Describing value

Publication metadata is seldom conceived as area of wonder and excitement. However, publication metadata is of enormous value and it cannot be underestimated as metadata helps to describe resources in structured and defined ways. Without accurate, detailed, and high quality metadata, publications would be almost impossible to discover. This is why libraries, databases, and discovery layers, maintain and curate metadata in structured and consistent ways.

Publication metadata is often sourced from providers to sustain a quality base. For instance, publishers enter metadata into Crossref who then share this openly. This is how metadata is drawn into GALA when you deposit using a DOI.

Creating accurate metadata

However, many deposits into GALA are made in line with REF requirements, and thus publication metadata cannot be sourced externally. Instead, it requires manually creating. This is incredibly important and is a part of why GALA has mandatory fields. Without author, title, and publication title metadata, for instance, records could lack integrity or utility.

Confounding this need to carefully create publication metadata is that authors of in-press works are often best placed to create this metadata with a system such as GALA. Authors have access to certain metadata that may not be in the public domain or are difficult to externally validate. For instance, it can prove incredibly time consuming and difficult for us to confirm the publication title of an article if it has not been stated or if where an ISSN is not provided. Searching for this information significantly slows down the process of making outputs visible and thus discoverable in GALA.

Caring is sharing

In a very similar way to how Crossref can be a source of publication metadata, GALA offers this functionality. This is why outputs deposited in GALA are discoverable in external services such as CORE and Google Scholar. Indeed, the visibility of publications on staff profiles is another example of this.

Colleagues in Digital Service have implemented technology that sources relevant publication metadata and draws it from GALA and presents the desired metadata on profile pages. As such, any errors in publication metadata in GALA will cause these errors to be replicated on staff profiles. (We have informed of Digital Services of an outstanding issue with the technology that they have used which provides non-standard references.)

Support is at hand

With publication metadata being an integral aspect of the REF’s authentication of compliance with their open access policy, we are well equipped to support any issues with metadata. Our experience of curating metadata and our understandings the utilities of it are invaluable in our work to support your outputs and research and the university’s research strategy. However, this can be time consuming, especially where there is a limited amount of metadata provided.

Whilst metadata may not yield the most exhilarating and dynamic conversations that one may ever have, metadata is the basis from which many processes are handled, digital services, and other processes that may be developed. This is why it is important that it is accurate and maintained, and why working together is the key to optimising this and improving efficiency.