INFLIBNET Newsletter's Articles
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Item Ensuring High-Level System Availability of Computing Services(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2016-10-01) Patel, Yatrik; V, RajaToday number of institutes and their day-to-day activities are solely depended on IT. Almost every aspect of the institutional activity and services needs Internet connectivity and computing infrastructure to function. IT made the things faster, easier. At the same time, the responsibilities of implementer has increased multi-fold to ensure less downtime of applications and services. The cost of downtime is very high and may spoil the reputation of institution and its services. The best way to overcome the failure of the system or applications is setting up the high-level system availability. High-level system availability refers to a server or an application that ensures uninterrupted operational for a maximum possible time. In fact, a fault-free system or application that is expected to run without fail has to be well-designed and thoroughly tested before its deployment. Nowadays servers and underlying network have to manage a large volume of traffic to serve millions of clients. Perhaps, a single server may not sustain such a heavy load. In this computer era, it is very challenging task to achieve “100% Operational” or “never failing” of any computing environment. This can be achieved by implementing various redundancy mechanisms for hardware as well as software. Most of the organization prefers to deploy their applications on cloud so that the disaster recovery can be achieved with immediate effect without much complexity and safeguarding investments. High-level system availability can avoid having single point-of-failure. If failure occurs restoration can be performed in microseconds. This article attempts to give glimpses and technical highlights on achieving maximum uptime with minimal chances to failure of computing environment using presently available technologies.Item Access to E-Resources for Indian Higher Education System and the Role of INFED (INFLIBNET Access Management Federation)(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2017-07-01) Patel, Yatrik; V RajaIndian Universities and institutions of higher education have witnessed a boost in e-resources accessible to their users through various consortium initiatives. However, at present, mostly the access is restricted to only university/institute campuses within specific IP ranges. There is a need to widen the access of e-resources. Ideally the access to e-resources should be available to users from anywhere i.e. on-campus, off-campus, from home, while travelling and at any given point of time. The purpose of this article to give an overview of the role of INFED (INFIBNET Access Management Federation) to expand the reach of e-resources and make some suggestions about how effective it is from perspective of practice with a view to justifying its role. This paper attempts to describe the scope of INFED and benefits of inter federation services, beyond the features off-campus access.Item R: An Open Source Software Environment for Statistical Analysis(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2017-04-01) Patel, Yatrik; Vaghela, Divyakant; Solanki, Hitesh; Vaidya, MitishaThe research data and its efficient analysis play a vital role in successful research as well as in drawing meaningful inferences. Students, scholars, research institutes, Government and non-Government organizations around the World depend heavily on statistical and data analysis to carry out their research as well for taking decisions based on statistical analysis of data. Statistics plays a vital role in almost all domains of knowledge. This article provides an overview of various comprehensive, proprietary and non-proprietary statistical packages that are available in the market place for carrying out statistical analyses on data such as SPSS, Stata, Minitab, SAS, etc. The article especially focuses on non-proprietary and open source statistical package called R, which is widely used in all research domains for statistical analysis, data mining and data visualization across the world.Item Science Mapping and Visualization Tools used in Bibliometric & Scientometric Studies: An Overview(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2017-01-01) Pradhan, PallabScience mapping and visualization techniques are used for data analysis in bibliometric and scientometric studies. Science mapping and visualization helps to explore the scientific knowledge, make it livelier by visualizing and showcasing the impact of research by displaying the structural relationship and dynamics of scientific research domains. Various software tools have been developed incorporating different science mapping and visualization techniques. This article briefly presents features and functions of such software tools used for data analysis in bibliometric and scientometric studies.Item Data Repositories in India with Specific Reference to "ICSSR Data Service: Indian Social Science Data Repository"(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2016-07-01) Pradhan, PallabThe raw research data / datasets used in the process of research analysis has immense inheritance value as like the research results itself. So, it is very evident and becoming very important to collect, store and manage such data / datasets properly for further reuse. In this regard, data repositories are becoming the trend setters in research data management and playing a great role for facilitating open access to data & promoting data sharing. Currently, hundreds of data repositories are available on the web covering a wide range of disciplines from around the world; and India is not an exception to it. The ICSSR Data Service has been initiated by ICSSR, New Delhi with aim to promote data sharing at a national level and to provide open access to social science research data / datasets hugely generated by various social science research institutes in the country. This article elaborates the current status of data repositories in the country, specifically the "ICSSR Data Service: Indian Social Science Data Repository". Further, it enumerates in details about ICSSR Data Service i.e. its objectives, development, current status, its features & functionalities, datasets, etc. Also, it explores the in-built online "ICSSR Data Analytics" and visualization tool developed using "R" language.Item Ranking Model for Indian Higher Educational Institutions through NIRF(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2016-04-01) Kumar, AbhishekFirst time in the history of independent India, the Government of India, took up the initiative to launch a Nationwide Ranking framework to rank the educational institutions in the country. The National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) was launched by Ministry of Human Resource Development on 29th September 2015 and ranking was announced on 4th April, 2016. The major role was played by UGC, AICTE, NBA and INFLIBNET in ranking of the institutions. INFLIBNET was entrusted with the responsibility of carrying out the implementation of the NIRF. This paper provides an overview of the various challenges and opportunities for improvement in the next interaction of the NIRF implementation.Item Semantic-based Researcher Profile Management System: Case Study on VIVO(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2016-01-01) P, KannanThe Internet has provided ample opportunity to this generation of scholars to communicate, share and discover information. Development of profile management system is crucial to organise research activities of an organisation and showcase them to the peer group. The semantic web is the extension web standard to organise the information through common data format and exchange protocol. This article explains about the semantic technologies such as; Resource Description Framework, Web Ontology Language, Open Linked Data. The purpose of this article is to discuss about what is profile management system, how it is used in the scholarly communication, etc. The article emphasis on semantic-based profile management system called: VIVO and its architecture, data integration tools and major features and functionalities, etc.Item Academic Identity: An Overview(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2015-10-01) P, KannanAcademic identity is quite popular in the recent years amongst researchers due to its usage in the research report system. It is essential for measuring research impact of an author or organisation. The article explains about various academic identity systems such as ISNI, Google Scholar Profile, Researcher ID, Scopus ID, RePEc and ORCID ID. The purpose of the article is to discuss the use of academic identity in the research ecosystem and its benefits. The article elaborates the possibility for integration of author identity in the research report system such as manuscript submission system, project proposal, grant application, award application, ranking system, etc.Item Altmetrics: Measuring the Broader Impact of Scientific Research(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2015-07-01) Pradhan, PallabMeasuring the impact of scientific research of individuals and institutions is a necessity and a challenging task for institutions, funding agencies and the government so as to draw a well-informed policy framework and draw pathways for future directions. While peer-review and citation-based bibliometrics indicators have become global means of measuring research output and are playing a critical role in this process. However, citations have been criticized for limiting their scope within academic and neglecting the broader societal impact of research. The Article-level-metrics (ALM) or altmetrics has emerged as an alternative metrics (alternative to bibliometrics) to fill-in the gap and setting a new trend in recent times for measuring the impact of scientific publications and their social outreach on web. Altmetrics is the new metrics for measuring research impact based on the data penetration on the web and social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Mendeley and CiteULike, etc. This paper provides an overview on altmetrics, its definitions, its data sources and available tools, merits and demerits, difference between altmetrics and bibliometrics, etc. Lastly, the article outlines possibilities of implementing altmetrics in publications-based services offered by the INFLIBNET Centre.Item MOOCs: An Educational Space with Difference(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2015-04-01) Kumar, Abhishek; Brahmbhatt, ShwetaThe article explains about Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) which is now a new educational space with difference in online educational world. The purpose of this article is to explain current scenario of e-Learning system using MOOC and its platform. The article is focused on MOOCs, its features, process / methodology, classification/category and platforms including different platform that offers MOOCs such as Coursera, edX, etc as well as parameter to evaluate MOOCs platforms.Item Recent Trends in Databases and New Technologies for providing Online Library Services to create “Intelligent Libraries”(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2015-01) K, Manoj KumarLibrary services have gone through phenomenal changes in providing information services by adopting proven technologies for dissemination of information to the users. Due to the fundamental shift in accessing information, latest tools and technologies are developed for meeting the versatility of platform for sharing of information over Internet. Over past few decades, databases played major roles in storing and indexing information in a structured way. Relational databases became important software for storage and management of data in conventional libraries. Various commercial as well as open source database management software have been introduced for various purposes. These software are having structured architecture to query and retrieve information through standard SQL. The compulsion to handle voluminous and structures data such as audios and videos has given birth to unstructured query languages like NoSQL databases. Similarly for the user interfaces, simple HTML and CSS have been replaced with more sophisticated tools like JSP, JSON, XML, XHTML & HTML 5, J-Query, DOM, AJAX, HTML5, built-in Java/PHP framework, etc. Device and browser independent applications are in demand due to the penetration of smartphones, tablets and other hand-held wireless devices amongst masses. These kinds of latest devices are widely used by academic community and users also demand for the applications which can easily run on these devices. Android, Windows Phone, Palm WebOS, Blackberry etc. are commonly used by students and academic community who look for the library services to run on these devices. To reach services and applications to the all strata of the society, the services should be available in vernacular languages also. This paper discussed evolution of databases and library automation software, trends in technological changes in application development, innovation in providing services, semantic web, ontology, recent front-end tools for user interface design and strategies to be adopted to choose such trends and tools.Item Federated Search & Discovery Services : A Standards and Protocols Perspective(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2014-10) Pradhan, Dinesh Ranjan; Pandya, MiteshWith advent of information and communication technology, drastic changes can be seen in the services offered by the libraries. One of the primary objective of the library is to serve their users in a time brand manner. In this age of information explosion there are lots of printed as well as digital documents that are stored in a library are available online either in open access or on subscription and it is very difficult to find relevant one in time. Federated search and discovery tools facilitate integrated searching for all types of materials from a single search box. The article describes some of the standards and protocols that can be used to streamline the operation of developing federated search engine and discovery tools.Item Developing National Ranking for Indian Universities: Moving towards World Class Universities(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2014-07) Arora, Jagdish; Trivedi, KrutiThis article describes important university ranking systems along with indicators and methodology deployed by them for ranking universities. The shortcomings of these ranking systems are highlighted. The article describes I-UGR system of ranking developed for ranking universities in Spain and elaborates on its formula. Finally, the article describes why I-UGR system of ranking universities could also be used for ranking universities in India.Item A Case Study on e-SARTS (e-Scholarship-Fellowship Award Registration Tracking System)(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2014-04) Kumar, Abhishek; Shah, DharmeshThe article provides details of a single-window platform for all scholarship/fellowship available to students, scholars and faculties under various schemes of University Grants Commission. The article delves on various features and functionalities of e-SARTS platform, methodology involved, role of INFLIBNET Centre and a brief write-up on each of the 13 scholarships / fellowships that are covered under e-SARTS. The article aims to reach out to eligible students, scholars and faculties who can benefit from these schemes.Item A Webometric Analysis of Institutional Repositories using Dspace in India(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2014-01) Asnani, RomaMajor technological changes have been noticed in scholarly communication and exchange in scientific communication since last few years. Web presence and appearance of scholarly content on the web has gained a special significance. This webometrics study is based on web impact factor of institutional repositories using Dspace in India with the help ofOpenDOAR database for data collection, Google search engine and Pajek, network design software through WebCrawler Socscibot 4 for network analysis was used as a graphical tool for creating inlinks topology.Item INFLIBNET's Virtual Classroom Using A-View: A Step towards Innovative e-learning Environment(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2013-10) Patel, Yatrik; Vaghela, DivyakantA virtual classroom is an innovative e-learning online environment. As human resources development in ICT and LIS skill is one of the core mandates of the INFLIBNET Centre, a variety of training programs are being conducted on regular basis. For better outreach, INFLIBNET Centre has initiated Virtual Classroom for benefiting the users of our services. The user will have the facility to learn from his/her own choice of place. This article explains the training provided by INFLIBNET Centre through A-VIEW software and how user can join our classroom to avail the benefits.Item Building the State-of-the-Art IT Infrastructure for ICT enabled Higher Educational Institutions(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2013-07) K, Manoj KumarStrength and quality of a higher education institute leverage on the state-of-the-art IT infrastructure which works as the technical backbone for the activities carried out by the institute and skilled manpower to handle the IT services of the Institute. Planning, analysing, designing, implementing and testing of such low voltage IT solutions which covers networking with virtualisation switches and structured gigabit cabling, IP telephony, Building Management System (BMS), sophisticated Data Centre with highend servers, UTM, Public Addressing System, Surveillance System, Video conferencing etc. are challenging tasks. This article introduces the concept of various components required for such a planning, designing and implementation of such a low voltage IT Solution.Item About Building of the INFLIBNET Centre : The Architect's perspective(INFLIBNET Centre, Gandhinagar, 2013-04) Hoof, SönkeItem Learning Management System: ATutor for Academic Institutions(INFLIBNET Centre, Ahmedabad, 2013-01) Kumar, AbhishekItem Assessing and Evaluating Research Performance of an Institution using Bibliometric Indicators(INFLIBNET Centre, Ahmedabad, 2012-10) Arora, Jagdish; Trivedi, KrutiThis article explains methods and metrics for assessing and evaluating research performance of an institution using Bibliometric Indicators. The paper highlights some of the underlying principles and metrics that are used for evaluation of research performance. It also provides background information to assist the universities / institutions to conduct evaluation of research performance.