eprints.utm.my Review

eprints.utm.my Review

Reviewer:  Mohd Amien M.Y.

Website adress:  http://eprints.utm.my

Category:  Repository Software

Resources : http://www.eprints.org/software

Developer:  University of Southampton

Main point:

a) Features of the system

Repository managers 

·         Lower the barrier for your depositors while improving metadata quality and the value of your collection.

Depositors

·         Time saving deposits

·         Import data from other repositories and services

·         Autocomplete-as-you-type for fast data entry

Researchers

·         Optimised for Google Scholar

·         Works with bibliography managers

·         Works with desktop applications and new Web 2.0 services

·         RSS feeds and email alerts keep you up to date

Developers

·         Tightly-managed, quality-controlled code framework

·         Flexible plugin architecture for developing extensions

Webmasters

·         Easily integrate reports, bibliographic listings, author CVs and RSS feeds into your corporate web presence

Institutions

·         High specification repository platform for high visibility, high quality institutional open access collections

·         Conform with research funder open access mandates

A better platform for a high quality repository. Backed by a support team with expertise in the research, library and publishing industries, EPrints 3 is the platform for a variety of open source, bespoke and hosted repository solutions.

b) How the system can help UTM to effectively manage the data and information of the staff or student?

Login system. - http://eprints.utm.my/ has a login function but the public cannot access it.  It seems that only the authorized person can login into this site. The public can only use the system to find informations.

Secure login - When logging into eprints, both username and password travel openly. Usually it is not a problem as eprints has its own authenticating mechanism, and stealing an eprints password gives the intruder very limited power. However when using centralized authentication (e.g., by LDAP) then protecting the password is more important. To prevent sniffing, login pages usually use secure connection. Here we discuss an easy way to set up eprints to use encoded password traffic.

Resource: http://wiki.eprints.org/w/Secure_login

c) Disadvantages and advantages of the system.

The most important rule is that eprints can only be edited when they are in a user's workspace. That means that to update an eprint, the user must either

• get someone with editor privileges to move the original eprint into their workspace and edit it in situ
• or create a new copy of the original eprint and edit that instead.

The advantage of the first approach is that it is direct and simple. The disadvantage is that it leaves no record of the previous state of affairs — the archive ceases to be a genuine mechanism for stable, long-term storage. It may have repercussions for external users whose Web pages link to a particular record, as they may find its information changes without warning. For example, an unpublished technical report may suddenly become a journal article with an updated title.

The disadvantage of the first approach is that you may have to wait some days for the editor to respond to the request.

The advantage of the second approach is that it maintains the records in the database, and allows external users to see that a particular journal article is a later version of a previous technical report.

The disadvantage is that it potentially leaves multiple records per publication, both of which will show up in a search.

Resources: http://www.eprints.org/documentation/handbook/editing-eprints.php