Upgrading The World Bank's Open Knowledge Repository to DSpace 7

June 17, 2024
Case Study
dspace-7-repository-world-bank-atmire
Industry: 
Open RepositoryDSpace ExpressCustom DSpace
The World Bank Open Knowledge Repository (OKR) is The World Bank’s official open-access repository for its research outputs and knowledge products and the largest single source of development knowledge. The upgrade of the Open Knowledge Repository (OKR) to DSpace 7 fulfilled a commitment to enhancing user experience, streamlining workflows, and amplifying the impact of development research globally. The World Bank aims to encourage innovation and allow anyone in the world to use Bank knowledge to help improve the lives of those living in poverty. Through collaboration with Atmire, the World Bank has established the Open Knowledge Repository (OKR) as a significant resource for disseminating development knowledge globally. This case study highlights some of the advancements made within the OKR:

Focus Pages

The OKR repository features two specialized Focus Pages: Sub-Saharan Africa and Sustainable Development Goals. These pages simplify the search process for users, allowing them to easily discover relevant items within each specific focus area. By selecting a “focus” facet value, users can perform targeted searches, enhancing their ability to find precise information quickly.

Each Focus Facet is designed to facilitate search filtering based on specific values. While these Focus Facet Values are not conventional metadata fields, they are defined in a configuration file, linking them to specific search queries. This setup ensures that users can efficiently filter and locate the content that matches their interests.

Sub-Saharan Africa focus page
Sustainable Development Goals focus page

Multilingual Features

The configuration of robust multilingual features within the OKR significantly enhances accessibility and user experience. By automatically displaying the item’s metadata, community, and collection information, and bitstreams in a user's preferred language (if available), the platform ensures seamless navigation and browsing.

Researcher Profiles through Person Entities

The OKR now features dedicated "Person Entities," spotlighting the researchers behind its content. Users can easily locate publications associated with a specific researcher, gain insights from their biographies, and explore links to external links providing intuitive navigation and enhanced discoverability. Additionally, the integration of "Person Entities" within the OKR fosters collaboration among researchers. By showcasing diverse expertise, these profiles facilitate connections between scholars working on similar topics. This promotes interdisciplinary dialogue and knowledge exchange, enhancing the OKR's value as a vibrant ecosystem for global research.

Researcher profile on OKR

Statistical Insights  

OKR provides administrators and users with detailed statistics on search queries, item views, downloads, and storage usage, facilitating informed decision-making and resource optimization. Furthermore, Altmetrics offers valuable insights into research impact and visibility.

World Bank Journals

The addition of journal entries within the Open Knowledge Repository (OKR) enhances the platform with structured entities for journals, volumes, issues, and publications. The feature enriches the repository's value as a knowledge-sharing platform, promoting efficient search and discovery. Overall, the inclusion of journal entries contributes to the OKR's mission of facilitating global collaboration and knowledge exchange within the development community.

Journal entities in OKR

Citation Integrations

The OKR's integration with sources like Scopus and Google Scholar increases its content visibility and demonstrates its growing influence. Users gain easy access to citation counts and are seamlessly linked to source platforms. This positions the OKR as a trusted knowledge hub and highlights the impact of the research it safeguards.

Improved search 

The repository project incorporates a feature that enhances the search experience by suggesting content based on metadata. As users type a search query, the platform offers word suggestions that start with the input, along with relevant items, communities, collections, authors and subjects. This functionality aids users in locating their desired content more efficiently and swiftly.

Suggested search

Conclusion

In conclusion, the new Open Knowledge Repository (OKR) represents a significant advancement in our commitment to innovation and collaboration. Working closely with the World Bank, we have created a next-level repository that enhances user experience and facilitates global knowledge sharing. From multilingual features to advanced statistics, every aspect of the OKR reflects our dedication to creating a valuable resource for the development community. We are proud of our achievements and look forward to the continued success of the OKR in the future.

Check out the repository at: https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/

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