For ScholarSphere service assistance, inquiries, requests, consultation, or sharing feedback, please use the following contact options:
For reporting problems using the ScholarSphere service, please contact the ITS Digital Library Technologies Service Desk:
Find Policy and Terms of Use on the About Page. Use the <%= link_to 'Contact Form', contact_form_index_path %> to request additional information about ScholarSphere.
Anyone can search, see, and download the publicly available (Open Access) content in ScholarSphere without needing to login.
Current Penn State faculty, staff, and students can deposit content into ScholarSphere.
ScholarSphere can be used with multiple browsers. For best performance, Chrome is a recommended browser for using ScholarSphere.
Login is located in the upper right-hand corner of the screen.
Only current Penn State faculty, students and staff will be able to login and see My Dashboard. The dashboard is created when a depositor uploads files into ScholarSphere; it is used for managing content. A user must be logged into ScholarSphere to access My Dashboard. To locate the dashboard, use the drop-down menu next to the login button and click on "My Dashboard."
When another depositor gives you edit permissions to their file, this file will appear in your dashboard.
Content will be displayed in your dashboard only if you have been assigned edit permissions by the depositor.
Your content will be retained in the database, along with the persistent URLs assigned to each item.
Enter keywords into the search box located at the top of the page. ScholarSphere searches on metadata (description) for content that has been made public. Full-text searching of content in an uploaded file is not available but is an enhancement planned for a future release.
The default parameter for searching is by "AND." If you enter two words in the search box, it searches on both of the words. An example is data curation: all results returned for this search will contain both words, but not necessarily adjacent to each other. Results might include both data curation appearing in one result, and digital curation appearing in another, with the word data appearing somewhere else in the result. To search by either word, use the term "OR" in your search. For example, results from a search for data OR curation will contain either the word data, or the word curation somewhere in the results, and might also contain both words, though not necessarily adjacent to each other. This type of searching is likely to bring back more results - it is a broader approach to searching. To search by a specific phrase, put quotation marks around the phrase. A search for "data curation" will return results in which the two words are adjacent to each other and in the specified order.
Enhancements in future releases will include more search options.
From your dashboard under Actions, click on Download.
After you login, search results will contain content that is visible to the Penn State community and any content that you have made private (visible only to you and to those with whom you've shared content). If you are not logged in, you will see only content that is visible to the public (i.e., Open Access).
All of your content is listed on your dashboard. Login to ScholarSphere (located in the upper right-hand corner of the screen) and select "My Dashboard" via the the drop-down menu next to your name that is displayed after login.
Click the New Search button that appears just above the first search result on the right-hand side of the search results column.
These words are based on an automatic spell checking feature of the keyword(s) that were entered. ScholarSphere searches the metadata (description) of content that has been deposited in ScholarSphere. As the content collection grows and expands, the 'Did you mean?' options will link to content found in ScholarSphere. Search results are based on whether you are logged in or not.
Use the drop-down menu located next to your name in the upper right hand corner of the screen. You must be logged in to access your dashboard.
This list includes the original upload of content that has open access visibility. When a file is edited after uploading, it will not appear in the Recently Uploaded list again.
The Browse By categories are a list of terms that represent metadata (description) entered by depositors to describe the files they uploaded.
Items in the Browse By list are displayed only if depositors entered metadata entered for those fields, e.g., keyword, location, publisher, etc.
Yes. Terms in the Browse By list will be displayed if files have open-access visibility.
Resource type is a description that is determined by the depositor, e.g. image, report, journal, presentation, etc. File format is the type of file, e.g. .jpg, .doc, .pdf, etc., and is identified by the system during the upload process.
You will see only items you have access to. These items will be displayed with an exact match to the name. For example, Sam Smith and Samuel Smith would not appear in the same list.
Yes. From the ScholarSphere Home page, select a term from the Browse By list. The resulting page displays an additional and related list of terms. Selecting a term from each subsequent results page brings back a combined search of all the terms that have been selected.
Selected terms are displayed in individual boxes near the top of the search results page. These terms can be removed by clicking on the 'x' located at the end of each line. Incrementally removing these terms will return you to the previous search results page. Removing all terms returns you to the ScholarSphere Home page.
Deposit Agreement can be found on the Deposit Agreement Page
Choosing a Creative Commons license will make it clear to anyone exactly what rights you have given for re-use of your work. Creative Commons is a non-profit organization dedicated to making the sharing and distribution of knowledge and creativity as uncomplicated and barrier-free as possible. It accomplishes this through various licenses, which people are free to apply to their creations as they wish.
These licenses range from somewhat restrictive to extremely open. Creative Commons uses various abbreviations and phrases that stand for types of licenses - types of sharing and distribution:
Creative Commons licenses can take the following combinations, which is what a depositor sees on the page where metadata (descriptions) are entered. Via the drop-down menu, the depositor may select any of the following licenses (these are all described at "About the Licenses" on the Creative Commons site):
Please note: Another license option that is listed is "All rights reserved." With this license you - as the copyright holder - reserve all rights held under copyright law, such as for distribution and creation of derivative works. This means that no one can use your content in a work - such as a presentation or article - or create derivatives from it without your permission.
Terms of use can be found on the Terms of Use Page
Guidelines and Policies can be found on the About Page
Yes. The required fields for metadata (description) to enter are Title, Keyword, Creator, and Rights (which has the default content of "Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0" but which you may change by selecting a difference license option). Also, you may add more than one keyword by clicking on "+" or by hitting Enter/Return on your keyboard.
Many of the fields include a "?" next to them. Click on the "?" to get a definition of the field.
Keyword," which is a required field to fill in, describes the content of the file you have uploaded. You enter keywords, also known as tags, to tell something about the content you have uploaded to ScholarSphere.
Do not submit sensitive data. Sensitive data includes, but is not limited to, personally identifiable information (PII), as covered by Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) and Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), specific locations of endangered plants and animals, or protected archaeological sites.
Do not submit any content for which you do not own the intellectual property rights or do not have permission from the copyright holder.
Examples include:
If you do not own the copyright to the content you wish to upload, you must receive permission from the rights holder before uploading. It is your responsibility to obtain copyright permissions before uploading content to ScholarSphere. If you wish to upload a journal article but are unsure who holds copyright, then please consult the Sherpa/Romeo site for publisher policies with regard to self-archiving in a repository service. See Deposit Agreement Page.
In the beta release, you can enter individual titles for each file but at the time of upload, metadata (description) entries are applied to all files. After your multiple files are uploaded and described, you may edit metadata for the individual files. You can access and edit files in My Dashboard.
Collections are not available in the beta release, but they are a very high priority for a future release. You can "group" items by giving them the same keywords
Use the <%= link_to 'Contact Form', contact_form_index_path %> to report the problem.
Browser uploads can accommodate 200MB maximum for an individual file upload and a 500MB maximum total upload for multiple files. To upload files that exceed these maximum limits, use the Contact Form to request technical assistance.
When files are uploaded and edited, ScholarSphere automatically captures certain details about them (e.g., date of upload, date last modified, file size, etc.) and updates the Description page with these File Details.
Navigate to the description (record) of a file, or - if you are already in My Dashboard - click on the file name to access the file record. The URL for the file will be displayed in your browser address bar like any other URL.
There are two ways. If you are in the record for your file, you may copy and paste the URL directly from your browser. If you are in the dashboard, find the file you want to share and use the paper clip icon in the row for that file (the right-most icon in the Actions column). Click on the icon and then paste (Ctrl+V) the URL in the desired location.
You can share the URL for a file via email (using the email icon in the record for a file), or via a suite of social media application icons displayed in a file record. The visibility and access permissions set for that file will apply when you share your file.
The delete option is available on your Dashboard. PLEASE NOTE: Anyone with whom you have shared edit permissions will be able to delete a file!
Yes, through the edit option. The depositor or any persons who have been given edit permissions may edit description fields for the file. Locate and click on the file name or thumbnail, click on Edit (under Actions) and go to the Descriptions tab.
Yes, through the batch edit option. The depositor or any persons who have been given edit permissions may edit description fields (metadata) for multiple files.
Yes, through the batch delete option. The depositor or any persons who have been given edit permissions may delete multiple files.
The depositor sets permissions during the upload process. Access permissions give the depositor of content the ability to control who can find, see, edit and download their content. You have the option of setting both "Visibility" (who can see an item) and "Share With" (who can edit.)
Yes. Use the following steps to edit permissions at any time:
For Visibility:
See above steps for Share With and follow until clicking on the Permissions tab. Then at the box that says "Select a group," click on the drop-down menu, and you will see a list of groups that you are a member of. If you are not a member of any group (also know as User Managed Groups [UMGs]), then you will not see a list. For more information about UMGs, see Penn State User Managed Group (UMG).
Social media icons are displayed in all file records in ScholarSphere, regardless of access permissions. You can use these social media applications to share your content (i.e., URLs for your files) with others. The visibility and access permissions you set for that content will apply for these additional ways of sharing your file. Persons without the appropriate access permissions will not be able to view the content.
Metadata is information describing a resource or collection of resources contained within ScholarSphere.
Metadata allows users to discover your content through searching on a number of different aspects of it -- subject search, author/creator search, format search, etc. It also allows content contributors to track the content they or others have submitted, i.e. files related to a grant-funded project, or about a particular topic of interest. It also helps other researchers understand how they may use the digital materials.
Two ways: depositors enter metadata (title, keyword, creator, subject, rights information, description, etc.), and ScholarSphere automatically generates other information about the uploaded file (these are the "File Details," which describe dates uploaded or modified, file size, etc.).
Yes. Depositors and those with edit permissions can use the following steps to edit and update metadata (description) at any time:
If you receive an error while using ScholarSphere, use the <%= link_to 'Contact Form', contact_form_index_path %> to report the problem.
You can submit new feature and enhancement through the <%= link_to 'Contact Form', contact_form_index_path %>.
The ScholarSphere repository is being built on the Hydra platform. The Hydra Project is a collaborative, multi-institutional effort to develop repository systems using common, community-sourced components. Initiated in 2008, Hydra partners include Stanford, the University of Virginia, DuraSpace, Indiana University, Columbia University and others. Penn State formally joined the Hydra project in June 2012, and will host the annual HydraCamp – a hands-on development training workshop – in October 2012.
If you would like additional information about ScholarSphere development, submit your request via the <%= link_to 'Contact Form', contact_form_index_path %>.
Use the <%= link_to 'Contact Form', contact_form_index_path %> to submit a request or inquiry.
The beta release does not include a mobile-friendly version, but accommodating mobile devices is planned for a future release.