CRIS seminar, Brussels 18-19 September 2003 CERIF CRIS seminar, Brussels 18-19 September 2003 Anne Asserson, University of Bergen anne.asserson@fa.uib.no

What is CERIF? Common European Research Information Format A mechanism for sharing R&D information in Europe An EC Recommendation to EU Member States euroCRIS custodian since 2000

Structure CERIF 91 CERIF 2000 CERIF in a nutshell Conclusion

CERIF91 1988 working group formed under EC After recommendation of Rectors of European Universities Conference Need for exchange of data on R&D Note : similar ideas at that time UN/UNESCO/CODATA OECD

CERIF91 Exchange of data on R&D in Europe Simple record format Project was an entity with Persons, organisations, and other information represented as attributes Research classifications scheme recommended 1991 , not updated since 1988 This is a background template. Just the top and bottom bars are in the template, and there are two text boxes - one for a title, and one for the points. The picture and the two picture ”bars” are NOT part of the template. They are removeable, and re-sizeable. To see the template layout: (sorry, this is in English) Go to the ”format” menu. Select ”slide layout” Click on the choice showing one title box and one points box. Click on Re-apply. Type in the text you wish to the boxes.

CERIF91 Title (of Project), Abstract (bilinguality of title and abstract will be recommended), Address (including name of the research unit, department, institute), Project director (definition: name of the 'holder` of the contract), Name(s) of the principal investigator(s), Starting date and expected ending date, Identification items: free key words, controlled terms (Research Thesaurus: optionally) (Recommended Research Thesaurus (list of controlled terms): Annex II.) codes of a classification scheme (Recommended Research Classification Scheme: Annex I. - Research Classification Scheme: recommended), Funding directly related to the project: funding source, budget yearly, optionally: breakdown into personnel, functioning, equipment, Personnel: number of full-time equivalent (FTE) researchers.

CERIF91 Not unlike modern Dublin Core Suffered from same problem see http://www.oclc.org:5046/research/dublin_core/ Or under www.w3.org Suffered from same problem Machine readable NOT machine understandable Basically, insufficiently formal for logic to be applied

CERIF91 Problem that CRISs had a single-entry focus Projects (national research councils) Persons (BEST uk, COS us, ….) Organisations (LABO fr, …..) Simple Record Format Project was an Entity with Persons, Organisations and other infomation represented as attributes Problems with repeating groups and relationships Research Classification Scheme recommended 1991 not updated since 1988

Structure CERIF 91 CERIF 2000 CERIF in a nutshell Conclusion

CERIF2000 The requirements were collected systematically Representative of each country nominated by the appropriate ministry / organisation in that country Additionally some experts who did not represent their country but were there to assist in the technological solution Actually, some members of this Working Group fulfilled both roles !

CERIF2000 cover projects , persons, organisations entities, not more attributes lengths & types & language, character set repeating groups (logical) need flexibility - relationships (conceptual) need better data quality need for consistent coding (semantic) consistently implementable (no supporting systems for CERIF91 existing) extensible for new requirements

CERIF 2000 Working Group set up 1997 and coordinated by DGXIII-D4, EC CERIF2000 Guidelines, Final Report of the CERIF Revision Working Group, 1999 Common format for development of new CRISs exchange of data from records in existing and future multiple different CRISs implies the need for common format for metadata describing records in existing and future multiple different CRIS

CERIF2000 CRIS can be implemented using subset or superset of full CERIF model: for projects (management) for people (expertise) for organisations (capabilities) for publications, patents , products (results) for services (offerings) for facilities, particular equipment (offerings) with role-based relationships

CERIF2000 Neutral Architecture Data Model can be implemented: relational object-oriented information retrieval (including WWW) Process model can be implemented DBMS and query; centralised or distributed; html web / harvesting / IR-query; advanced knowledge-based technology

CERIF2000 An organisation just starting to build a CRIS An organisation with one or more legacy CRISs and wishing to evolve to a new single one Are in the market for an ‘ideal’ CRIS CERIF provides a template

Funding Programme PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Contact Event Prize/Award Results Publication Results Patent Skills General Facility Results Product CV Particular Equipment Event Service Prize/Award Classification

CERIF2000 Extended relational model Linking relations with attributes (roles and time stamp) 3 base entities Person, Organisation, Project 12 secondary base entities (linked to base entities) 36 Look up tables (to ensure data quality) 39 Link tables (flexibility) all text fields have multiple language fields maximum representativity with minimum complexity

CERIF2000 ICERIS (IS) Access to Information on Icelandic Research Projects & R&D Results AURIS-MM (AT) Provides access to Austrian University Research extended with multimedia SICRIS (SL) Access to University Research in Slovenia HUNCRIS Access to R&D in Hungary SRIS (GB) Scottish Research Information Systems, public research in Scotland CRIS-MER (EC) Research information on Migration and ethnic Relations (planned) Corporate model, CCLRC (UK) METIS (NL) previously OZIS, currently used by majority of Dutch Universities Fdok (NO) University of Bergen, results

CERIF2000 Metadata Model is a subset of Exchange Model is a subset of Full Model Full Model is intersection of existing CRISs excluding uncommon variants

Structure CERIF 91 CERIF 2000 CERIF in a nutshell Conclusion

Funding Programme PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Contact Event Prize/Award Results Publication Results Patent Skills General Facility Results Product CV Particular Equipment Event Service Prize/Award Classification

Three Primary Entities PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Concepts: (1) entities that reflect main ‘views of entry’ into CRISs (2) entities with no direct functional dependency on each other (3) entities that can refer to themselves (recursion) (4) entities linked in pairs by ‘linking relations’ (5) ‘linking relations’ represent temporally-bound roles (6) ‘linking relations’ have primary key of each entity, role, date/time start, date/time end and any other constraints PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple

As an Example: PERSON-ORGUNIT Concepts: Linking Relations PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Person-Orgunit As an Example: PERSON-ORGUNIT Concepts: (1) May have many instances of the relationship for each instance of PERSON and ORGUNIT due to role and temporal bounding (2) Role: the purpose of the relationship e.g. employee | head | …. (3) Temporal: the use of <Start Date/Time> and <End Date/Time> defines the duration of this relationship Analagous for PROJECT_ORGUNIT and PERSON_PROJECT PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple

Primary Base Entity: ORGUNIT PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Orgunit-Orgunit Concepts: (1) ORGUNIT may have an organisationally subordinate relationship to another ORGUNIT e.g. a Group within a Department (2) ORGUNIT may have a symbiotic relationship to another ORGUNIT e.g. two Groups that have a cooperation agreement (3) ORGUNIT may have a financial relationship to another ORGUNIT e.g. customer - contractor PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple

Primary Base Entity: PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Concepts: (1) PROJECT may have an organisationally subordinate relationship to another PROJECT e.g. a sub-Project (2) PROJECT may have a symbiotic relationship to another PROJECT e.g. two Projects that cooperate by agreement (3) PROJECT may have a temporal relationship to another PROJECT e.g. one project follows on from another PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple

Primary Base Entity: PERSON PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Concepts: (1) PERSON may have a socially subordinate relationship to another PERSON e.g. a child of a parent (2) PERSON may have a symbiotic relationship to another PERSON e.g. two researchers that cooperate by agreement (3) PERSON may have a temporal relationship to PERSON e.g. a lecturer (dates) becomes a reader (dates) PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple

Secondary Base Entities: Funding Programme PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Concepts: (1) Funding Programme is related to (a) ORGUNIT and / or (b) PROJECT (2) A Person is only funded via (3) any other entities are only funded via PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple

Secondary Base Entities: example: CONTACT PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Contact Concepts: (1) all contacts in one place - no replication, no update problems (2) >1 contact dependent on role e.g. private address|work address (3) the PROJECT contact is usually the project leader: a PERSON (4) the ORGUNIT contact is usually the head: a PERSON (5) but may have a generic address e.g. project URI | Orgunit email (helpdesk@rl.ac.uk) Analagous for Publication, Product, Patent, Event, Prize/Award.... PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple

Secondary Base Entities: example: RESULT_PUBLICATION PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Result_Publication Concepts: (1) temporally-bound role linking relations (2) >1 linking relation : Result_Publication and other entities (3) PERSON role may be author, co-author, editor, reviewer…. (4) ORGUNIT role may be publisher, IPR or copyright owner.. (5) PROJECT role may be the source of the idea PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple

Secondary Base Entities: example: RESULT_PUBLICATION PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Result_Publication Can Express: (where DT-date/time) Person A (DT1 - DT2) (is author of) Publication X Orgunit O (DT1 - DT2) (is owner of IPR in) Publication X Person A (DT1 - DT2) (is employee of ) Orgunit O Person A (DT1 - DT2) (is project leader of) Project P Person A (DT1-DT2) (is member of) Orgunit M Person A (DT1-DT2) (is member of) Orgunit N Orgunit M (DT1-DT2) (is part of) Orgunit O Orgunit N (DT1-DT2) (is part of) Orgunit O PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple

PERSON Links Funding Programme PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Contact Event Results Publication Results Patent Skills General Facility PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple Results Product CV Particular Equipment Event Service Prize/Award

PROJECT Links Funding Programme PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Contact Event Results Publication Results Patent Skills General Facility PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple Results Product CV Particular Equipment Event Service Prize/Award

ORGUNIT Links Funding Programme PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Contact Event Results Publication Results Patent Skills General Facility PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple Results Product CV Particular Equipment Event Service Prize/Award

Classification Funding Programme PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Contact Event Results Publication Results Patent Skills General Facility PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple Results Product CV Particular Equipment Event Service Prize/Award Classification

The Whole Thing Funding Programme PROJECT ORGUNIT PERSON Contact Event Results Publication Results Patent Skills General Facility PERSON - related entities green ORGUNIT: related entities yellow PROJECT and ORGUNIT: related entities orange PROJECT, ORGUNIT & PERSON: related entities purple Results Product CV Particular Equipment Event Service Prize/Award Classification

Structure CERIF 91 CERIF 2000 CERIF in a nutshell Conclusion

Conclusion CERIF is based on a knowledge of: Previous CRIS systems throughout Europe and wider The R&D in relevant information technologies CERIF2000 (and its subsequent developments) is used already in systems And new ones are starting up all the time

Conclusion CERIF as it is today Has a long evolution Has been improved with Experience of use of earlier versions Improved technology support allowing More accurate representative data structuring More expressive data management CERIF is an EC recommendation to EU Member States CERIF is managed and maintained by euroCRIS not-for-profit organisation www.eurocris.org