Skip To Content

Required Fields Formatting Requirements

Manual Fields

The following two required fields – Standardized Rights Statement and Title – must be found in the Data Provider’s original metadata.

Standardized Rights Statement
Standardized Rights Statement edm:rights Required, 1. The URI of the rights statement from rightstatements.org or license URI from creativecommons.org that applies to the digital object or digital representation found at edm:isShownAt. The statement found at the URI cannot contradict or repeat information found in dc:rights.

We have the following requirements for the rights field:

  • The field must only have the URI from rightsstatements.org or creativecommons.org and no other text in the field. Note the URI differs from the URLs found on rightsstements.org. Please use the URIs as seen below:
    • CORRECT URI: http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
    • INCORRECT URL: http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en
  • The field must not contradict or repeat information found in the local rights field. If you wish to put the text of the rights statement in a second rights field, we’ll only harvest the fields with the URI, but we must have at least one field that only has the rights URI field.
  • To see a full list of acceptable values, check the DPLA Github.
  • At ODN, we recommend using the Rights Statements over Creative Commons licenses for most items. In most cases, the library providing the resource isn’t the creator of the resource and isn’t able to provide a license for the material in the same way a creator is. In addition, the 12 rights statements are written to be easily understood by the public so they can determine what they can legally do with your resources. Since the goal of DPLA is to provide access, we recommend using as clear rights and licenses as possible.
Title
Title dcterms:title Required, 1 or more. Primary name given to the described resource.

We don’t have any formatting requirements for the title, except it must be present in your metadata. DPLA does recommend the title is as descriptive as possible.

Automatic Fields

The following four required fields – Data Provider, Collection, Is Shown At and Preview – are usually found automatically from Data Provider’s OAI-PMH Feed, or other relevant information.

Collection
Collection dcterms:isPartOf Required, 1. Collection or aggregation of which described resource is a part; will be determined from the OAI set name. Can use as an alternative value if necessary; notify ODN during initial QA process.

We’ll use the OAI-PMH Set name for this field. If you want use a different name, please note that and any questions on your mapping template. DPLA does not currently display this information on the public side of the website, but has plans to display it in the future.

Data Provider
Data Provider edm:dataProvider Required, 1. The organization or entity that supplies data to DPLA through a Provider.

We’ll use name providers list as the “Institution Name” on the ODN Mapping Template for this field. The institution name will be identical for all items for all items in a collection. DPLA will display this information as “Contributing Institution” on their website.

Is Shown At
Is Shown At edm:isShownAt Required, 1. Unambiguous URL reference to digital object in its full information context.

Often this information is found in the <Identifier> field depending on the Digital Asset Management System institutions use. Some Digital Asset Management Systems may put the information in the dc:identifier field. DPLA will display this information as the “URL” on their website.

Preview
Preview edm:preview Required, 1. The URL of a thumbnail, extract or other type of resource representing the digital object for the purposes of providing a preview.

This information is often found in the dc:identifier field depending on the Digital Asset management system used. Occasionally, institutions may have to request that systems administers program this item.

DPLA will display this as a thumbnail image in searches and on the item record on their website. Some items, such as, audio and video files are not required to have thumbnails. If your items don’t have a natural thumbnail, please don’t use a default image for this field.

Please take a moment to review your collections thumbnails. If your system is using default thumbnails, please let us know so we can remove them during our XSTL transform.