POLICIES AND TERMS OF USE

2024-03-31

1. Introduction

The Ocean Best Practices System (OBPS) is hosted by the International Oceanographic Data and Information Exchange (IODE) of the UNESCO-IOC as an IOC coordinated activity (IODE and the Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS)).

The repository is a Methodological Management System provided for the ocean community to share their practices, standards, protocols, methods, standard operating procedures etc.

The OBPS Repository is not an archive for general publications on marine and aquatic sciences - for those, please deposit into the complementary AquaDocs.

2. Citation of OBPS repository

To cite the OBPS repository, the citation is as follows: Ocean Best Practices System (OBPS). [Website].
Available: https://www.oceanbestpractices.org/ (Accessed date.)

For citing individual records in the OBPS Repository, please use the citation for the document as provided in the OBPS record metadata.

3. Disclaimer

By consulting, depositing and/or downloading data from the OBPS repository, the user understands the following:

Inclusion of a methodology in the OBPS does not indicate that the methodology is recommended by OBPS. OBPS annotates records as an Endorsed Practice https://doi.org/10.25607/OBP-1983

The information, data, statements, geographical boundaries, maps and declarations expressed in documents and objects in the OBPS repository do not imply the official endorsement or acceptance by UNESCO/IOC-IODE.

UNESCO/IOC-IODE does not warrant that the information, documents and materials contained in the OBPS repository and OBPS website is complete and correct and shall not be liable whatsoever for any damages incurred as a result of its use. Contributors to this repository are solely responsible for the contents of their uploaded documents.

Mention of a commercial company or product within this repository content does not constitute an endorsement by UNESCO/IOC-IODE. Use of information from this repository for publicity or advertising purposes concerning proprietary products or the tests of such products is not authorized.

4. Content Scope

This section defines the parameters of content that are appropriate for a document to be deposited into the OBPS Repository. The OBPS Repository Team, in consultation with experts in the respective field, has the right to reject any deposit not deemed to be within the content scope of the repository.

  • Deposits should be made on the understanding that the content is a contribution to the methodological base of the ocean community (see 4.1)
  • The focus of the content should be methodologies applied in ocean-related sciences (see 4.2)
  • Methodologies should support global and regional interoperability across the ocean information value chain from requirement setting, through observations to data management and ultimately to the end user applications and societal impacts

4.1. Thematic

The OBPS Repository includes a range of ocean-related thematic topics such as methods/practices in ocean and related sciences research, data and information and applications across the ocean value chain representing disciplines such as: biology, chemistry/geochemistry, computing/data management, environment/pollution, geology/geophysics, meteorology/atmosphere, physical oceanography, research support, resources/fisheries, technology/engineering, modeling and analyses, administration and social sciences such as ethics, interdisciplinary topics and methods which impact knowledge of the oceans and that the ocean may impact.

The open ocean and coastal environment scope for the repository, extends from the deep waters of the open ocean to estuarine/brackish and freshwater environments.

4.2 Methodology Scope

As a guide, the following are types of methodologies accepted into the repository:

  • Guidelines & Policies: A set of conventions and options to advice action; an indication or outline of conduct. Policies are generally high-level guidelines on expected or acceptable behaviour, especially of a governmental body
  • Method: A documented procedure, a step-by-step set of instructions for accomplishing a task. Examples include manuals, scientific/medical protocols, standard test methods and standard practices (e.g. standard operating procedures)
  • Methodological commentary/perspective: Narrative reflections on or discussion of a methodological document
  • Description of a metrology standard: Documentation of a physical standard or procedure used for metrology (e.g. a manufactured object used to calibrate sensors)
  • Open Standards for observations, data management, modeling, visualization and applications.
  • Specification of criteria: a description of requirements (e.g. a technical, quality assurance and inclusivity requirements) that a methodology should comply with in order to fulfill the expectations of a community or organisation
  • Reports with methodological relevance: a report of any activity which has relevance to methodology (e.g. a set of existing methods were compared, a report on a field expedition where new technology was tested, or a report on a computational benchmarking experiment)
  • Training/Educational material: Documents designed specifically for training and/or educational activities, rather than to accomplish a task in an operational context.

Methodology types can be published as :

  • Equipment User Manuals
    From developer/manufacturer. Good for assembly and for deployment, Specs often recorded in unrealistic environment
  • Standard Operating Procedures (SOP)
    Very comprehensive one parameter, one problem description, describe method and not nuances of specific design
  • Best Practices (guides, manuals, cookbooks, etc)
    Practical knowledge plus elements of the two above categories. Often developed for specific environments, phenomenon or platforms and by single experts or institutions.
  • (Certified) Reference Materials
    Provide trusted reference for calibration and quality control
  • Published Papers
    Methodology/protocol described in a published journal/book article.
  • Best Practices Documents (OBPS Templates available)
    Written by practitioners for the community, often used as the basis for a published peer review article.
  • Training Courses
    Documentation and video that includes the content of the training course

The OBPS recognizes that repository users looking for practices and methods to adopt in their own settings, are interested in the maturity and quality of a method (maturity of a method is the measure of the level of development). The OBPS does not recommend methods but does record a method as ENDORSED https://doi.org/10.25607/OBP-1983.

The OBPS offers document templates for supporting the creation of ocean practices, and the process itself is well described in Fig. 2 in Przesławski, et al 2023. Importantly, the document title and abstract and methods body text should describe its methods focus.

4.3 Spatial

The OBPS Repository is global in its geographic coverage. To enable discovery of methods applied to work in specific open ocean and coastal geographic regions, depositors should input geographic metadata derived from the interface-provided authorized geographic vocabularies.

5. Language

Methods published in multiple languages that are compliant with the above scopings, are accepted into the repository provided that in the metadata submitted they have an English title and abstract (and preferably in the document itself).

6. Depositors

  • Items may only be deposited by users registered in the OBPS repository.
  • The validity and authenticity of the full text content of submissions is the sole responsibility of the author/s.
  • Authors or their agents will be responsible for ensuring the documents they archive do not have any restrictions on their electronic distribution. If the submission task is delegated to other persons (e.g. the librarian), then the institute must ensure they have the requisite authority.
  • The OBPS Repository Editorial Team has the right to reject deposits containing incomplete metadata or metadata only without a full text deposit upload.
  • Duplication of documents in different open access repositories is permitted.

6.1 Document types

Methodologies can be published digitally as the following: document types:

  • Book/Monograph: A book or a conference volume or complete serial issue.
  • Book Section: A chapter or section in a book, monograph or conference volume.
  • Journal Contribution: A contribution to a journal
  • Report: This may be a technical report, project report, documentation, manual or guideline, working paper, discussion paper.
  • Report Section: A chapter or section in a report.
  • Software: Computer programs and applications.
  • Video/Image : A static image or recording of moving visual images made digitally.
  • Web Based Content: Usually a website/webpage. If a document is hosted on a website, use the appropriate document type for the
  • item and include the website URL in the Resource URL metadata field.
  • Other: Something within the scope of the repository, but not covered by the other categories.

At metadata input, selecting one of the above document types will present the depositor with the metadata fields to complete, only for that document type; for example, journal contribution metadata is not displayed to input for a report deposit.

COMPLETION OF ALL METADATA FIELDS is highly recommended to facilitate discovery of the method.

7. Full Text

The purpose of the OBPS repository is to make full-text methodological documents and other objects discoverable, accessible, and usable by any user with access to the Internet. Thus, the OBPS Repository adheres to the FAIR Principles (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Re-Usable) in its design.

When inputting a record, the metadata must be accompanied with a full text file upload, otherwise it will not be accepted on submission.

Searching and downloading full text documents in the OBPS repository is free for any individual user. Re-use of OBPS content is controlled by the display of Rights Permissions (eg Creative Commons License) including any other copyright restrictions. The downloaded content must not be changed in any way unless allowed by the Permission to Use license attached to the metadata.

In compliance with Copyright Conventions, single copies of full text items may be downloaded for educational, scientific or research purposes or not-for-profit purposes without prior permission or charge i.e. Fair Use, provided the following are displayed:

  • The correct citation to authors, title and full bibliographic details
  • The DOI and /or URL for the original metadata page
  • The original copyright statement
  • The original Rights permission statement

7.1 Full Text File Formats

It is mandatory to upload a full text file when submitting a repository record. The following file formats will be supported and preserved using either format migration or emulation techniques:

  • supported (we fully support the format)
    • Adobe PDF/a (.pdf)
    • plain text (e.g. .txt)
  • known (we can recognize the format, but cannot guarantee full support)
    • Microsoft Word (.doc, .docx)
    • Microsoft Powerpoint (.ppt, .pptx)
    • Microsoft Excel (.xls, .xlsx)
    • Open/Libre Office(.odt, .opp, .ods)
  • Non-Text: Image (jpeg, mpeg) and audio files (wav) can be uploaded but may not be supported for preservation purposes.
  • Files uploaded in compressed format (zip, rar, 7z, …) are not accepted because long-term support cannot be explicitly guaranteed.

Deposit of other file formats should be discussed with the OBPS Repository Manager.

8. Copyright

  • Only items complying with copyright conditions or permission to use license (e.g. Creative Commons) should be deposited.
  • Any copyright violations are entirely the responsibility of the authors.
  • If the OBPS repository receives proof of copyright violation, the relevant item will be removed immediately.
  • Acceptable reasons for the repository to withdraw the record and full text include:
    • Journal publishers' rules
    • Proven copyright violation or plagiarism
    • Legal requirements and proven violations
    • National security
    • Falsified research
  • Withdrawn items are deleted entirely from the database and the creator notified. Metadata of the withdrawn item will not be searchable,
  • If necessary, an updated acceptable version may be deposited.

9. Metadata standards

The repository uses the well-established metadata standard Dublin Core Metadata Elements and makes use of widely adopted controlled thesauri and other terminological resources.

10. Metadata Policy

Third parties may collect metadata from the OBPS Repository via automated mechanisms and facilitate end-user services to support the dissemination and retrieval of the repository’s content. It is the policy of the OBPS to allow the harvesting of metadata, but to explicitly prohibit the automated harvesting of the full text content of the intellectual works in the OBPS repository.

11. Preservation

The Preservation policy for OBPS Repository documents:

  • All materials posted in the OBPS repository will be retrievable but it is strongly recommended authors use PDF/a. [PDF/a is an ISO-standardized version of the Portable Document Format specialized for use in the archiving and long-term preservation of electronic documents. PDF/a differs from PDF by prohibiting features unsuitable for long-term archiving, such as font linking and encryption.]
  • OBPS repository will try to ensure continued accessibility.
  • ‘Supported’ in Section 7.1, means that the OBPS repository will make the file usable in the future, applying whatever combination of techniques (such as migration, emulation, etc.) as is appropriate, given the context of need. Not all proprietary formats can be supported. These files will still be preserved. It is likely that for extremely popular but proprietary formats (such as Microsoft .docx, .xls and .ppt), OBPS repository will be able to help make files in those formats viewable in the future. Items will be retained indefinitely.
  • OBPS repository regularly backs up its files according to current best practice.
  • Items may be removed as in Section 8 above; for any other reason this is strongly discouraged.
  • In the event that the OBPS repository is closed down, the database will be transferred to another appropriate archive.