What is IDeA?

IDeA is one way in which IUPUI is addressing the research communities’ need for new outlets in scholarly communication. It is an institutional digital repository which employs the DSpace open source software (freeware) created by MIT and Hewlett Packard in 2000. IUPUI is in good company as Cambridge University, Columbia University, Cornell University, University of Washington, and Edinburgh University have also selected DSpace as a means for establishing their own institution’s digital repository.

IDeA embodies four essential elements

1. Institutionally Defined: IDeA reflects the work of the IUPUI community as opposed to one subject area as other digital repositories have done.
2. Scholarly: IDeA contains material which adheres to IUPUI’s guidelines defining scholarly work.
3. Cumulative and Perpetual: IDeA is structured to preserve an individual’s, a communities’, a universities’ research from the formal conceptualization of an idea to the final publication of the research and analysis created by that idea.
4. Open and Interoperable: IDeA’s creation and management is rooted in standards. These standards allow the records (or metadata) associated with each item in the repository to be easily shared. Standards also ensure that any necessary migration, which inevitably comes about as technology changes, will occur smoothly.

The Communities of Scholarship

IDeA is structured in a way that groups on campus contributing to the archive will be able to control the essential elements of their community of scholarship. Each community of scholarship determines who may contribute to its collection or community, each community decides how it would like works described, indexed, or cataloged, and each community establishes who may access the works housed in its community of scholarship.

The Library

The technical aspects of maintaining the repository’s infrastructure and ensuring submitted items are digitally preserved are handled by the experts at University Library and Ruth Lilly Medical Library. The library will also provide support to campus groups and individuals as they begin establishing communities of scholarship within IDeA. Information technologist will assist with setting up the structure of the community. Metadata professionals can guide communities in creating quality records for their scholarly works. Subject experts will be available for communities seeking in-depth subject-based knowledge.

IDeA’s Benefits*

• Getting your research results out quickly, to a worldwide audience
• Reaching a worldwide audience through exposure to search engines such as Google
• Storing reusable teaching materials that you can use with course management systems
• Archiving and distributing material you would currently put on your personal website
• Storing examples of students’ projects (with the students’ permission)
• Showcasing students’ theses (again with permission)
• Keeping track of your own publications/bibliography
• Having a persistent network identifier for your work, as shown in this image
• No more page charges for images. You can point to your images’ persistent identifiers in your published articles

*From Introduction to DSpace for Faculty.