Service Features and Benefits

The Scholaris service provides a number of features and benefits, listed below. 

• Centralized Hosting & Technical Support:
  • Scholaris (Scholars Portal) installs, hosts and maintains the key technical components so you can focus on your core work.
  • Regular upgrades and modern architecture mean your repository benefits from the latest technological developments.
  • From setup and migration to ongoing support, the dedicated Scholaris team provides timely assistance, project tracking, training, and access to resources and documentation for your repository team.
     
• Flexible and Customizable: 
  • Scholaris provides a flexible model and support for customizations to tailor your repository to meet the needs of your repository community.
  • Institutions retain control over their own repository branding and theming. 
  • Scholaris helps you support your researchers. Your repository team continues to manage the daily operations of your repository and maintain direct relationships with scholarly community.
     
• Community Supported: 
  • Scholaris is a community driven service shaped by subscribing institutions and strengthened through collaboration with the Canadian and global repository community. 
  • Subscribers provide on-going input on the direction of the service and have opportunities to contribute to and benefit from expert group recommendations, shared documentation, and community discussions. 
  • Scholaris operates on a cost-recovery basis through a collective funding model, allowing institutions to share infrastructure costs while benefiting from centralized support and community expertise. 
     
• Secure Data Storage: 
  • Scholaris data is stored at the University of Toronto Libraries data centre and content is backed up on a nightly basis to ensure rapid recovery in the event of unforeseen circumstances.
     
• Open Source & Open Access 
  • Scholaris provides infrastructure for Green Open Access scholarship.
  • Scholaris supports open infrastructure by using DSpace open source software and contributing to the DSpace community. 
     
• Persistent Identifiers 
  • Scholaris collaborates with the national persistent identifier (PID) community to ensure long-term citation, discoverability, and accessibility of repository content.
  • Scholaris provides technical assistance for the setup and implementation of Handles, DOIs and ORCID. 
     
• External Authentication
  • Scholaris simplifies access for researchers through seamless and secure integration with institutional authentication systems, including Shibboleth, OIDC, and ORCID.
     
• Digital Preservation
  • While Scholaris is not a dedicated digital preservation system, the service and the DSpace platform it's built on provide features and functionality that support preservation activities, including checksum generation, metadata capture, export capabilities, and secure data storage and backup.
  • Scholaris collaborates with the Scholaris Digital Preservation Expert Group (S-DPEG) on the development of community-facing guidance to build digital preservation capacity among repository teams and across institutions, and is currently working with the S-DPEG to develop flexible pathways and workflows for the long-term preservation and access of repository content.

Please refer to the Scholaris Branding Guidelines and Communications Kit for guidance and suggestions on communicating the Scholaris service offering to your scholarly community and institutional leadership.