DRS User Guide

The Digital Repository Service (DRS) is a secure repository system designed to store and share the scholarly work from Northeastern University’s colleges, departments, faculty, and staff. The DRS was developed by Northeastern University Libraries as a tool for University faculty and staff to protect the valuable information and data that has been created as part of the University’s research and instructional mission. It provides long-term security for the files it stores, as well as access management controls and support for various metadata standards (including MODS, Dublin Core, TEI, and LOM) to help ensure that data is as accessible and usable in the present and the future.

The DRS also provides mechanisms through which repository data can be used in other venues, such as departmental portals, digital research projects, and online publications. Users can upload files, make them public, and share them with anyone, or restrict access to only a certain set of users. The DRS is also a discovery platform; anyone can search, browse, view, and download content that is made public. Because the DRS is built using Fedora, an open source repository system with a user-friendly API, objects stored in the DRS can be accessed and displayed using customized web-publishing tools, like Omeka, Drupal, or WordPress.

=Searching and Exploring the DRS

Access

It is important to know that browse and search results are limited to only the repository files that you have the right to view. Therefore, if you browse or execute a search before signing in to the DRS, only publicly available files will be returned. To search or browse all files you have access to discover, view, and download, it is recommended that you sign in to the DRS (see the user guide for Signing into the DRS for more information). Once you sign in you will be able to search, browse, view, and download a greater number of files.

Searching

General Search

The persistent search box (located on every DRS page) can be used to search all files that you have access to view:

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A result will be returned when your search terms match text stored in that file’s descriptive metadata fields (title, names, subjects, abstracts, descriptions, etc…) or, in the case of text documents, in the full text of the resource. To optimize your search and improve your results, you may use some of these tricks:

Quotation marks

Enclose your search terms with quotation marks to perform an exact search of those terms

Boolean operators

Future development

Wildcards

Future development

Search Collections and Communities

Searches can also be limited to just a particular collection or community. Navigate to the collection you would like to search and enter your search terms in the search box to the right of the collection or community title:

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Search Results

Results

When you execute a search, the results of that search will be returned to you in either a list or grid display:

List	Grid
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You can switch between displays by toggling the List View and Grid View buttons:

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Filtering Your Results

You can narrow your search by filtering the results by year, creator name, file type, or department name or degree (for Theses and Dissertations). Use the “Limit your search” menu (located to the left of the results in List View, or above the results in Grid View) to select how you would like to filter the results:

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You may remove filters by clicking on the “x” following the appropriate filter to the right of the Search Results heading.

Sorting Your Results

You may also customize how the results of your search are sorted. To change the sort order of your results, select your preferred order (Title, Relevance, Creator, or Date) from the Sort By drop-down menu:

Number of Results

You may also select the number of results per page (10, 20, 50, or 100) from the Show drop-down menu.

Browsing

Start from the DRS homepage to browse Smart Collection files, Northeastern communities, and faculty and staff. Browsable content is displayed on the homepage under the Featured Content heading:

Theses and Dissertations: NU’s master's theses and doctoral dissertations from 2008 to the present. Research Publications: Faculty and staff research, including articles, preprints, and offprints. Presentations: Faculty and staff presentations from various conferences and meetings. Datasets: High value datasets, such as statistical datasets and research datasets. Communities: Northeastern departments and groups that have deposited material in the DRS. Faculty and Staff: Northeastern faculty members who have deposited material in the DRS.

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Clicking on any of the Featured Content categories will return a list of browsable files, which can be sorted or filtered just like a search results list.

Saving and Downloading Files

Saving Files in Sets

Sets are curated compilations of DRS files. You may create as many Sets as you need, and you may add any DRS file to your Sets. Sets are sustainable and won't disappear unless you delete the Set yourself. Sets are tied to your DRS user account, so you must sign in to add a file to a set, or to create, view, and manage your Sets.

Your Sets page is accessible from your user drop-down menu in the top right of any page:

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From your Sets page you can:

• create a new set
• edit an existing set
• delete an existing set
• remove files from a set
• download a set

You can add files directly to a Set by clicking the briefcase icon next to the download options for any file. You may also create a new set from the search results page. Simply click the briefcase icon for the file you would like to add to a Set and click “Create New Set”:

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When you create a Set you have the option to make it public, or to grant access to certain groups:

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Use the link for the Set page, which usually looks like this: https://repository.lib.neu.edu/sets/neu:5m60qx55t , to share your Set of files

Downloading Files

Individual Downloads

There are a few ways you can choose to download a single file:

From the List View search results Click the file type button to the right of the title for the file you would like to download.	Error creating thumbnail: File missing
From the Grid View search results Click the “Downloads” button below the title, and select the file type you would like to download.	Error creating thumbnail: File missing
From a file’s details page Click the file type button in the Downloads section.	Error creating thumbnail: File missing

Download Queue for Multiple Files

Your Download Queue is a temporary list of files that can be downloaded as a compressed .zip file. Files added to your Download Queue will remain in the queue until you sign out or close your browser. If you want to save a file and come back to it later, add it to a Set, which is a permanent list you can maintain over time (to learn more about Sets, see the Saving Files in Sets section of this user guide).

Files can be added to your Download Queue in the same way files can be downloaded individually. Click the download icon to the right of any file type to add it to your Download Queue:

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When you are ready to download all the files in your Download Queue, click the Download Queue button to the left of your name in the user drop-down menu:

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From the Download Queue page you can:

• remove files from your Queue
• clear your Queue
• download all the files in the Queue

Click “Download” to generate the .zip file of all your Download Queue files (if your Queue is large, this may take some time). When your file is finished generating, a Download link will appear. Click this link to download the drs_queue.zip file, which contains all your specified files.

Your Download Queue is session specific and is not intended to be a permanent list of files. Downloading your Download Queue to a .zip file, closing your DRS session, and signing out of the DRS will permanently empty your queue. Use Sets to save files in a persistent list.

Linking, Citing, and Re-using Materials in the DRS

Linking

Files deposited in the DRS are assigned a handle, which is permanent URL. Find the file's handle by scrolling to the end of its full description page.

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It’s important to keep in mind that not all files in the DRS are publicly available. When you are logged in you will have access to files other may not. You can still link to these files, but not everyone will have permission to view or download the files.

Citing and Re-Using DRS content

DRS and Library staff respect copyright and expect users to follow all copyright and fair use guidelines. If an object in the DRS is under copyright (regardless of whether it has a copyright or other rights restriction notice), make sure you follow all copyright or fair use policies before using or distributing that object. For more information about copyright and fair use, visit the Library web page on copyright and fair use: http://library.northeastern.edu/get-help/copyright-and-fair-use. Please follow appropriate citation rules for citing DRS content in your work (future DRS development will include a citation generator).

For Expert Users

Bulk Uploads

It is not always feasible to deposit project files on-by-one. The DRS has two established workflows for uploading many files at a time:

Custom Upload Tool

Communities that would like to deposit similar files on a regular basis can upload multiples files at a time using a custom upload tool. The upload tool is designed to extract metadata directly from the uploaded files (including title, creator, date created, description, etc…) and deposit those files in a specific collection. Once the upload tool is developed for a project or a community, authorized users can compress the desired files into a single .zip file and upload them in one step.

Back-End Processing

Communities that would like to deposit many different file types, with varying metadata, into various collections may do so by submitting their files, along with the metadata for those files, to DRS staff. If metadata is not readily available for the files, DRS staff can design a spreadsheet or form to gather the necessary information needed to deposit the files. If the files already have metadata, which could be stored in a spreadsheet or a document, DRS staff can manipulate that data to create metadata appropriate for the DRS.

We will be happy to work with you to discuss the best method for your project.

Groups and Grouper (Future development)

Grouper is a tool supported by ITS that defines and manages groups of people in the Northeastern community, and all University staff and faculty have access to this group management tool. Once a group is created in Grouper it can be used in the DRS to set viewing and metadata editing privileges for collections and for files. The advantage to using Grouper to define your group is that it only needs to be managed in one place, Grouper, and as an administrator of your group, you, not DRS staff, have control over who can access your, or your community’s, files or collections.

To start curating groups in Grouper, visit https://neuidmsso.neu.edu/grouper/ and sign in with your MyNEU credentials.

Managing Groups

Grouper is an ITS supported tool. For more detailed information about using Grouper, or for help with issues, please visit the Grouper Help page (https://neuidmsso.neu.edu/grouper/help.do) or contact ITS.

Help and Other Resources

Documentation

Other helpful documents, like the DRS FAQ, can be found on the Digital Scholarship Group's DRS page: http://dsg.neu.edu/resources/drs/

Contact

Please contact DRS staff (Library-Repository-Team[at]neu.edu) for for help with the DRS.