Going global - step 1
Today the repository map mashup site went global!
So far all data has been restricted to the UK. The repository data has come from two sources - ROAR and OpenDOAR. However neither of these data providers (until recently) provided any geographical data. OpenDOAR stores postal addresses, however these need to be converted into good old fashioned longitudes and latitudes. So the data for the UK is mostly hand-crafted.
In an attempt to improve on the amount of geographical data, Tim Brody from Southampton used http://www.hostip.info/ to generate location information for the IP addresses of many of the repositories. The maps have now harvested this data from ROAR allowing it to show more than 300 repositories.
(Tim Brody has also now used this data to create Google Earth files (see his blog for details) as originally blogged by Richard Jones ‘Repository 66 and the Google Map Adventure ‘).
Stage 2…? An interface to allow users to upload either corrected or new geographical data for their repository.
Stage 3…? Use some geocoding software to convert postal addresses from OpenDOAR into geographical location data.
Caveat - there are a few wrinkles in the system. For example if one institution hosts several servers, due to the programmatic fashion by which the locations are generated, the coordinates of the repositories will be identical. The code powering the maps just needs to offset each of them slightly. As it happens, the Google Earth version of the data is identical, but Google Earth shows one item, but with multiple lines coming out of it each ending in an icon for the repository - neat!