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Manchester eScholar OAI-PMH documentation

On this page,

• What is OAI-PMH?
• Manchester eScholar implementation.
• Example usage.

What is OAI-PMH?

OAI-PMH stands for The Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting. It is a mechanism for supporting repository interoperability between content providers. Data Providers (such as Manchester eScholar) use OAI-PMH to expose structured metadata of their repository content. Service Providers then make OAI-PMH service requests to harvest that metadata. OAI-PMH is a set of six services or verbs that are invoked within the HTTP framework.

OAI-PMH services (verbs)

There are six services provided by OAI-PMH. These are:

1. GetRecord - This verb is used to retrieve an individual metadata record from a repository. Detailed information about the"GetRecord" verb can be found within the OAI-PMH documentation.
2. Identify - This verb is used to retrieve information about a repository. Detailed information about the"Identify" verb can be found within the OAI-PMH documentation.
3. ListIdentifiers - This is similar to the "ListRecords" verb, but rather than retrieving the entire record, retrieves only the headers of the records. Detailed information about the"ListIdentifiers" verb can be found within the OAI-PMH documentation.
4. ListMetadatFormats - This verb is used to retrieve the metadata formats available from a repository. Detailed information about the"ListMetadataFormats" verb can be found within the OAI-PMH documentation.
5. ListRecords - This verb harvests records from a repository. Detailed information about the"ListRecords" verb can be found within the OAI-PMH documentation.
6. ListSets - This verb is used to retrieve the set structure of a repository. Detailed information about the"ListSets" verb can be found within the OAI-PMH documentation.

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Manchester eScholar implementation

Manchester eScholars implementation of OAI-PMH is in accordance to the OAI-PMH Implementation Guidelines. Key features of this implementation are:

• Base url - Our base url is: http://www.escholar.manchester.ac.uk/api/oai2.
• Sets - Manchester eScholar defines two OAI-PMH sets. These are:
  • "thesis" and
  • "fulltext".
• Manchester eScholar is registered with a number of service providers. These include:
  • OAI registry (see the OAI register).
  • DART (see the DART website).
  • EThOS( see the EThOS website).
  • BASE (see the BASE website).
  • OpenDOAR directory (see the OpenDOAR directory).
  • ROAR registry (see the ROAR registry).
  • CORE (see the CORE website).
  • Google scholar (see the Google scholar website).

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Example usage

Using the Manchester eScholar OAI-PMH Application Program Interface (API) requires simply to append an AOI-PMH verb onto the Manchester eScholar base url. So, for example:

• "http://www.escholar.manchester.ac.uk/api/oai2?verb=ListMetadataFormats" retrieves the metadata formats supported by Manchester eScholar.
• "http://www.escholar.manchester.ac.uk/api/oai2?verb=GetRecord&identifier=oai:escholar.manchester.ac.uk:uk-ac-man-scw-126591&metadataPrefix=oai_dc" retrieves the harvested metadata for the eScholar record with id "uk-ac-man-scw-126591.
• "http://www.escholar.manchester.ac.uk/api/oai2?verb=ListRecords&metadataPrefix=oai_dc" retrieves the metadata for all harvested eScholar records.
• "http://www.escholar.manchester.ac.uk/api/oai2?verb=Identify" identifies Manchester eScholar within OAI.
• "http://www.escholar.manchester.ac.uk/api/oai2?verb=ListIdentifiers&metadataPrefix=oai_dc" retrieves the header metadata for all harvested eScholar records.
• "http://www.escholar.manchester.ac.uk/api/oai2?verb=ListSets" lists the sets supported by Manchester eScholar.

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