Fedora Digital Library Software Evaluation
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Chapter 8
Fedora Digital Library Software
Evaluation
http://www.fedora.info/
Introduction
Fedora digital object repository management system is based on the Flexible
Extensible Digital Object and Repository Architecture (Fedora). It is an open-
source digital content repository service, which provides a flexible tool for man-
aging and delivering complex digital objects[1]. Fedora provides interfaces for
creation, ingest, management, and dissemination of contents stored within a
repository.
Fedora software development began in 1997 as a DARPA and NSF funded
research project at Cornell University. The University of Virginia and Cornell
University2 jointly developed Fedora with funding provided by a grant from
the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The software is flexible enough for serving
variety of digital documents with different functionalities such as digital asset
management, institutional repositories, digital archives, content management
systems, scholarly publishing enterprises, digital libraries etc.
Fedora 1.0 was released in May 2003, with future releases following approxi-
mately every quarter with added functionality and corrected bugs discovered by
users and the Fedora development team. In June 2004, the Andrew W. Mellon
Foundation funded Fedora Phase 2 for an additional 3 year project.
Fedora model is a simple model which allows all objects to be managed in a
239
CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 240
consistent manner in a Fedora repository. It is the robust integrated repository-
centered platform that enables the storage, access and management of all kinds
of digital content and offer information and services for communities such
as scholars, artists, educators, Web innovators, publishers, scientists, librari-
ans, archivists, publishers, records managers, museum curators or anyone who
presents, accesses, or preserves digital content, and software developers who
work on open source Web and enterprise content technologies.
The system is designed in such a way that full featured institutional repositories
and other interoperable web based digital libraries can be built.
First version of Fedora was released on 16th May 20003. For the present study
version 2.2.1 of the software which was current release during the course of
study was selected for further evaluation. The current version provides a repos-
itory that can handle more than 10 million digital objects efficiently[2]. This
version was released on 13th August 2007. Fedora has released version 3.0 dur-
ing April 2008. The following sections lists different observations after having
installation of version 2.2.1.
8.1 Content Acquisition
8.1.1 Which document types can be added in the software (books, reports, journal
articles, lecture notes, technical reports, thesis, images, audio/video files, data
set files etc.?)
Fedora supports to upload conventional digital objects (such as books,
other text documents, learning objects, geospatial data, images, maps, com-
puter programs) and Complex, Compound, Dynamic objects (such as videos,
numerical data sets, their associated code books and audios)
8.1.2 Does the software have capability to define the domain/scope of Digital Library
for whom it is intended for? No
8.1.3 If yes, what level of users it is intended for? No
8.1.4 Which digital document file formats does the system support? ( proprietary
as well as open source):- Fedora supports the following MIME type file
formats:
CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 241
text/xml, text/plain, text/html, text/html+xml, text/svg+xml, text/rtf, im-
age/jpeg, image/jg2, image/gif, image/bmp, image/png, image/tiff, audio/
mpeg, audio/x-aiff, audio/x-wav, audio/x-pn-realaudio, video/mpeg, video/
quicktime, application/postscript, application/pdf, application/ rdf+xml, ap-
plication/ ms-word, application/ms-excel, application/ms-powerpoint, ap-
plication/smil, application/octel-stream, application/ x-tar, application/ zip,
application/ x-gtar, application/ x-gzip, application/ xml, application / xhtml
+x , application/ xslt+xml, application/ xml-dtd.
8.1.5 Does the system carry out duplicate checking while uploading the data? What
happens if the same digital document is submitted multiple times?
Fedora carries out duplicate checking via its PID number (ie persistent
identification number). If the same PID is entered again Fedora gives error
message. But it does not check duplicate entry via Title or Author of the
document.
8.1.6 How does the system allow to upload digital objects, whether normal digital
object or compressed digital objects?
Fedora supports to upload digital objects with normal size as well as it
supports to upload compressed digital objects such as zip, tar, gz, gtar,
gzip file formats.
8.1.7 Does the software support to upload digital objects from existing URL?
Fedora supports to upload digital documents from existing URL as well as
it can redirect to existing URL of the digital document where repository
only uploads metadata details of the document and provide link to the full
text.
8.1.8 Does the system support distributed/community based acquisition? No
8.1.9 Does the software support metadata/content import? In which file format
data is required for importing?
Fedora supports to ingest/import one digital object or from a local file or
from live repositories available on Internet. Fedora supports to import data
into Fedora repository if data is available in XML format. The valid for-
mats are currently ’foxml1.0’ and ’metslikeFedora 1’.
8.1.10 Does the system support importing of bulk metadata/content of digital ob-CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 242
jects?
Yes, Fedora supports to import bulk digital objects along with their meta-
data.
8.1.11 Does the software support import of automatic metadata for the digital objects
that are added into the repository?
Yes Fedora automatically extracts Dublin Core metadata datastream con-
sisting of the elements dc:title and dc:identifier. The value for dc:title will
be obtained from the object’s label (if present in the object) and the value
for dc:identifier will be assigned to the objects dc:identifier will be as-
signed to the object’s persistent identifier or PID.
8.1.12 Does the software support metadata/content export? In which file format
data is exported?
Fedora supports to export contents in FOXML (Fedora Object XML) and
METS (Fedora METS Extension) format. Fedora also supports to export
single digital object or multiple digital objects by data types along with op-
tions such as behavior definitions, behavior mechanisms and data objects.
While exporting data Fedora also supports to export each file in three dif-
ferent options such as ’public’, ’migrate’, or ’archive’. Public produces an
export file that is appropriate for use outside the Fedora repository. Mi-
grate produces and export file that is appropriate for migrating an object
from one Fedora repository to another.
8.1.13 Does the system support export of bulk metadata/content of digital document
files?
Yes, Fedora supports to export bulk metadata/contents of digital objects.
8.1.14 Does the system allow adding past versions of the digital document files?
Yes, Fedora has a very good feature to add different versions of the digital
documents that are added into the repository with same metadata entries.
For every new digital object added into the repository Fedora will show all
the objects with drop down menu.
8.1.15 Does the software support its own accession number for each document that
gets added into the repository?
Yes Fedora supports to create either custom accession number or defaultCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 243
accession number and each digital object in Fedora is identified with PID
i.e. Persistent Identification Number for e.g. Test:1 or demo:1. Each digital
object should have alphanumeric PID.
8.1.16 It is necessary to know whether software supports weed out policy?
Every digital object that is added into Fedora repository has three states
such as active, inactive, deleted. Hence it is possible to delete or make
documents inactive if they are not used by others.
8.1.17 Does the system support to delete items from the collection, move objects
from one collection to other collection, cross-list objects across categories?
Yes software supports to delete items from the repository. Digital objects
in Fedora have no specially collections. All documents added into the
Fedora repository are unique and have different labels.
8.1.18 Which persistent identifier scheme does the system support?
Fedora supports Uniform Resource Identifier i.e. URI for each document
that is added into the repository as well as system supports other identi-
fier schemes found in PRONOM and the Global Digital Format Registry
(GDRF). URI’s are specified using the ’info’ scheme.
In Fedora one can also assign one or more alternate identifiers for same
digital document such as local identifiers or global identifiers such as Han-
dles or DOI.
8.1.19 Does the system’s persistent URL method handle an object’s change in loca-
tion and state in future with same identifier number? Yes.
8.2 Content Management
8.2.1 Does the system has proper workflow in place which handles different submis-
sion processes?
No, Fedora installation doesnot support any workflow but other tools such
as Fez/Valet/Murador/Elated etc. support workflow[3]. Installation and
configuration of Fez was tried but Fez 1.3 installation was not running with
Fedora 2.2.1 installation and latest Fez installation had bug hence this tool
was not explored due to unsuccessful installation of Fez on 2.2.1 version.CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 244
8.2.2 If the system supports to have proper workflow for all actions into the repository
then whether submission supports following options:
8.2.2.1 System allows to create overall system administrator Yes
8.2.2.2 System allows to submit documents by users via web No
8.2.2.3 System allows to set up submission rules No
8.2.2.4 System can define accept/reject policy for all documents that gets added into
the repository No
8.2.2.5 Allows multiple collections within same installation of the system No
8.2.2.6 Home page for each collection/community No
8.2.2.7 Allows to set different policies for different collections No
8.2.2.8 Allows to set different authorization policies for different collection/items added
into the repository No
8.2.2.9 Allow to edit metadata submitted by users No
8.2.2.10 Sends email notification to users/submitters/authors No
8.2.2.11 Sends email notification to metadata reviewers No
8.2.2.12 Sends email notification to reviewer No
8.2.2.13 Sends email notification to administrators No
8.2.2.14 Allow users to review completed content No
8.2.2.15 Allow users to review uncompleted content No
8.2.2.16 Allow content administrator to review submissions No
8.2.2.17 View pending content administration tasks No
Fedora doesnot support any submission process. All the documents that are
added into the Fedora repository are added through FedoraAdmin Interface.
8.2.3 Does the system support to upload documents into the repository through Librar-
ian’s interface as well ?
Fedora supports to upload documents only through FedoraAdmin login pro-
cess. Documents can also be uploaded through Web Interface by installing
other tools such as FEZ, VALET which are web based and can provide differ-
ent workflow.
8.2.4 Does the software provide easy way for adding/editing of records for Librarian as
well as for the remote user? Are insertion and deletion of records easy?CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 245
Fedora has only FedoraAdmin user interface, which is used for uploading doc-
uments into the Fedora repository. It is not very easy to use FedoraAdmin
interface.
8.2.5 Are the supported file formats well documented in the system? Can new file formats
be added or removed by the end user?
Fedora supports to upload file formats from MIME registry. The supported
formats are well documented in Fedora.
8.2.6 Does the repository software have any capabilities, such as access control lists,
Internet address filters, etc., that limit who is allowed to submit items in the
software?
Fedora supports access control based on IP filtering. For each digital object
added into the repository it can provide access restriction based on IP address.
8.2.7 Does the repository software maintain audit logs that identify by whom and when
documents are submitted into the repository? Yes
8.2.8 Does the system support knowledge organization systems such as ontologies, the-
sauri, classification systems and taxonomies for users while adding documents via
web in the repository? No
8.2.9 Does the system support digital objects to be grouped into organized structure (i.e.
linear/hierarchical/graphical structure) No
8.2.10 Does the system support to generate authority files? No
8.2.11 Does the system allow digital object to be member of multiple collections i. e.
content mapping? No
8.2.12 Does system allow users to modify (add/delete/update) metadata/complete doc-
ument added within the repository? No
8.2.13 Does the system support to show strength of each collection? No
8.3 Metadata Submission and Support
8.3.1 Does the software support to add descriptive metadata (such as author, title, sub-
ject, publisher, copyright , year of publication, etc. ) for each digital object that
gets added into the repository? YesCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 246
8.3.2 Does the software support to add administrative metadata (such as technical as-
pects of digital documents, source of information (when and how it was created),
rights management, how the digital document is created, what is file size, in what
file format digital document is in, what is needed to view the digital document) for
each digital object that gets added into the repository? Yes
8.3.3 Does the software support to add structural metadata (such as description, owner,
data type, date deposited, version number, date of last revision, how compound
objects are put together, how pages are ordered to form chapters) for each digital
object that gets added into the repository? Yes
8.3.4 Does the software support adding/editing/deleting metadata fields? Yes
8.3.5 Are help messages given in each metadata field while entering data? No
8.3.6 Does the metadata entry field have atleast one field mandatory? What are the
mandatory fields in each software?
Fedora has only one mandatory field i.e. Title or it is called as Label in the
repository.
8.3.7 Does the software support Unicode character set for metadata entry? Yes
8.3.8 Does the software allows to create and manage a variety of different metadata
schemas to meet different needs across the subject disciplines ? Yes, Fedora
defines creating new metadata schemas as ’behavior definition’. User can cre-
ate different metadata fields for different collections through bDefinition and
Bmechanism utility.
8.3.9 Can the metadata fields or formats be customized? Yes
8.3.10 What type of Metadata Schemas are supported by the software as a default?
Fedora supports any standard XML format for representing and transmitting
complex objects. Fedora supports different metadata schemas such as Dublin
Core, METS, MPEG-21, DIDL, IEEE LOM, MARC.
8.3.11 Does the software have default metadata entry templates? No, Fedora reposi-
tory supports to import any XML based metadata even if it is generated using
external XML editor.
8.3.12 Are the metadata formats documented? NoCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 247
8.3.13 Does the software support different interface for metadata entry and whether cus-
tomized data gets added into the system?
Fedora supports to add customized data but there are no different interfaces for
metadata entry.
8.3.14 How does the software verify that submitted objects and metadata are correct?
No
8.3.15 Are there automated checks of the metadata, such as verifying that a date entered
into a field is really a date string? No
8.3.16 Does the repository software have any means to verify that objects or metadata
have not been tampered with, such as checksums or digitally signed checksums?
For metadata there is no checksum available in Fedora.
8.3.17 Does the software support real time updating and indexing of accepted contents?
Yes. As soon as data is added into Fedora it is available for the end user.
8.3.18 Does the software allow for metadata extensibility and complexity? Yes
8.3.19 Does the software support metadata versioning? What happens to old versions of
metadata or content objects when they are replaced by new versions or modified
in some way? No
8.3.20 Does the repository software support provenance metadata? What is included in
the provenance? Yes, Fedora supports to add different information related to
digital object such as origin of object, file type, file size etc.
8.3.21 Does the software support metadata crosswalk? Yes
8.3.22 Does the software supports ’thesaurus’ building? Does it specify which thesaurus
standard is used? Which subject heading DDC, DC or LC is used for thesaurus
building? No
8.3.23 Does the software have ontology support? No
8.3.24 How does the repository verify file types, for example, if a JPEG images is submitted
to the repository, does the software verify that it really is a valid JPEG, or does it
just blindly take the submitters word?
Yes, while importing any file in Fedora it does not upload that file unless proper
MIME type is selected. Otherwise it throws an error as “Imported text does-CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 248
not contain valid XML. Inline XML metadata datastreams must contain valid.
XML”.
8.3.25 While exporting metadata whether software supports checksums? No
8.3.26 It is necessary to know whether the software support RAP protocol? Yes
8.4 Classification
8.4.1 Does the system allow digital objects to be grouped into classification/subjects?
No
8.4.2 Which classification system does the software support? Fedora does not support
any classification system.
8.4.3 Does it allow to group documents as per the class number? No
8.4.4 It is also necessary to know whether system supports hierarchical browsing of col-
lections through class number? No
8.5 Information Search & Retrieval
8.5.1 Browsing
8.5.1.1 Author/Creator/Contributor Yes
8.5.1.2 Title of the document/Title of the book/Title of the article etc. Yes
8.5.1.3 Issue Date/Date of Publication Yes
8.5.1.4 Collection No
8.5.1.5 Communities No
8.5.1.6 Subject browsing Yes
8.5.1.7 Publisher wise browsing Yes
8.5.1.8 Table of Contents browsing No
8.5.1.9 Multi-Dimensional Browsing No
Fedora supports to browse all collections through all DC fields such as pid, label,
fType, cModel, state, OwnerId, cDate, mDate, dcmDate, bDef, bMech, title, creator,CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 249
subject, description, publisher, contributor, date, type, format, identifier, source, lan-
guage, relation, coverage and rights.
8.5.2 Searching
8.5.2.1 Searching content via different metadata fields such as author, title, subject, pub-
lisher etc. Yes
8.5.2.2 Full text searching
Yes,Fedora supports full text searching by installing FedoraGSearch utility and
integrating it with existing Tomcat.
8.5.2.3 Boolean (AND, OR, NOT) searching Yes
8.5.2.4 Basic search Yes
8.5.2.5 Advanced search Yes
8.5.2.6 Does the system allow to search the database putting boolean operators such as
!, |, &, ∼ , +, −, etc. as well as ’must contain’, ’should contain’ ’may contain’,
’not contain’, as operators in place of AND, OR, and AND NOT Boolean operators
respectively
Yes
8.5.2.7 Truncation/Wild card searching Yes
8.5.2.8 Exact words/phrases searching Yes
8.5.2.9 Proximity searching Yes
8.5.2.10 Stemming Yes
8.5.2.11 Fuzzy searching Yes
8.5.2.12 Phonetic searching No
8.5.2.13 Case sensitive or case insensitive while searching Yes
8.5.2.14 System should support term weighting Yes
8.5.2.15 System should support search history option , reuse of query, query save option.
No
8.5.2.16 Boosting the term YesCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 250
8.5.2.17 Range searching No
8.5.2.18 Use of thesaurus or permuted index for searching No
8.5.2.19 Expand search Yes
8.5.2.20 Lateral searching No
8.5.2.21 Search support for special collections No
8.5.2.22 Searching via table of content and classification codes No
8.5.2.23 Ability to browse subject/author authority files No
8.5.2.24 PIC variant searching (plurals, international spelling variants, and compound words)
No
8.5.2.25 Support multilingual search and retrieval Yes
8.5.2.26 Allow refinement of searches with qualifiers Yes
8.5.2.27 Ability to group: prior to search, user can delimit pending results’ listings, and
group results by item characteristics (type, format) No
8.5.2.28 Spell checker support No
8.5.2.29 Refine searches: Once results are retrieved, users have the ability to focus and
reduce number of items retrieved Yes
8.5.3 Sorting
The system should support sorting results by
8.5.3.1 Author No
8.5.3.2 Title No
8.5.3.3 Issue Date No
8.5.3.4 Relevance No
8.5.3.5 Other No
8.5.4 Which search engine tool kit is used for searching the database?
Fedora uses Lucene & Zebra search engine tool kit for searching the database.CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 251
8.5.5 How is the recall and precision ratio while searching the documents?
Since the system supports searching via metadata fields and full text searching
the recall is high via word searching and precision is high if the metadata fields
are used for searching the database.
8.5.6 How is the speed of the retrieval of the documents?
The speed of the retrieval of documents is very fast in Fedora but it does not
show on the screen how many documents are retrieved within how many sec-
onds.
8.5.7 Does the system provides help for the users while searching digital documents?
Fedora provides help for the users for searching but the default search does not
have a good help support.
8.5.8 How are the results displayed to the users? Whether users can download contents
after searching? How are results displayed such as metadata, filetype, file size?
After every search Fedora displays each digital object in three ways:
Digital Object Profile View
Dissemination Index View
Item Index
8.5.9 While viewing the results does the system provide access control? Yes
8.5.10 Does system support streaming audio/video option? Or it allows only to download
documents? Whether browser can support any other document viewing? Does the
end user needs to have a plugins and software for viewing particular documents?
Fedora can be integrated with any proprietary/open source streaming server. If
streaming server is not installed software supports to download the audio/video
file on the browser and makes it available to the end user. End user needs
to have respected plugins to view a particular file. If any streaming server is
installed the video are easily viewable to end users.
8.5.11 Does the system support advance features such as my binders, virtual bag, shelving
etc. No
8.5.12 Whether system supports unified search? (Unified search is the support for finding
items that are scattered among a distributed collection of information sources orCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 252
services, typically involving sending queries to a number of servers and then merging
the results to present in an integrated, consistent, coordinated format)? No
8.5.13 Whether system supports federated search? ( Federated search allow users to
search multiple digital libraries with a single query from a single user interface. The
user enters a search query in the portal interface’s search box and the query is sent
to every other digital library software)? No
8.6 Access Control, Privacy and Management
8.6.1 How users are managed in digital library? Fedora does not support to add any
users.
8.6.2 Does the system support to add/edit/delete user profiles? No
8.6.3 Does the system support to define different roles for different users? No
8.6.4 Does the system keep detailed information of each user that is registered in the
repository such as name, email, phone number, address, etc.? No
8.6.5 How the permissions are given to users who have registered into the repository ?
No
8.6.6 Does the system have provision to identify active and inactive members and take
necessary action against inactive members? No
8.6.7 User Roles
8.6.7.1 Does system allow to create different groups for different users No
8.6.7.2 Does system allow to create different groups of users No
8.6.7.3 Does system allow definition of different user groups No
8.6.7.4 Does system limit access by role No
8.6.7.5 Does system allow collection to be customized for each role/group No
8.6.8 Does the system allow access limits at different levels?
i. File/object level Yes
ii. Collection level No
iii. User/Group level No
8.6.9 How passwords are administered in the system? NoCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 253
8.6.10 Does the system assign passwords for each user? No
8.6.11 Does the system allow users to select passwords? No
8.6.12 Does the system have mechanism to retrieve forgotten password? No
8.6.13 How is the level of access for Inside/outside users (such as outside users can access
only metadata and abstract level access and internal members can access full texts
as well as metadata ?
Fedora access can be configured based on IP address.
8.6.14 Does the system have any mechanism to provide access to the digital library via
i. IP source address filtering Yes
ii. Proxy filtering Yes
iii. Credential-based access No
8.6.15 Are access denials flagged in any special manner by the software? Does the software
keep access logs and how accessible are the logs to either human or machine pro-
cessing and interpretation? Yes Fedora has client logs as well as logs reported
by server for all events that are carried out in Fedora.
8.6.16 Does the system support access to the collection for a specific period? No
8.7 Authentication and Authorization
8.7.1 Does the system support to provide setting different authorization policies?
No, Fedora does not support setting any authorization policies.
8.7.2 System should support restricting access to contents through password authentica-
tion, IP filtering, and proxy filtering.
Fedora supports access to contents through IP filtering.
8.7.3 System should be able to support access based on browsing/viewing metadata,
certain records, full text item or collections through different authorizations with
different privileges for different communities or individuals. No
8.7.4 System should also be able to allow set different roles for different members for
different items/collections. NoCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 254
8.7.5 Does the system support a super user/admin user who is overall manager/ admin-
istrator of the software?
Fedora has FedoraAdmin as a superuser/administrator for overall management
of the repository.
8.7.6 Does the system use authorization to support different roles within the system (for
eg submit user, metadata editor, reviewer, approver, overall administrator etc.)
No
8.7.7 Does the system use an external authentication mechanism such as LDAP (Lightweight
Directory Access Protocol)?
Fedora does not support configuring with LDAP.
8.7.8 Does the system display only those pages that are pertinent to each user that
he/she is able to see? No
8.7.9 Does the system support the feature that groups are assigned to one or more roles?
No
8.7.10 Does the system support the feature that users are assigned to one or more groups
or collections? No
8.7.11 Does the system support the following roles:
i. Content Developer Role: must be able to create/add/edit/delete metadata
and content in defined (not ALL) collections in addition No
ii. Administrator Role: must be able to add/delete/create users and groups
Yes
iii. Contributor Role: must be able to submit metadata and content, in addition
to general users’ role No
iv. General User No
v. Submitter No
vi. Metadata Reviewer No
vii. Max Role: must be able to do all activities within the system Yes
8.7.12 Does the system use authorization to verify users with campus security systems
(NetID) NoCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 255
8.8 Interoperability
8.8.1 It is necessary to know whether the software supports Z39.50 protocol and OAI-
PMH protocol?
Fedora supports OAI-PMH protocol.
8.8.2 Which harvesting software is used by the Digital Library Software for metadata
harvesting?
Fedora uses OAI-PMH harvesting software for metadata harvesting. Every dig-
ital object added into the repository has a primary Dublin Core record that con-
forms to the schema available at http://www.openarchvies.org/OAI/2.0/ oai_dc.xsd.
This metadata is accessible using Fedora’s OAI-PMH 2.0 provider interface.
8.8.3 SRU/SRW Support Yes
8.8.4 Does the software have openURL support? Yes
8.9 Ease of Deployment of each software
8.9.1 Software Installation
8.9.1.1 Packaging and installation steps
For evaluating Fedora the current version of Fedora i.e. 2.2.1 available on 15th
November 2007 was downloaded. The current version has only one jar file i.e.
Fedora-2.2.1-installer.jar which is around 75 MB in size and is self installable
file if all environment variables are set properly as well as if Fedora22 database
is created in mysql the installation takes place smoothly. The installation steps
of Fedora are included in Appendix E of this document.
8.9.1.2 Automatic installation script
Yes Fedora has automatic installation script that is called as Fedora-2.2.1-installer.
jar file.
8.9.1.3 Disk space used
For installing Fedora software and demo collection 349 MB disk space was
required.CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 256
8.9.1.4 Time required to install each software
If all environments are set properly the installation of Fedora is very easy. It
took around two hours to successfully install and setup Fedora.
8.9.1.5 Documentation help available and useful for installation
Fedora installation and configuration guide is available on Fedora site.
http://www.fedora.info/download/2.2.1/userdocs/distribution/installation.html
8.9.1.6 Environments needed to set for installation of each software
JAVA_HOME, CATALINA_HOME and Fedora_HOME environments are re-
quired to be set for installing Fedora
8.9.1.7 Operating systems (Linux/Windows/Solaris/MacOS/GNU/AIX) on which software
can be installed
Fedora can be installed on Windows 2000, NT, XP. Solaris, any Linux flavor or
Mac OS
8.9.1.8 Programming languages used
Fedora is developed using CORBA and JAVA[4]
8.9.1.9 Database supported at backend
Fedora supports mysql, postgreSQL, Oracle and its own database called as
mckoi.
8.9.1.10 Web Server used
Fedora uses Apache Web server and Apache Axis (SOAP) Servlet.
8.9.1.11 Java servlet engine needed
Apache Tomcat Web Server is needed for Fedora Installation
8.9.2 System Support/ Maintenance
8.9.2.1 Documentation/manuals Yes
8.9.2.2 Mailing lists/discussion forums
Currently, two mailing lists serve the Fedora Community:
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/fedora-commons-developers
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/fedora-commons-usersCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 257
8.9.2.3 Wiki pages
http://fedora.info/wiki
8.9.2.4 Help desk support No
8.9.2.5 Ease of system administration (ability to configure for different uses) No
8.9.3 Hardware/ Software Requirements
8.9.3.1 What are the minimum hardware requirements for the repository software?
There are no specific hardware requirements provided on Fedora site but Fedora
can be installed on any P IV machine with 512 MB RAM.
8.9.3.2 How actively is the software maintained by its owners or contributors?
Fedora has been well maintained by its owners and new versions are regularly
available.
8.9.3.3 Does the software have procedures in place to monitor and receive notifications
when hardware technology changes are needed? No
8.9.3.4 Does the software creators have a process to stay current with the latest operating
system security fixes? Yes
8.9.4 Security
8.9.4.1 Does the system have security methods such as
i. Data encryption Yes
ii. Digital signatures Yes[5]
8.9.4.2 Server security (Does software has secure database connection?) Yes
8.9.4.3 Ability to restrict access repository at item level (For eg to view metadata but not
content) Yes
8.9.5 System Level Security
8.9.5.1 Fixity - such as checksums or digestsCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 258
Fedora supports data integrity stamp for the datastream which can be calculated using
one of many standard algorithms such as MD5, SHA-1, SHA-256, SHA-384, SHA-
512
8.9.5.2 Management of users’ accounts and rights to specified locations within the DL No
8.9.5.3 Logging and auditing events
Yes Fedora keeps logs of its client, server and tomcat operations.
8.9.5.4 Does the software support any security if OS does not have any firewall implemented?
Yes Fedora has BeSecurity feature.
8.9.6 General features related to technical aspect
8.9.6.1 Does the software have any back end maintenance? No
8.9.6.2 Does the software have RSS support? No
8.9.6.3 Does the software have easy mechanisms to upgrade the software from old versions to
new versions?
Yes, it is easy to upgrade software from old versions to new versions.
8.9.6.4 Does the software support migration of data from one repository software to another
repository software?
Fedora supports to ingest data from other repositories to Fedora system such as from
Eprints and DSpace.
8.9.6.5 Does the system support any ranking algorithms for the documents added in the reposi-
tory? No
8.9.6.6 Are there any known issues/bugs in the system? No
8.9.6.7 Whether a novice user can easily publish content ?
Fedora is not available for end user to publish contents. Only FedoraAdmin can add
documents in Fedora.CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 259
8.9.6.8 How often user needs to use database schema for making any change?
User does not need to use database schema for making any changes.
8.9.6.9 Whether user can reorganize database? No
8.9.6.10 Does system support automated content acquisition, harvesting and automatic metadata
generation, including named entity recognition, automatic subject indexing/classification?
Fedora generates automatic metadata if no data is filled in.
8.9.6.11 Does the system support to store metadata records separately from the actual contents?
Yes, Fedora store metadata and actual files in different sub directories.
8.9.6.12 Does the software support storing varied file formats?
Fedora supports to upload files if available in any MIME format.
8.9.6.13 Does the system keep the original files name, size and created date? No
8.9.6.14 While using the software if any errors occur, does the system allow to submit the error
report? No
8.9.6.15 How many developers are working for the software?
16 committers are working for the Fedora software.
8.9.6.16 How many users are using the software/strength of the community?
On Fedora site there are so far 28 organizations who are using Fedora[6]as on 4th
April 2008.
8.9.6.17 Does the software provide its history on the web page for evidence of sustainability and
vitality? Yes
8.9.6.18 Total number of downloads of the software?
No information about total number of downloads of the software was available.
8.9.6.19 Is the software really under Open Source License terms and conditions?
The Fedora Repository System is open source software distributed under the Mozilla
Public License distributed through Sourceforge.net.CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 260
8.9.6.20 Are there any costs involved for using OSS-DL? No
8.9.6.21 Does the repository software have a clear policy regarding software upgrades?
Yes, Fedora has a clear policy for software upgrades and the future releases are
planned.
8.9.6.22 Whether the software has a long-term leadership and consulting services?
Yes, Fedora has long term leadership and consulting services as it is maintained and
developed by University of Virginia and Cornell University under Fedora Commons
which is non profit organization.
8.9.6.23 After releasing the software whether it was tested and whether it has integrated new
features or not?
Regular beta testing of the software is carried out and new features are added regu-
larly in Fedora.
8.9.6.24 How is the mailing list used by the users?
Fedora has common users mailing list as well as developers mailing list. Both the
lists are extensively used by the users. The following table (Table 8.1) shows the
number of requests sent by Fedora users on Fedora general users list as observed on
4th April 2008.
Table 8.1: Fedora User’s Mailing List Data
Year Number of Requests Sent on
Fedora User’s Mailing List
2003 148
2004 269
2005 716
2006 1202
2007 835
2008 4th April 227CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 261
8.9.6.25 Whether software has conducted any workshops, training sessions on local, regional,
national and international levels?
Fedora workshops are conducted in US and Europe. Fedora is still not very popular
in other parts of the world.
8.9.6.26 Whether software is built according to open standards? Yes
8.9.7 Architecture of the Software
8.9.7.1 How is the architecture and design of the software whether it is simple or complex?
The Fedora architecture is based on the concept of object-oriented programming, a
software design method that models digital objects using classes that define proper-
ties of the objects and operations that may be performed by those objects.
Fedora employs XML and METS (Metadata Encoding Transmission Standard) to
create digital objects by encapsulating content, along with metadata about the con-
tent, and actions that can be performed on the content. This linkage of the content to
the applications that are used to search, render, and display it distinguishes Fedora
from other digital repository systems. Clients (administrative or patrons) interact
with the Fedora repository through an application-programming interface (API) that
provides management and access services.
Fedora software assures that the object-oriented architecture of Fedora makes migra-
tions less risky and less complex for repositories storing heterogeneous collections.
One of the important feature of Fedora architecture is it has the flexibility to deal
with the diversity of electronic record types, supports versioning to preserve access
to former instantiations of both content and services, can manage digital objects
as items within a collection and manage collections with complex structures and
includes a technology suite that incorporates XML and Web Services, which are
ideally suited to nourish and develop preservation networks.CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 262
Figure 8.1: Fedora Architecture
Figure 8.2: Fedora Digital Object Structure
8.9.7.2 Does the architecture supports separation between different local parts and put into differ-
ent machines ( e.g. centralised/distributed database, relational/object-oriented database
management system, different components of the directory to distribute to different ma-
chines) and the transport model (protocols for communication between the system and
the user interface or between system components) No
8.9.7.3 Does system support grid architecture? How grids can help to disaster recovery of data?
Fedora supports grid architecture.
8.9.8 Scalability:It is necessary to know whether software is scalable in terms of storage and
retrieval?
With Fedora one can build a system that scales from a single-server to the largest
organizational multi-server system. Fedora can handle more than 10 millions of
documents.CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 263
8.9.9 Extensibility:Extensible, to allow new elements (collections, data types, services, etc.)
to be easily added to the digital library. Yes
8.9.10 Storage: Does the system support data compression for eg in case of multimedia col-
lections the size of the files (for eg video/audio files) would be very large hence system
should support compression/decompression techniques. Does the system support to store
compress file formats?
Yes, Fedora supports to store compressed file formats. When end user searches for
the compressed file it does uncompresses compressed files on the end users browser.
8.9.11 Backup/Restore facility
8.9.11.1 Does software supports backup function, which contains metadata associated with
access controls, customized files, as well as full texts of the documents added in
the repository? No
8.9.11.2 Does the software explicitly require any particular backup strategy, or does it just
rely on system-level backup plans, like periodic disk backups to tape?
Fedora rely on system-level backup plans.
8.9.11.3 In the event of a disaster, what recovery plans are supported by the software? No
8.10 User Friendly Interface
8.10.1 Whether end user can easily customize the user interface “look and feel”? Whether the
end user can change the header, theme, footer, overall web interface of the system? Yes
8.10.2 Can user interfaces be localized in their language? Yes
8.10.3 How is user interface for the experienced or non experienced user’s?
Fedora admin user interface is not very easy to use for non experienced user. It
requires more knowledge to use FedoraAdmin user interface as well as Fedora Web
UI.
8.10.4 How is the user interface designed for the use of librarian or for the use of user’s?
User Interface in Fedora is complex. It is not very easy to use Fedora Web UI.CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 264
8.10.5 Whether system provides web based interface for all its functionalities? No
8.10.6 Does the system provide online help? No
8.10.7 Does the system provide multilingual access support? No
8.10.8 Does the system allow users to submit feedback on system problems? No
8.10.9 Does the system notify user’s current state of the task? No
8.11 Usability
8.11.1 What user skill levels are expected to use the web interface?
Fedora is not very easy to use. Terminologies used in Fedora are difficult for end
user to understand. Hence one has to have proper knowledge of digital library as
well as Fedora terminologies then only it is easy to use Fedora either for the end user
or for the library staff.
8.11.2 Is the user able to navigate and find his/her ways to information quickly and easily?
No, Fedora web user interface search feature is not very easy to use. It takes time to
understand the web feature supported with Fedora.
8.11.3 How are the help features provided with the software? Does help feature allow a user to
feel comfortable within a digital library? Does the help feature provide general as well as
technical answers to the problems?
No help features are provided with the software. The Web UI of Fedora is not very
simple to use and understand. No ’help’ files are provided with Web UI.
8.11.4 Does the user need to know which player or viewer is necessary to view multimedia or
other digital objects from the system?
No, Fedora automatically runs the file if required browser plugins are installed by
the end user.
8.11.5 Does the user interface provide facility to give user opinion on the web as well as does
the software support user to fill up online user feedback form?
No, Fedora does not support any such feature.CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 265
8.11.6 Does the system support to show usage statistics such as:
(a) Usage patterns No
(b) Use of materials No
(c) Usage statistics No
(d) Who uses, what, when No
(e) For what reasons/decisions No
Fedora generates reports based on different types such as objects and the time when
these objects were added into the repository. For e.g. It can generate a report based
on all objects last modified in 24 hours.
8.11.7 Transaction Log Analysis
8.11.7.1 Does the system keep error log files?
Yes, Fedora keeps error logs in client as well as in server log directory. Fedora client
keeps detail log of all items ingested into the repository as well as Fedora server
keeps log of initializing different services.
8.11.7.2 Does the system keep user logs?
No, Fedora does not keep user logs data as there are no users in Fedora.
8.11.7.3 Does the system keep track of query’s submitted to the system? Does it store any query
log?
No, Fedora does not keep track of query’s submitted to the system. It does not store
any query log.
8.12 Copyright/Policy Issues
8.12.1 Does the repository software have any means to manage, store, or enforce contract
agreements for all the digital documents that are added into the repository? Yes
8.12.2 Does the software have any capabilities, such as access control lists, Internet address
filters, etc., that can be used to enforce copyright or access restrictions? How granularCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 266
are these access controls? Can different restrictions be applied to different objects in the
repository? Yes
8.12.3 If repository ingests digital content with unclear ownership/rights, does it have policies
addressing liability and challenges to those rights? No
8.13 Advanced Features
8.13.1 Whether software has long term leadership and consulting services? Yes
8.13.2 Does the system provide citation data? No
8.13.3 Does the software have defined road map for the future? Yes
8.13.4 Does software support indexing of all documents that are added in the repository in a
distributed way, without central control? Yes
8.13.5 Virtual Collection Support: Does software supports to generate virtual collections /special
collections across several content providers? No
8.13.6 Load Balancing: Does software has any mention of load balancing? It is necessary to
know how the software functions when number of records are more or more number of
people try to access the software?
Fedora supports to upload millions of documents as well as it can handle multiple
requests.
8.13.7 Visualization: Does the software support visualization feature? No
8.13.8 Personalization: Does the system support Personalization feature? No
8.13.9 Translation Service: Does the system provide translation service? No
8.13.10 Community Services: Does the software supports to provide community services such as
allowing members of the digital library community to exchange ideas, make announce-
ments, write reviews etc. No
8.13.11 Page Ranking: Does the software supports page ranking such as supported by commercial
digital libraries . NoCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 267
8.14 Digital Preservation
8.14.1 Does the software support any digital preservation strategy and if yes, does it explicitly
support any particular preservation strategy, such as described by PREMIS like, bit-
level preservation, format migration, format normalization, emulation, or restrictions on
submission formats?
Fedora at present does not support any preservation strategy but all objects added
into Fedora repository are Internally represented in the file system as files in an open
XML format. These XML files include data and metadata for the objects plus rela-
tionships to services and other objects.
8.14.2 Whether system preserves the file’s original identities such as its name, size and created
date?
Fedora does not preserve file’s original identity. It changes file’s name into the PID
number assigned by Fedora.
8.14.3 Does the system have any data integrity check for a file added into the repository?
Yes,Fedora supports variety of data integrity checks while file being added into the
repository such as MD5, SHA-1, SHA-256, SHA-384, SHA-512
8.14.4 Does the software have quality control measures to ensure integrity, and persistent doc-
umentation identification for migration purposes? No
8.14.5 Does the repository software preserve pre-existing persistent identifiers for submitted
packages or objects? Yes, Fedora supports to upload alternate ID’s or alternate URI
of the digital documents if already existing.
8.14.6 Does the software support preservation of metadata? It addresses the following attributes
of an archived digital object:
• provenance - documenting the history of the object. Yes
• authenticity - validating that the digital object is in fact what it should be, and
has not been altered. Yes
• preservation activity - documenting the actions taken to preserve the digital
object. NoCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 268
• technical environment - describing the technical requirements, such as hard-
ware and software, needed to render and use the digital objects. Yes
• rights management - recording any binding intellectual property rights that may
limit the repository’s ability to preserve and disseminate the digital object over
time. Yes
8.14.7 How does the software manage compound objects (where multiple file formats of same
object are linked together)? Yes, Fedora supports to upload compound digital objects
which is one of the unique feature of Fedora.
8.14.8 Does it have mechanism to keep licensing conditions for individual images/objects in the
repository? Yes
8.14.9 Does the software support to track and manage copyrights and restrictions on use of the
resources as required by contract or license? No
8.14.10 Where does the repository software store actual digital files and the metadata? Fe-
dora stores all the digital objects and its metadata in the data directory of Fedora
installation.
8.14.11 Can the repository software automatically validate checksums on a periodic basis? No
8.14.12 Are the checksums cryptographically signed to prevent tampering? Yes
8.14.13 Does the repository software have a well documented process by which a submission is
ingested into the repository for storage? For example, how and when does the repository
software generate fixity data, such as checksums? Yes
8.14.14 How does the repository software verify that archival objects and metadata are correct?
Are there automated checks of the metadata, such as to verify that a date entered into
a field really is a date string? No
8.14.15 Does the repository software provide audit logs of all events that have occurred in the
life cycle of a package? Yes
8.14.16 If repository ingests digital content with unclear ownership/rights, does software has
policies addressing liability and challenges to those rights? YesCHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 269
8.14.17 Does the software have mechanisms to change its preservation plans as a result of its
monitoring activities? No
8.14.18 Does the system have any mechanism in determining when objects in digital archives
should migrate to new hardware and software? No
8.14.19 Can the software support scheduled events such that a human can be notified on a preset
schedule to manually check for format obsolescence? No
8.14.20 Can new file formats be added or removed? Yes
8.14.21 Does the software have ability to handle variety of file formats and does it also supports
file format versioning? Yes, Fedora has ability to handle variety of file formats and it
does supports file format versioning.
8.14.22 Does the software have mechanisms in place for monitoring and notification when format
(or other representation information) obsolescence is near/or are no longer viable? No
8.14.23 Can the software monitor any standard format registries in order to ascertain format
obsolescence? No
8.14.24 What standards does the repository software use to describe file formats and does the
software record representation information? Does it use Internet MIME Types? Fedora
uses Internet MIME type for representing file formats.
8.14.25 Does it use any format registries? If yes, which format registry is used such as PRONOM
or GDFR or DCC to represent format information? No
8.14.26 Does the system support automatic format registration, For unknown formats does the
system sends any message to the submitter requesting for additional information?
Fedora supports automatic format registration. For unknown file formats system con-
verts those files to Fedora supported MIME type formats and uploads the documents.CHAPTER 8. FEDORA SOFTWARE EVALUATION 270
Figure 8.3: Fedora Installation ScreenBibliography
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1st May 2007).
[3] Kortekaas, Christiaan (2007). Making Fedora easier to implement with FEZ.
Open Repositories, p.1-47 http://espace.library.uq.edu.au/view.php?pid=UQ:11924.
(Browsed on 1st December 2007).
[4] Payette, S. and Lagoze, C. : Flexible and extensible digital object and repository
architecture (Fedora). http://www.cs.cornell.edu/payette/papers/ECDL98/Fedora.html.
(Browsed on 5th December 2007).
[5] Jantz, R. and Giarlo, M. J. (2005). Digital preservation : architecture and technology.
D-Lib Magazine, 11(6), http://www.dlib.org/dlib/june05/jantz/06jantz.html. (Browsed
on 10th January 2008).
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