Accessing grey literature in an integrated environment of scientific research information

The DARE programme was initiated in the Netherlands by the SURF Foundation, the Dutch universities, the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW), and the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO). The objective of the programme was to enable digital access to research results of all the Dutch scientific institutions. Since the DARE programme (2003 - 2006), all the institutes involved have had their own repositories. The DAREnet portal website (www.darenet.nl/en) gives access to the content of all the repositories. As from 1 January 2007, KNAW Research Information has taken over responsibility for the DAREnet website, formerly maintained by the SURF Foundation. DAREnet currently contains three sections: DAREnet proper, Cream of Science, and Promise of Science. In November 2007 DAREnet provides access to some 138,000 digital publications at 19 institutions. Cream of Science showcases prominent research from the Netherlands. It lists over 200 top Dutch academics, providing worldwide access to more than 48,000 publications. About 60 percent of these can be accessed full-text (PDF). Promise of Science enables full-text search of over 16,000 e-theses. In all, some 30 percent of the objects can be listed as grey literature. These grey publications have always been hard to find but can now easily be accessed in DAREnet. They can also be found via Google and other search engines. Another service run by of KNAW Research Information is NARCIS, the National Academic Research and Collaborations Information System. NARCIS (www.narcis.info) is a portal website where users can find research information (programmes, projects, researchers and their expertise, research institutes) from the Current Research Information System (CRIS), full-text publications, and news items from research institutes' websites. Later this year datasets will also be included. Because there is some overlap in content and functionality between the DAREnet and NARCIS systems, KNAW Research Information has decided to integrate DAREnet into NARCIS. This involves the creation of one back-end system and centralised content updates in one location. All the functionalities for current users of both portals will remain, including the RSS feed and advanced search options, and new ones will be added. After the integration of DAREnet and NARCIS, the big challenge will be the interlinking of the three major research information types in NARCIS: programme and project descriptions, primary data, and research publications (articles, reports, books, patents, etc.). This interlinking will be made possible by the development of an exchange format for the source systems. Unique digital author identifiers, a project in which each individual researcher in the Netherlands is given a unique number, are being used to create the links. In the paper the development of connecting the information in NARCIS will be described in detail. NARCIS will be part of the Dutch Academic Information Domain. When completed this system will enable full-text (grey) literature and any underlying datasets to be searched in their context (research programme, institute, fields of expertise). Finally, the European dimension, i.e. the DRIVER project - Digital Repository Infrastructure Vision for European Research (http://www.driver-repository.eu) will be described.