So, it's been a while since I posted to this blog. In that time we must have made some progress on the Publications System and QMRO right?
Well, yes and no.
Here's a little update
Publications:
PubLists has been upgraded to version 3.6 of Symplectic Elements. This has been scheduled for a while and seems to have gone pretty smoothly. Thanks to my ever diligent colleague in IT Services for making it happen. New features in version 3.6 should make the battle with verification a little easier, as well as helping us get at the information we really want.
The Publications website, now re-christened (again) as Research Publications has finally been approved and is now awaiting launch. Launch of the website is tied very closely to developments and fixes still required for the repository, more on this below. It's looking really good, and fits in very nicely with the College's apparent move to streamline and link information held in various places to central systems. Get us!
Repository:
QMRO content is growing apace and we are really pleased with uptake. There are currently nearly 850 items somewhere in the repository (no, we haven't lost them!), mostly either live in the archive or waiting for attention by repository staff in the workflow. We're also concentrating some effort on the eThesis collection, getting up-to-date with this for 2009-10 in a bid to catch up with ourselves.
And so, the difficult bit... when will QMRO finally go public? Well, the same bugs that have been causing the delay to launch up to now are still plaguing us. With some time allocated to fixing this both by IT and Symplectic people we hope to have to finally sorted out by the end of February, but as with all previous 'forecasts' this comes with the proviso that we're able to get some resource to identify and fix the problem.
In other news, we've just taken out a consultancy contract with @Mire, who are specialists in DSpace and will therefore be helping us to turn it into the all-singing all-dancing repository that I had envisaged! More on this when we get the development under way.
Lastly, an upgrade of the DSpace software to version 1.6.2 is scheduled for completion by end of February, so it's going to be a busy month on the repository. Again, more on this when the dates are finalised...
Keep watching
