ePrints UK

Introduction

Funded by JISC-FAIR, the ePrints UK project developed a subject-based, national services through which the higher and further education community can access the collective output of e-print papers available from compliant Open Archive repositories, particularly those provided by UK universities and colleges. ePrints UK will benefit from the RDN partners' expertise in developing services tailored for particular subject audiences, the considerable user base visiting existing RDN services and the ongoing work of the JISC funded Subject Portals Project.

Project Partners with UKOLN

UKOLN is working in collaboration with the following:

• The Resource Discovery Network - now Intute
• OCLC Office of Research
• The OpCit Project at the University of Southampton

Relevant Articles

• Marieke Guy, Andy Powell, Michael Day. Improving the Quality of Metadata in Eprint Archives. January 2004, Ariadne Issue 38.
  Also on University of Bath repository - Opus - http://opus.bath.ac.uk/11302/
• Ruth Martin. ePrints UK: Developing a National E-prints Archive. April 2003, Ariadne Issue 35.
• Philip Hunter, John MacColl, Marieke Napier. Developing an Agenda for Institutional E-Print Archives. October 2001, Ariadne Issue 29.
  Also on University of Bath repository - Opus - http://opus.bath.ac.uk/11299/

More Information

Further information can be found at the Jisc project Web site.

Work on ePrints UK at UKOLN

UKOLN is home to the ePrints UK Project Manager and is contributing to many of the work packages:

WP1 - Central database of UK e-print archive metadata records

UKOLN is undertaking this work with OAI harvester and database being hosted on RDN machines at UKOLN. UKOLN will be responsible for the maintainence of this database for the duration of the project.

WP2 - Interfaces to central metadata database

UKOLN is leading this work package and will be developing these interfaces in collaboration with technical staff at each of the RDN hubs.

WP3 - Name authority and subject classification Web services

UKOLN will be contributing to the design of these interfaces, but the bulk of the development work will be at OCLC. In addition UKOLN will develope test rigs and the client software to use these interfaces.

WP4 - Citation analysis Web service

UKOLN will be contributing to the design of these interfaces, but the bulk of the development work will be at SOTON. In addition UKOLN will develope test rigs and the client software to use these interfaces.

WP5 - Supporting studies

UKOLN will undertake a total of four supporting studies in key areas relevant to the ePrints UK project and with a focus on the project.

WP6 - Evaluation

This work package will evaluation e-Prints UK in various ways. The project will undertake an evaluation of the subject classification Web service; taking a statistical survey approach and analysing the Dewey classmarks assigned to 400 metadata records. UKOLN will undertake this work.

WP7 - Publicity, promotion and events

This work package will deliver 18 regional workshops that will promote the establishment of e-print archives by UK universities and colleges and provide a forum for the dissemination and discussion about best practice. These events will be delivered by the RDN hubs.

UKOLN staff working on the ePrints UK project:

Marieke Guy

Project Manager
E-mail: m.guy@ukoln.ac.uk

Michael Day

Research Officer (Metadata)
E-mail: m.day@ukoln.ac.uk

Greg Tourte

Systems Developer
E-mail: g.tourte@ukoln.ac.uk