The idea

A short time ago CAIRSS was approached by a Repository Manager from within the CAIRSS community to assist with exporting the contents of their repository to a spreadsheet. It was made apparent that accomplishing this task would greatly assist with Institutional Repository management tasks and most importantly ERA related work.

The tools

There are many ways that data can be extracted, moved and converted. The wisest choice is to use tools that are interoperable. An example of this would be choosing OAI-PMH to extract data rather than attempting to communicate with an individual Repositories data storage device or database etc.

The solution

Our CAIRSS Technical Officer Tim McCallum has completed a solution to address this task in the form of a Java Web Application. FoREveR – Flexible Repository Export Reporter.

Extracting the data

The data extraction is carried out using an OAI-PMH harvester. In this instance The Fascinator was used to accomplish this task. With regards to recent trends in Institutional Repository development and the use of SOLR the next step was an easy choice; simply extract the data from The Fascinator using a SOLR query. As an added bonus SOLR is able to supply the data in JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) format.

Converting the data

Overview

After testing different methods of converting the data including XSLT and Python some research was done revealing some excellent JSON libraries written in Java. The final choice was Java given the fact that the JSON libraries could meet the requirements for this application and that OAI-PMH, The Fascinator and SOLR were all already written in Java.

Technical

The JSON data returned is the result of an HTTP request (can be set to fetch all by default). This data is converted to Java Maps and Java ArrayLists for further processing. The application loops through every record that has been returned and creates a Java Set (unique list/master list). This Set is then displayed in the users browser. This is a last minute chance to select or deselect metadata before the final report is written. It is sometimes the case that a metadata field containing a large amount of content is best left out, as this can make the spreadsheet unmanageable from an end users perspective.

Reporting the data

Once approved the application creates an HTML file with all data saved to a table. The table includes table headings, table rows, table data cells and unordered lists for repeating information. This file can be opened in Microsoft Excel and Open Office spreadsheet applications or viewed in a browser.

Screen Shots

Optional SOLR Query

Note: It is not necessary to know SOLR query syntax, the application can be set to get everything by default. This may be an area to address with the community and feedback is welcome.

Feedback

Small sample of spreadsheet output

Using the Flexible Repository Export Reporter (FoREveR)

As this software is in the very early stages of its life cycle reports can be created by CAIRSS and emailed out to you. Please contact CAIRSS Central if you think that your institution can benefit from the use of this tool.

The source code is available at http://cairss.caul.edu.au/trac/browser/code/FoREveR for your interest, however it has not been extensively tested. All feedback is welcome. CAIRSS will endeavor to improve and enhance the software to meet your needs.