BALSA and proposal for

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• BALSA and proposal for
• OpenURL routing service

Andrew Bevan (EDINA user support)
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EDINA

• JISC funded datacentre at University of Edinburgh
• Along with MIMAS at University of Manchester
• Runs online services and develops projects
• Bibliographic but not exclusively
• Adoption of international standards
• e.g. Z39.50 becoming COUNTER (statistics)
  compliant
• History, since 1996, of serials development work
• e.g. with ISSN register with SALSER
• SUNCAT (Serials Union Catalogue for the UK)
• CASA Cooperative Archive of Serials and Articles
  (EC project)
• Collaborative work
• with UKOLN, in JISC programmes etc.

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OpenURL policy

• To accommodate other OpenURL resolvers
• http//edina.ac.uk/support/openurl.shtml
• Make bibliographic services OpenURL aware
• All now enabled, to support links to OpenURL
  resolvers
• SFX and Balsa, already activated for some sites
• Also provide links to institutions' OpenURL
  resolvers
• One set up yesterday
• Will follow OpenURL standard and adapt accordingly

4
Balsa

• Part of Join-Up cluster of JISC 5/99 projects
• Xgrain, Zblsa, Docusend and ZETOC
• ZBLSA - journals (and articles) locator
• Essentially an OpenURL resolver
• Successor to EDINA links, prototype system
• Developed 2000-2003
• Currently in use at several universities at no
  charge
• Used in conjunction with EDINA services
• Aim to continue offering 2004-, proposal with
  JISC
• Project fully documented at http//edina.ac.uk/bal
  sa/

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Balsa

• Open system, potential for use by other DSPs
• Links to OPACs, Union catalogues and full-text
  services
• Z39.50 (could be SOAP) call to sources for items
  availability
• Using OpenURL data passed such as ISSN, SICI,
  DOI
• Future enhancements include link to Docusend for
  document delivery
• Variability of effectiveness depending on
  publishers data
• As target and source

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Balsa sources with direct links to them
Balsa button
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Linking to the full-text
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OpenURL router proposal

• Solution to problem for institutions and service
  providers
• time-saving device
• Application for portals and other open-access
  services
• providing access to an OpenURL router
• Proposal to JISC with support of UKOLN
• Decision hoped by early 2004
• Reference table for DSPs to consult
• i.e. not a black box for use
• Customisable at local level
• e.g. button design

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Scaling issue

• Referrers
  Institutional resolvers

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OpenURL router benefits

• All referring services use a single base URL
  http//openurl.ac.uk
• All institutions register the address of their
  OpenURL resolver with the national router
• The national service routes each OpenURL request
  to the appropriate resolver
• Reduces the cost to a discovery service of
  becoming OpenURL aware
• Reduces the cost to an institution of registering
  its OpenURL resolver with each referring service
• Boost overall awareness and usage of OpenURL

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Router model

• Referrers
  Institutional resolvers

OpenURLrouter
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EDINA

• Comments or questions
• Sandy.Shaw_at_ed.ac.uk (project manager)
• or Tim.Stickland_at_ed.ac.uk (lead engineer)
• or edina_at_ed.ac.uk (main helpdesk)
• URLs
• http//edina.ac.uk/balsa/
• http//edina.ac.uk/support/openurl.shtml
• http//edina.ac.uk/projects/