Malaysian Integrated Electronic Thesis and Dissertation

• Main Author: M. Mohamad Noorman
• Format: Conference Paper
• Language: English
• Published: 2013
• Subjects: Electronic Thesis and Dissertation (ETD) system; Federated searching; Malaysian Institutions of Higher Learning
• Online Access: http://ddms.usim.edu.my/handle/123456789/6202

The number of Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs) is gradually increasing at ' Malaysian Institutes of Higher Learning. However, using different software, platforms and j: policies for the dissemination of ETDs, has caused new challenges in the context of I interoperability and integration of various ETD providers. So far. the most important 7 ,I attempt toward providing a unified interface for distributed ETD providers has been < Malaysian Theses Online (MYTO). Nevertheless, this portal cannot expose harvested metadata for external and international metadata harvesters. Furthermore, the whole 1 process of integrating and updating metadata from Institutions of Higher Learning is not :! automatic. We have tried to provide a unified interface for search and brows of Malaysian 4 3 Institutions of Higher Learning ETDs through the introduction of "Malaysian integrated ETDs". This system is based on well known protocol OAI-PMH, which is accepted by most of Malaysian Institutions of Higher Learning. The significance of this system is that, it acts not only as a data provider but also as a service provider. It extracts metadata from various data providers and exposes it to the service providers. The extracted metadata can be integrated with international ETD catalogues such as the NDLTD union catalog. This system does not have the regular weak points of Federated Search Systems such as, dependence on external service, slowness and difficulty in merging results. Implementation of this system will facilitate the search and brows of ETDs for the members of Malaysian Institutions of Higher Learning and increase the visibility of Malaysian ETDs through integration into the international databases. Digital library service providers in national and international levels can use this system for offering value added services.