Internet 5. DOI is supported by a resolution system that makes DOIs “actionable” in the Internet Users can resolve DOIs to the identified content and/or other resources related to that content. Unlike the URLs, DOIs are associated to documents and not to locations: if a document is moved to a different location, users are readdressed to reach the correct page. www.medra.org mEDRA

13. DOI resolution system The underlying technology is the Handle System ® produced by CNRI (Corp. National Research Initiatives) Handle is a resolution system: i.e. a tool to resolve a name to a source of information (typically a URL). It belongs to the n2l (urn to url) technologies Handle allows multiple resolution: i.e. a DOI can point to more than one source of information www.medra.org mEDRA

14. DOI resolution system URL(s) are included in metadata Registrant is technically allowed and must up-date metadata in order to guarantee persistence www.medra.org mEDRA

15. Resolution vs Identification Remind that “what the DOI identifies” and “what the DOI resolves to” are two different concepts What the DOI The DOI ® (Digital Object Identifier) is a standard for identifying any object of intellectual property. A DOI provides a means of persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related current data. On digital networks, all intellectual property is simply a string of bits; a DOI can apply to any form of intellectual property in any digital environment. DOIs have been called "the bar code for intellectual property": like the physical bar code, they are enabling tools for use all through the supply chain to add value and save cost. A DOI differs from commonly used internet pointers to material such as the URL – Uniform Resource Locator, the usual means of referring to World Wide Web material – because it identifies an object as a first-class entity, not simply the place where the object is located. A DOI is also different from commonly used identifiers of intellectual property like standard bibliographic and related identifiers (ISBN, ISSN, ISRC, etc) because it is associated with defined services and is immediately "actionable" on a network. However, the DOI does not compete with these standards since it allows them to be integrated as suffixes in DOI strings. A DOI is an implementation of the Internet concepts of Uniform Resource Name and Universal Resource Identifier. A DOI is different from abstract naming specifications such as URN in that it is a defined identification Identified entity Informat. on the document DOI Resolution 1 Resolution 2 Resolution 3 AbstractHow to buy the doc. Resolution 4 www.medra.org mEDRA

16. Resolution vs Identification It is also possible that DOI does not resolve to the identified entity What the DOI The DOI ® (Digital Object Identifier) is a standard for identifying any object of intellectual property. A DOI provides a means of persistently identifying a piece of intellectual property on a digital network and associating it with related current data. On digital networks, all intellectual property is simply a string of bits; a DOI can apply to any form of intellectual property in any digital environment. DOIs have been called "the bar code for intellectual property": like the physical bar code, they are enabling tools for use all through the supply chain to add value and save cost. A DOI differs from commonly used internet pointers to material such as the URL – Uniform Resource Locator, the usual means of referring to World Wide Web material – because it identifies an object as a first-class entity, not simply the place where the object is located. A DOI is also different from commonly used identifiers of intellectual property like standard bibliographic and related identifiers (ISBN, ISSN, ISRC, etc) because it is associated with defined services and is immediately "actionable" on a network. However, the DOI does not compete with these standards since it allows them to be integrated as suffixes in DOI strings. A DOI is an implementation of the Internet concepts of Uniform Resource Name and Universal Resource Identifier. A DOI is different from abstract naming specifications such as URN in that it is a defined identification Identified entity (e.g. a book) Informat. on the document DOI Resolution 1 Resolution 2 AbstractHow to buy the doc. Resolution 3 www.medra.org mEDRA

17. DOI: Persistence Why a Persistent Identifier? URLs are not sufficiently reliable Why a Persistent Identifier? URLs are not sufficiently reliable Identification “the half-life of a referenced URL is approximately four years from its publication date “ (Diomidis Spinellis, The Decay and Failures of Web References, ACM). 6. DOI is persistent identifier www.medra.org mEDRA

18. Content URL

19. 404 File not found Content URL

20. DOI directory URL Content Publisher DOI directory DOI directory DOI

21. DOI and Preservation The connection between preservation and DOI work lies in interoperability and persistence 1) A distributed virtual archive requires that all the players and components interoperate 2)Preservation: How do we interoperate with the future? Persistence is interoperability with the future www.medra.org mEDRA

22. DOI Governance and structure 7. DOI system is based on a designed social structure DOIs, similarly to ISBNs, are registered through Registration Agencies Technology Handle system IDF CNRI RA 1 mEDRA RA 2 Community of interest 1 Community of interest 2 European content industry Set up of a Local Handle System www.medra.org mEDRA

23. What the mEDRA project is mEDRA is a project within the eContent programme of the European Commission – Action line 2 Start up: 1 July 2002 – Conclusion: 30 June 2004  Objective: to set up a multiple-application, multi-lingual European DOI Registration Agency Multiple-application: the existing agencies mainly focus on individual applications Multi-lingual: the existing agencies (except Enpia) focus on English- based content European: the existing agencies are based in USA (three), Australia, Korea and UK www.medra.org mEDRA

24. What the mEDRA project is Results achieved mEDRA has been appointed as DOI Registration Agency and this will be effective by July 2003 www.medra.org mEDRA

25. mEDRA partnership AIE – the Italian publishers association (co-ordinator) MVB – a company of the German publishers association, ISBN agency for German linguistic area SNE – the French publishers association Editrain – a Spanish company specialised in services for book-trade CINECA – the technological provider, a consortium of Italian Universities. www.medra.org mEDRA

26. The mEDRA blueprint Preliminary studies (market survey, metadata study and technological assessment) lasted on 30 Nov. 2002 Architectural design lasted on 28 Feb. 2003 System implementation: by 30 Nov. 2003 a first commercial release of the whole system will be delivered: publishers can join the system since July 2003 Experimentation involving early adopters – Dec. 2003 - Apr. 2004 Second release of the system and start up of the commercial phase by 30 June 2004 www.medra.org mEDRA done forthcoming

27. Application 1: Voluntary deposit system Printed works, thanks to legal deposit, always have a certified publication date. What about digital editions? mEDRA is studying the possibility to develop a voluntary deposit system using the DOI technology to identify contents (time stamping and digital signature) Aims: to certificate (using time stamping technologies) that a digital or web content was registered by a party at a certain date. to create a tool in case of contest on rights ownership or on authorship Certifications can be opposed to third parties www.medra.org mEDRA

28. Application 1: Voluntary deposit system The service will be available at the beginning only for text files, both monographs and journal articles, and in a second time also for images (photographs, icons etc.), software. mEDRA system has to guarantee that: 1)The content was registered by a party at a certain date. 2)the metadata identify the author www.medra.org mEDRA

29. Application 1: Voluntary deposit system  During a deposit request, the user will send to mEDRA the document identified by a DOI and the metadata. To certify that the deposit took place in a certain date, mEDRA will apply a timestamp and will sign the document with mEDRA’s signature. www.medra.org mEDRA

30. Application 2: Persistent citation system The need: to substitute URLs with DOIs to cite Internet resources This allows to have persistent citations of resources (no more “error 404-file not found”!) How to make persistence effective is a task of registration agencies. It is a very simple application, exploiting one of the key features of DOI, but providing further value added:  Check routines to control persistence  alert system to avoid broken link  Procedures and discipline for publishers www.medra.org mEDRA

31. Application 3: Tracking relations between IP entities Aim: take under control the relations between digital objects. We have defined five kinds of “parent-child” relations between IP entities  A is part of B (a chapter of a book…)  A is a different product form of B (pdf and doc file of the same content)  A is a new edition of B (different in content)  A is a different language version of B  A is a resource about B (a press release or a cover of a book) They are registered in metadata so that users (final and intermediaries) can navigate all the relations with a unique tool www.medra.org mEDRA

32. Contacts Gabriella Scipione g.scipione@cineca.it Tel +39-051-6171634 www.medra.org mEDRA

33. Application 1: Voluntary deposit system  For legal issues, mEDRA will require both timestamps and a mEDRA’s certificate to a valid Certification Authority www.medra.org mEDRA

34. Cineca: main activities  VIS.I.T. (VISual Information Technology): inter-disciplinary laboratory equipped with powerful and graphic supercomputers for graphical treatment that enabled Cineca to take part to numerous E-projects www.medra.org mEDRA