[Dspace-general] [Dspace-tech] DSpace `Dublin Core' | Date Issued | Date Range | How to represent

Tue Jun 12 18:27:09 EDT 2007

Hello Paulo Jobim,

On Wed, 2007-06-13 at 03:01, instituto A.C.Jobim wrote:
> Hi Richard

> I think using the date.issued field quite confusing because thats  what
>  DSpace automatically uses when you don't check the "item has been 
>   published before" box.

My use of `date.issued' for previously published items is consistent
with the recommendations here:

 http://www.dspace.org/technology/metadata.html

A short summary of the suggested element / qualifier pairs follows:

1.) date -- Use qualified form if possible

2.) date accessioned -- Date DSpace takes possession of item

3.) date available -- Date or date range item became available to the
public

4.) date copyright -- Date of copyright

5.) date created -- Date of creation or manufacture of intellectual
content if different from date.issued

6.) date issued -- Date of publication or distribution

7.) date submitted -- Recommend for theses and dissertations

Clearly, dc.date.issued is to be used for the date of `original'
publication in the case of previously published material.
dc.date.created, on the other hand, is only to be used in addition, and
not as a substitute for, dc.date.issued.

> At the Institute here we used date.created and maybe I will change it  
> for simply date.

As above, probably its undoubtably best to use a qualified form if you
can.

> Researchers here use sometimes brackets or parentesis to indicate if  
> a date is a guess of the researcher and all these things break the  
> browse by date page and make the sorting alleatory. We finally  
> decided to treat this field as text and not date (in dspace.cfg) so I  
> remove the brackets in the field sort_date and everybody uses the  
> YYYY-MM-DD format so periods like 1960-1970 will be sorted correctly  
> and the browse page will not break.

The primary issue for me is how to represent date ranges in the
dublin_core.xml file so that DSpace can adequately sort and display the
range in `Browse by title' and `Browse by date', and display the range
in `Brief item view'. If I properly understand the relatively few
responses to my query, the short answer is that one cannot. The stock
DSpace distribution does not enable one to specify a date range in an
item's date metadata fields, for e.g., something along the lines of the
DCMI Period Encoding Scheme:

 http://dublincore.org/documents/dcmi-period/

This is a serious deficiency in any system, let alone in one that has
pretensions to provide a basis for a digital archive. I would welcome
comments from DSpace core developers on their proposed solution to
DSpace's lack of support for encoding periods.

Best regards,

 Richard Mahoney

> I hope this helps
> Paulo Jobim
> 
> Em 12/06/2007, às 07:34, Richard MAHONEY escreveu:
> 
> > Hello Scott,
> >
> > Thanks for your note.
> >
> > On Tue, 2007-06-12 at 12:06, Scott Yeadon wrote:
> >> Hi Richard,
> >>
> >> It's up to you how you represent your values, you could use the DCMI
> >> Period or something simple such as "1930-1940". We tend to have the
> >> latter since that's what our users typically enter. The batch import
> >> process won't parse the values, as long as the document is valid  
> >> XML the
> >> values will be accepted.
> >
> > Granted that using something such as:
> >
> > <dcvalue element="date" qualifier="issued">1964-1970</dcvalue>
> >
> > in one's `dublin_core.xml' file seems practical and expedient, on my
> > system at least -- DSpace-1.4.0 -- such an approach breaks DSpace's
> > `Browse by Title', `Browse by Date', and the offending item's `Brief
> > View'.
> >
> > This is the reason I first asked the lists for details of how one
> > should _correctly_ represent a date range in the DSpace
> > `dublin_core.xml' file. Using `1964-1970' and so on simply does not
> > seem to work.
> >
> > I have put together a series of screenshots to indicate the issues:
> >
> > http://indica-et-buddhica.org/sections/repositorium-preview/known-
> > issues/dspace-item-date-ranges
> >
> > As you will see, I am - unhappily - coming to the conclusion that
> > DSpace does not support item date ranges at all. It is also becoming
> > clear that the lack of genuine validation by the item importer can
> > easily lead to the widespread corruption of ones metadata. I hope I am
> > wrong as these would be serious deficiencies.
> >
> >
> > Best regards,
> >
> >  Richard Mahoney
> >
> >
> >> Scott.
> >>> Message: 3
> >>> Date: Fri, 08 Jun 2007 12:08:16 +1200
> >>> From: Richard MAHONEY <r.mahoney at iconz.co.nz>
> >>> Subject: [Dspace-general] DSpace `Dublin Core' | Date Issued | Date
> >>> 	Range |	How to represent
> >>> To: DSpace Tech <dspace-tech at lists.sourceforge.net>,	DSpace General
> >>> 	<dspace-general at mit.edu>
> >>> Message-ID: <1181261296.8680.21.camel at proliant>
> >>> Content-Type: text/plain
> >>>
> >>> Dear List Members,
> >>>
> >>> I am in the process or preparing material for bulk import and have
> >>> again encountered and issue that I was inclined to gloss over  
> >>> last time
> >>> it arose: the format of the DSpace Dublin Core Date Elements,
> >>> Qualifiers, and particularly, the Values.
> >>>
> >>> What exactly is the required Value format and is it configurable?
> >>> Simple date Values such as the following present no difficulty:
> >>>
> >>> <dcvalue element="date" qualifier="issued">1970</dcvalue>
> >>>
> >>> The trouble for me -- and this situation would arise often for many
> >>> projects -- is how to correctly represent date ranges, for e.g.,  
> >>> date
> >>> issued, 1964 to 1970. Which Value format should should be used to
> >>> represent a date range in DSpace DC? Some DSpace version of the
> >>> W3C-DTF/ISO 8601 scheme?
> >>>
> >>>  http://dublincore.org/documents/2000/07/28/dcmi-period/
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Best regards,
> >>>
> >>>  Richard Mahoney
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> > -- 
> > Richard MAHONEY | internet: http://indica-et-buddhica.org/
> > Littledene      | telephone/telefax (man.): +64 3 312 1699
> > Bay Road        | cellular: +64 27 482 9986
> > OXFORD, NZ      | email: r.mahoney at indica-et-buddhica.org
> > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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> >
> >
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-- 
Richard MAHONEY | internet: http://indica-et-buddhica.org/
Littledene      | telephone/telefax (man.): +64 3 312 1699
Bay Road        | cellular: +64 27 482 9986
OXFORD, NZ      | email: r.mahoney at indica-et-buddhica.org
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Indica et Buddhica: Materials for Indology and Buddhology
Repositorium: http://indica-et-buddhica.org/repositorium/
Philologica: http://indica-et-buddhica.org/philologica/
Subscriptions: http://subscriptions.indica-et-buddhica.org/