OAI
OAI integration
The Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH) defines a mechanism for harvesting records containing metadata from repositories. The OAI-PMH gives a simple technical option for data providers to make their metadata available to services, based on the open standards HTTP (Hypertext Transport Protocol) and XML (Extensible Markup Language). Thus, metadata from many sources can be gathered together in one database, and services can be provided based on this centrally harvested, or “aggregated” data.
Alma implements the following OAI roles:
- Data Provider – OAI-PMH is supported by Alma for exposing metadata via the ‘General publishing’ module
- Service Provider – Alma uses OAI-PMH as a basis for importing metadata
This is illustrated in the following diagram:
Alma as a Data Provider
Alma supports exposing metadata via the ‘General publishing’ module. In order to allow exposing metadata, the following should be done in Alma:
- Define an ‘OAI’ integration profile
- Define a ‘general publishing‘ profile
Note that an OAI profile defines the repository, and a publishing profile defines the set. For more information, refer to the Alma online help.
The following table summarize the OAI options:
| Status of OAI Implementation | In Production | |
|---|---|---|
| Protocol Version | 2.0 | |
| Transport Protocol(s) Used | Character Set: Unicode/UTF-8 Transport Layer: HTTPS | |
| Base URL | <Alma domain>/view/oai/<institution code>/request | |
| Supported formats | MARCXML | |
| supported verbs | GetRecord Identify ListIdentifiers ListMetadataFormats ListRecords ListSetsNote: These examples are in Alma’s Guest sandbox environment. See OAI in the Guest sandbox for more details. | |
| Supported prefixes | marc21 oai_dc oai_qdc mods unimarc kormarc | |
| Deleted records handling | transient | |
| Granularity | YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ssZ | |
| Delimiter | : | |
| Repository Identifier | alma.<institution code> | |
| Max bulk size for ListIdentifiers, ListRecords | Configurable, up to 900 |
Alma as a Service Provider
Alma uses OAI-PMH as a basis for importing metadata, for repository and digital material updates. In order to allow importing metadata using OAI, an import profile should be defined in Alma. For more information about setting the profile, refer to the Alma online help.
The following table summarize the OAI options:
| Status of OAI Implementation | In Production |
|---|---|
| Protocol Version | 2.0 |
| Transport Protocol(s) Used | Character Set: Unicode/UTF-8 Transport Layer: HTTPS |
| Supported formats | oai_dc (simple) oai_qdc (qualified) oai_marc21 DSpace’s simple archive format. |
| required verbs | GetRecord Identify ListMetadataFormats ListRecords ListSets |
| Content handling | The following are configurable:
|