My Publications - why we've removed these potentially confusing links

When the repository was launched, initial testing identified the need for an easy way to find items from the TULIP publication database, or those that might be created by a colleague. Thus the ‘My Publications’ searches were created. Unfortunately, there has been some confusion about their purpose, so, as part of the recent upgrade, these options have been removed.

These links were essentially links to “canned searches” – they searched the repository to find records that include either your staff ID number or your name, with the results being the same as if you’d used the advanced search function available from the repository home page.

Often the search results for these two options differ slightly. This could be because staff ID numbers haven’t been included in some of the records, or your name might have been entered differently. In any case, the My Publications links were intended to be two quick ways for authors to find records that they are connected with, rather than a way of managing records.

The best way to keep track of your records in the repository is to look at your Manage Deposits page. All records with the status “Live Archive” are in the repository and will be available for you to select for your PDR and staff profile.

If you find that you’re really missing the My Publications links, please let us know as they can be brought back quite easily. By removing these potentially confusing links, we’re hoping that repository users will find the Manage Deposits screen much less daunting.

As ever, if you’re having any problems with the repository, please contact our IR team irhelp@liv.ac.uk. If you’d like to organise training for you or your colleagues, please contact Stephen Carlton stephen.carlton@liverpool.ac.uk. 

"That citation doesn't look right" - citation displays in the Repository

It’s sometimes remarked that the “citations” in the repository don’t look right – that they aren’t of a recognised format, or don’t correspond to a particular discipline’s style guidelines. The reason for this, and why we have surrounded the word “citations” with scare quotes is outlined below.

The main purpose of the Repository is to provide a way for published outputs to be made generally available, allowing the dissemination of research from institutional authors. So, the Repository in itself isn’t a citation database. Part of the impact of this is, for example, full names rather than initials being used for staff authors, which is a side effect of the processes necessary to link the Repository to PoA and other institutional processes. All of the information necessary to create a citation can be exported from the Repository, with users able to use that output to create their own citations with whatever tools they wish.

To display the information held about any individual item, the Repository generates a pseudo-citation display, using one overall style. Given the many different disciplines at Liverpool it is impossible to settle on one specific citation style to use as a model that would be acceptable to all, so a generic style has been selected.

We hope that this addresses concerns about the appearance of publication details in the Repository, and welcome feedback on this issue either as comments on these blog posts or via email to irhelp@liv.ac.uk.