EZID introduces an OAI-PMH interface

EZID has just implemented a standard Open Archives Initiative, Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH) interface, allowing external harvesting of the information we store for most of our identifiers. That’s right–not all identifiers are included. Eligibility criteria are:

• only real identifiers (no test IDs),
• only “public” identifiers–the owners have given permission for harvesting/indexing,
• only identifiers with target URLs pointing to locations outside of EZID,
• and only identifiers with at least a minimal set of descriptive information, or “metadata.”

As a reminder, the term “target URL” means the digital location of the resource being registered with an identifier.

At the present time, the number of eligible identifiers exceeds 1.5 million, split about evenly between both DOIs and ARKs. DOIs are digital object identifiers, commonly used in scholarly communication. EZID’s DOIs are also available for indexing via the DataCite OAI-PMH service. ARKs are archival research keys, in use by a wide range of researchers, museums and libraries; the new EZID OAI-PMH interface represents the first public interface to these identifiers.

For EZID clients, the new interface means greater opportunities for their content to be seen. Every time someone clicks on an EZID ARK or DOI, the target URL gets a “hit.” For information aggregators, the new interface opens up a treasure trove of new information to explore.

More information about the interface is available here. Let us know if you have questions.