Guide to Institutional Repository Software

Universities and research centers throughout the world are actively planning the implementation of institutional repositories. Such planning entails policy, legal, educational, cultural, and technical components, most of which are interrelated and each of which must be satisfactorily addressed for the repository to succeed.

The Open Society Institute intends this document to help organizations with one facet of their repository planning: selecting a software system that best satisfies an institution’s needs. An institution’s system needs will be driven by its content policies and by the procedures required to implement those policies. A well designed and carefully planned repository program can function well with any of the systems discussed here-but none of these systems can help a poorly designed or inadequately planned repository succeed. Therefore, where necessary, the notes to the System Feature & Functionality Table (PDF format 250 K) attempt to explain the relevance of system technical features in the context of a repository’s broader planning, design, and policy framework.

A Guide to Institutional Repository Software v 3.0: