The BRII project has officially concluded. However development and user engagement work is still ongoing. We will continue to add data to the registry and go around the Univeristy selling our outputs and asking people for more feedback. We will keep you updated on our progress here and in our weblog http://brii-oxford.blogspot.com

If you want to know more about our outputs and outcomes, have a look at "BRII Papers, Reports and Presentations".

If you would like more information email me at: cecilia.loureiro-koechlin@bodleain.ox.ac.uk or ring me at +44 (0)1865 280028 or Sally Rumsey (BRII Manager) at e: sally.rumsey@bodleian.ox.ac.uk tel: +44 (0) 1865 283860.

BRII will enable efficient sharing of research activity information using semantic web technologies. Ontologies and taxonomies will define and describe data objects (eg people, research groups, funding agencies, publications, research ‘themes’) to forge connections between them and provide web-based services to disseminate and reuse this information in new contexts. It will create efficiencies, greater accuracy of data, and better discovery of research activities at Oxford. University data sources will include academic departments and central services. Half the project will be devoted to stakeholder input, collaboration and ‘buy-in’ aimed at evolving current work practices and processes. The project started on September 2008 and will end on March 2010.

Aim

The aim of the project is to enable efficient sharing of research management data, particularly Research Activity data, a subset of research management data which can be made visible and publicly available (ie data about research at the University of Oxford). We will collect data from a selection of existing data stores and will create exemplar services that disseminate and re-use that data using a lightweight solution based on semantic web technologies. The project aims to harvest from data already published or appropriate for open publication i.e., Research Activity data. The infrastructure will be able to handle access controlled information, but this is outside the project scope.

Objectives

1. Negotiate stakeholder input, collaboration and buy-in from a small number of internal data providers/creators, a selection of end-users and management and other stakeholders
2. Identify data sources and content for inclusion and re-use within the research information infrastructure (RII)
3. Build RII infrastructure comprising combine Harvester technology, instance of Fedora and web services and semantic web services
4. Provide RDF ontologies and taxonomies to define and categorise research data
5. Provide a selection of web-based applications to disseminate the research data
6. Create a University Blue Pages as an example of a web-based application that re-uses the data
7. Demonstrate embedding and future sustainability by data providers/creators, end users and key stakeholders

This project supports the JISC strategy by its use of non-invasive, yet service oriented and flexible technology to support research and its management within an institution. The project makes use of standard semantic Web 2.0  technologies to create free-flowing channels between administrative, descriptive and technical data, thereby removing the current ‘silo’ mentality of data management. It provides an easy method to share research information data within and beyond the institution. For research active institutions, this will support the ways in which they meet their institutional missions.