The University Library is tomorrow launching the institutional repository OAR@UoM.

This online archive will collect, preserve and disseminate a variety of scholarly material produced under the University’s auspices.

National intellectual output and heritage will also be accepted for submission to the archive.

The main benefit of the institutional repository is that it will increase the visibility of research carried out at the University and will serve as a dissemination tool.

The archive is integrated with the library’s portal HyDi and accessible via its website.

Most of the content deposited onto the repository will be available in Open Access.

It will include articles, books and book chapters, theses or dissertations, conference proceedings, audio visual material that is out of copyright and other scholarly content. OAR@UoM is set up on widely used open source software DSpace, which provides internet-based tools for the submission, processing and uploading of material.

The software will allow scholars and researchers to search the repository through various parameters, including title, author, date, discipline, community (faculty or department) or collection.

The system will also provide RSS feeds to alert users when new content relevant to their particular area of research is uploaded onto the repository.

OAR@UoM will serve as a platform whereby University authors and researchers can upload their research in open access so that it can be easily identified and accessed by local and international scholars within academia as well as by the public.