Webometrics Repository Ranking July 2010–41 DSpaces in Top 100
By Bram Luyten, @mire
Leuven, Belgium Earlier this month, the CSIC (Spain) published it’s Top 800 Institutional Repository Ranking. That’s right, instead of listing 400 institutions, they now increased this to 800. This is useful and motivating for smaller repositories, to monitor their progress, even if that means jumping from the 500 range to the 400 range.
A short introduction about the Webometrics Repository Ranking initiative:
The aim of the Ranking is to support Open Access initiatives and therefore the free access to scientific publications in an electronic form and to other academic material. The web indicators are used here to measure the global visibility and impact of the scientific repositories.Read a full description of the methodology
This months ranking is strongly shaken up, compared to the January 2010 ranking. Although there is no formal or full explanation, 2 elements could contribute:
- .xls files are no longer counted as full texts (”rich files”).
- Because of “strange results” visibility in the Bing search engine was excluded form the visibility parameter.
Changes in the ranking algorithm always make it very tedious to compare this ranking to previous editions, but as the author, Dr. Isidro F. Aguillo, states:
“Web is still evolving, I think in the future, the web will reflect even better the reality, in the meantime I am fueling the virtuous circle. If the ranking push people to web publish then web indicators become more trusted.”
Thanks to some fine work of Claudia Jürgen in the past, identifying repository platforms for the listed ones, and the work I did on the July 2009 and January 2010 rankings, we compared this new ranking to the old one.
In overall, DSpace’s presence among the top 100 listed repositories is fairly stable, with 41 repositories listed now, compared to 45 in January 2010 and 43 in January 2009.
We’re very proud to see @mire clients, and their repository projects, listed here. Click them for more information on the project.
Here are DSpace repositories for which the rank improved, compared to January 2010:
+4 NA Ohio State University Knowledge Bank
+7 EU University of Helsinki Ethesis
+8 EU Cambridge University Dspace
+12 EU Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Lirias Repository
+21 EU Tartu University Library Dspace
+23 EU Universidad Carlos III de Madrid Archivo Abierto Institucional
+24 EU Diposit de la Recerca de Catalunya
+29 NA University of Kansas Scholarworks
+34 CA University of British Columbia CIRCLE
+35 EU Research in Atmosphere, Cryosphere, Hydrosphere and Solid Earth Fields
+49 NA University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign Ideals
Unfortunately, there were some Instances who dropped in the ranking:
-119 EU Malmo University Electronic Publishing
-110 AS Hokkaido University Collection of Scholarly and Academic Papers
-104 AS Ochanomizu University Web Library Institutional Repository
-90 AU Flinders University Academic Commons
-86 EU Universitat Dortmund Eldorado Institutionellen Repositorium
-78 AS Nagasaki University Academic Output
-78 NA SUNY Dspace
-77 NA Rochester Institute of Technology Digital Media Library
-77 EU Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam Academic Repository
-69 AS National Tsing Hua University Repository
-66 NA University of Oregon Scholars’ Bank
-66 AS Kanazawa University Repository for Academic Resources
-64 NA University of Rochester Research
-63 AU Australian National University Dspace
-60 EU Aberystwyth University Cadair Repository
-51 NA University of Calgary Dspace
-48 EU Universidade do Minho Repositorium
-44 AU University of Sydney E-Scholarship
-43 NA Cornell University eCommons
-43 NA Boston University Digital Research Archive
-41 EU Leiden University Digital Repository
-41 NA Rice University Scholarship
-38 AS University of Tokyo Repository
-36 NA AMNH Scientific Publications
-35 IBC Biblioteca Digital Jurídica do Superior Tribunal de Justica
-34 AS Waseda University Dspace
-34 NA University of Wisconsin Digital Repository
-32 AS Kyushu University Institutional Repository
-31 NA Jet Propulsion Laboratory Beacon Espace
-30 NA Caltech Authors
-29 AS Indian Statistical Institute Digital Library
-27 NA University of Michigan Deep Blue
-22 EU National Library of Finland Dspace Services
-22 AU University of Adelaide Digital Library
-21 NA Université de Montreal Depot Institutionnel Numerique
-19 NA University of New México Institutional Repository
-18 AS Nagoya University Repository
-15 NA Oregon State University Scholarsarchive
-15 IBC Universidad de los Andes Repositorio Institucional
-15 EU Goteborg University Open Archive
-15 EU University of Bergen Open Research Archive
-15 NA Simon Fraser University Institutional Repository
-11 EU University of Edinburgh Research Archive
-8 EU Igitur Archive Universiteit Utrecht
-8 EU INIST I-Revues
-8 NA Georgia Tech’s Institutional Repository
-7 NA University of Toronto T Space
-5 EU Universitat Politécnica de Catalunya Upcommons
-3 AS Kyoto University Research Information Repository
-2 EU Digital CSIC
-1 NA MIT Dspace
We were able to identify a few institutions who weren’t in the top 100 before, but are now. Unfortunately, we have no exact ranking for these institutions from previous editions. (position - institution name - positions won):
35 EU Université de Liège Open Repository and Bibliography
59 NA ScholarSpace University of Hawai’i at Manoa
73 EU Libre Acces Aux Rapports Scientifiques et Techniques
74 NA University of Texas at Austin Libraries Digital Repository
96 NA Smithsonian Institution Digital Repository
Especially the Université de Liège’s appearance on place 35 is remarkable, as it’s a very high entry for an institution not being in the top 100 before (so it’s at least 65 positions up)
It would be great to hear from the top climbers, if they made certain customizations or improved their repository in a certain way, to explain the improvement in rank. At this point it’s very hard to identify whether the change in the algorithm is fully responsible for the changes, or whether best practices at institutions could explain the changes.
To make a further analysis for your institution, it could be useful to compare the 4 different metrics between July & January:
Size (S). Number of pages recovered from the four largest engines: Google, Yahoo, and Exalead.
Visibility (V). The total number of unique external links received (inlinks) by a site can be only confidently obtained from Yahoo Search and Exalead.
Rich Files (R). Only the number of text files in Acrobat format (.pdf) files extracted from Google and Yahoo are considered.
Scholar (Sc). Using Google Scholar database we calculate the mean of the normalised total number of papers and those (recent papers) published between 2001 and 2008.
After the ranking in January 2010, we identified following institutions that kept winning positions, despite the change in algortihms:
(position January 2009 - position July 2009 - position January 2010 - region - repo name)
85 83 38 NA Cornell University eCommons
53 36 17 EU INIST I-Revues
122 82 64 AS Nagasaki University Academic Output
79 49 36 IBC Biblioteca Digital Jurídica do Superior Tribunal de Justica
140 99 87 NA Rice University Scholarship
63 54 43 EU Digital CSIC
135 122 113 EU Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Lirias Repository
31 27 26 NA Ohio State University Knowledge Bank
From these, only Ohio State University Knowledge Bank and Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Lirias Repository kept up with the trend with +4 and +12 positions gained.
To conclude … all DSpace instances that we could identify in the ranking (especially under 200, there are probably a lot more, but we didn’t have the time to verify the full list of 800 repositories).
(Current Ranking - Difference between Jan 2010 and July 2010 - Region - Repository name)
7 -1 NA MIT Dspace
19 -8 EU Igitur Archive Universiteit Utrecht
22 +4 NA Ohio State University Knowledge Bank
25 -8 EU INIST I-Revues
28 -3 AS Kyoto University Research Information Repository
29 -5 EU Universitat Politécnica de Catalunya Upcommons
30 -7 NA University of Toronto T Space
31 -15 NA Oregon State University Scholarsarchive
34 -27 NA University of Michigan Deep Blue
35 EU Université de Liège Open Repository and Bibliography
36 -8 NA Georgia Tech’s Institutional Repository
38 +7 EU University of Helsinki Ethesis
43 +34 CA University of British Columbia CIRCLE
45 -2 EU Digital CSIC
47 -15 IBC Universidad de los Andes Repositorio Institucional
50 -15 EU Goteborg University Open Archive
51 +2 AS National Taiwan University Repository
55 -22 EU National Library of Finland Dspace Services
59 AS ScholarSpace University of Hawai’i at Manoa
61 +24 EU Diposit de la Recerca de Catalunya
62 +29 NA University of Kansas Scholarworks
66 -48 EU Universidade do Minho Repositorium
71 -35 IBC Biblioteca Digital Jurídica do Superior Tribunal de Justica
72 +21 EU Tartu University Library Dspace
73 EU Libre Acces Aux Rapports Scientifiques et Techniques
74 NA University of Texas at Austin Libraries Digital Repository
75 -41 EU Leiden University Digital Repository
76 -32 AS Kyushu University Institutional Repository
78 -30 NA Caltech Authors
81 -43 NA Cornell University eCommons
82 +35 EU Research in Atmosphere, Cryosphere, Hydrosphere and Solid Earth Fields
86 -31 NA Jet Propulsion Laboratory Beacon Espace
88 -34 AS Waseda University Dspace
90 -22 AU University of Adelaide Digital Library
91 -18 AS Nagoya University Repository
93 -15 EU University of Bergen Open Research Archive
94 -15 NA Simon Fraser University Institutional Repository
95 -66 NA University of Oregon Scholars’ Bank
96 NA Smithsonian Institution Digital Repository
98 -38 AS University of Tokyo Repository
99 +49 NA University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign Ideals
101 +12 EU Katholieke Universiteit Leuven Lirias Repository
113 EU Universidad de Alicante Repositorio Institucional
115 -63 AU Australian National University Dspace
117 -21 NA Université de Montreal Depot Institutionnel Numerique
118 -44 AU University of Sydney E-Scholarship
124 NA Texas A&M University Digital Repository
125 -66 AS Kanazawa University Repository for Academic Resources
128 -41 NA Rice University Scholarship
131 -11 EU University of Edinburgh Research Archive
132 +8 EU Cambridge University Dspace
137 AU University of Technology Sydney Press Institutional Repository
138 -19 NA University of New México Institutional Repository
139 -34 NA University of Wisconsin Digital Repository
142 -78 AS Nagasaki University Academic Output
147 SA Repositorio de la Escuela Superior Politécnica del Ecuador
148 -78 NA SUNY Dspace
149 -69 AS National Tsing Hua University Repository
153 +23 EU Universidad Carlos III de Madrid Archivo Abierto Institucional
155 NA University of Delaware Library Institutional Repository
159 NA University of Manitoba Mspace
162 -36 NA AMNH Scientific Publications
163 -77 NA Rochester Institute of Technology Digital Media Library
167 -104 AS Ochanomizu University Web Library Institutional Repository
167 EU Università di Trieste Openstarts
169 -51 NA University of Calgary Dspace
170 -43 NA Boston University Digital Research Archive
175 NA New York University Faculty Digital Archive
178 AS Indian Institute of Astrophysics Dspace
181 AS Hong Kong University of Science and Technology Institutional Repository
189 EU Cranfield University CERES
192 AS National Chengchi University Repository
193 EU Jyväskylä University Digital Archive
194 NA University of Minnesota Digital Conservancy
196 -29 AS Indian Statistical Institute Digital Library
197 EU University of Helsinki HELDA
207 AS Griffith University Research Online
209 -110 AS Hokkaido University Collection of Scholarly and Academic Papers
212 IBC Universidad de Chile Repositorio Académico
215 NA University of Washington Researchworks
216 AS Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology Repository
218 AS University of Hong Kong Scholars Hub
219 AS Tokyo Gakugei University Repository System
223 NA Kansas State University Research Exchange
226 NA National Institute for Technology and Liberal Education Repository
234 NA Indiana University Scholarworks
236 NA Open Access Server of the Woods Hole Scientific Community
239 -64 NA University of Rochester Research
240 EU University of Leicester Research Archive
245 AF Council for Scientific and Industrial Research Space
247 EU Brunel University Research Archive
249 IBC Universidade Federal do Parana Biblioteca Digital de Teses e Dissertações
250 EU Trinity College University of Dublin Research Archive
251 -77 EU Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam Academic Repository
253 EU European University Institute Institutional Repository
256 -86 EU Universitat Dortmund Eldorado Institutionellen Repositorium
257 -60 EU Aberystwyth University Cadair Repository
259 NA Queen’s University Qspace
261 -90 AU Flinders University Academic Commons
264 AU University of Canterbury Research Repository
269 AS Kumamoto University Repository
271 AS Mie University Scholarly E-Collections
274 -119 EU Malmo University Electronic Publishing
277 AS Yokohama National University Repository
279 NA Youngstown State University Repository
284 AS National Institute of Oceanography India Digital Repository
285 EU School of Advanced Study University of London Space E-Repository
287 AU Australian Defence Science and Technology Organization Repository
305 NA Drexel University e-Repository and Archive
315 EU Universita degli Studi di Milano Institutional Archive of Research
326 AS Kagoshima University Repository
329 NA Indiana and Purdue University Indianapolis Digital Archive
338 EU Loughborough University Institutional Repository
347 AS Obihiro University of Agriculture and Veterinary Medicine Academic Repository
353 EU Roskilde University Digital Archive
365 NA University of Waterloo UWSpace
369 EU Universita degli Studi della Tuscia Dspace
376 AS Xiamen University Institutional Repository
390 EU University College of Boras Academic Digital Archive
414 EU University of Hertfordshire Research Archive
418 EU Universitat Kassel Dspace
418 EU Open University Netherlands Dspace
441 EU University of Bristol Repository of Scholarly ePrints
446 NA George Mason University Archival Repository Service
461 EU University of Macedonia Digital Library & Institutional Repository
482 AS Raman Research Institute Digital Repository
516 AS Tokyo University of Foreign Studies Prometheus Academic Collections
641 EU Technical University Ostrava Repository
729 AU University of Auckland Researchspace
765 EU Halmstad University Scholarly Archive
If you think we made a mistake, or if you want to discuss this ranking, please contact Bram Luyten at or add your comments to this blog. This could be interesting.
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