Co-ordination Agency DissOnline

Since July 1998 the German National Library has collected online dissertations and doctoral theses, administered the metadata format and the submission procedures  for online university papers. In this context, it participated in the "Dissertation Online" project. The Co-ordination Agency DissOnline  was established at the German National Library to ensure that state-of-the-art technology was used to produce the project's results, that necessary further development was initiated and a competence network set up.

From November 2005 to January 2008 the German Research Association (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, DFG) is sponsoring the development of a "portal for online dissertations". The aim of the project is to network digital dissertations and doctoral theses, taking into account documents offered commercially with corresponding access mechanism. The portal will offer specific access points and the option of a web service to connect with (international) subject portals and the vascoda internet portal.

In collaboration with the University of Duisburg-Essen and Humboldt University Berlin, the Co-ordination Agency DissOnline is involved in the "DissOnline-Tutor" project. Its aim is to develop tools for the Microsoft Word, Open and StarOffice word-processing systems and for the LaTex text layout system for authors of dissertations and doctoral theses, and to provide recommendations and training materials. The project will receive funding from the DFG from October 2005 to July 2007.

The Co-ordination Agency DissOnline focusses in particular on co-ordination and guidance of institutions participating in DissOnline. The Co-ordination Agency

• is the point of contact for scientific institutions, libraries, publishing houses and authors, and administers the  "Dissertation Online" mailing list
• encourages co-operation between participating scientific publishing institutions and promotes knowledge transfer. It coordinates further developments and modifications, publicises them and makes them accessible through the  "Extended E-dissertation" mailing list and other methods 
• uses the information exchange at www.dissonline.de to publish notes on publications and research, on formats, tools and legal questions related to online university papers for libraries, postgraduates, specialists and research centres
• recommends new or further technical developments, with the focus on state-of-the-art technology and national and international standardisation efforts. It offers university libraries assistance in introducing or changing their procedures in transmitting online dissertations and their metadata
• is active in public relations and promotes the publication of dissertations in digital form
• and collaborates with national and international organisations in order to achieve its objectives

The German National Library promotes the development and standardisation of metadata  in the Office for Library Standards  and ensures the long-term archiving of electronic publications. In order to provide permanent access to electronic resources, the German National Library has developed a service to allocate and manage "persistent identifiers". This service was transferred to a productive system environment as part of the EPICUR  project.