Friends: This is especially meant for those who attended the Open Access Workshops at MSSRF held in May last year in which Prof. T B Rajashekar was a facilitator (in the first workshop). Eight days ago Prof. Rajashekar was killed in a road accident a few miles from Bangalore while he was returning to his office after attending a wedding. May his soul rest in peace. A very large number of people, including many who attended the workshops at Chennai, have sent condolence messages. But the best tribute we could pay a great man like Rajashekar is to follow his example and keep our promise to him. Rajashekar had conducted many other workshops too. In particular, he conducted one on OA especially for INDEST librarians. I would also urge them to set up institutional archives as soon as possible. I know that archives have been set up at NCL, IIMK, NIC-Indian Medlars Centre, etc. Here is the report by Les Carr of the University of Southampton, another facilitator at our workshops, on the two workshops on Open Access held at MSSRF, Chennai in 2004. Virtually every one who attended the workshop promised that s/he will set up an archive within a few months at his/her institution. Now more than a year later, let us take stock. How many archives have been set up and how many papers have been deposited inthem so far? How many of those who attended the MSSRF workshops have not set up an archive so far and what are the reasons? Is there anything that I can do to help. Best wishes. Subbiah Arunachalam ------- Workshop on Open Access http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/3650.html Executive Summary: (a) Indian Open Access Workshops a Great Success (b) Open Source Development Company offers pPrints Support for Very Modest Fee (c) Further plans to promote Eprints across India, China and Brazil. The Open Access workshops in Chennai, India 2-4 May 2004 and 6-8 May 2004 were conceived and organised by Subbiah Arunachalam, on a suggestion from Prof. M S Valiathan, President of the Indian National Science Academyand held at the Bioinformatics Centre of the M S Swaminathan Research Foundation The workshops were attended by 50 scientists, research managers and librarians from a wide range of research institutions from India (below). The aim of the workshops was to enable each organisation to set up an institutional EPrints archive; we confidently expect to see at least a dozen sustainable, populated archives to appear within the next three months. More than 150 people applied for the available places which were limited by the requirement to provide hands-on access to computers for instruction in the practical aspects maintaining an EPrints archive. The workshops covered essential background (Open Access philosophy, the theory of the Open Archiving Metadata Protocols, issues of document and metadata formats) but majored on the practical aspects of using, installing and configuring EPrint archives, with a particular focus on the budgetary and management resources required for setting up a pilot project within each organistaion to establish an institutional archive. The participants were all highly motivated and technically very competent. Indian researchers and institutions are particularly keen not only to obtain more access to high quality research, but also to provide access to high quality Indian research which they feel is under-represented in international journals. Many of the participants have Linux servers, excellent network infrastructure and a large number of publications to hand, and consequently anticipate no difficulty in setting up an EPrints server themselves, or in arranging institutional support for doing so. One of the participants was the head of an Open Source Software company operating in the not-for-profit and NGO sector with whom we are in discussion about a service for installing, configuring, maintaining and upgrading EPrints archives. The organiser of the workshop, Professor Subbiah Arunachalam from the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation, is next organising a meeting of government officials representing India, China and Brazil to discuss national and international policies for promoting Open Access and Research Archiving. I have been invited to the annual ICCC Electronic Publishing conference in Brazil to give a keynote, to meet Brazilian government officials and to run a workshop on EPrints Archiving. Research Institutes attending Workshops ================================ Bose Institute, Calcutta Central Electro Chemical Research Institute, Karaikudi Central Institute of Psychiatry, Kanke Central Leather Research Institute Central Potato Research Institute Central Research Institute for Dryland Agriculture Entomology Research Institute Indian Agricultural Research Institute Indian Agricultural Statistics Research Institute Indian Institute of Technology (reps from each of 5 cities) Indian National Science Association Indian Institute of Astrophysics Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode International Crops research Institute for the semi-Arid Tropics M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation National Academy of Agricultural Sciences National Brain Research Centre, Nainwal National Chemical Laboratory National Informatics Centre National Institute of Nutrition Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology Tuberculosis Research Centre Universities ------------ Anna University Central Institute of Fisheries Education, Mumbai Deemed University Govind Ballabh Pant University Of Agriculture and Technology Kerala Agricultural University Maharashtra Animal and Fishery Sciences University Shivaji University Tamil Nadu Agricultural University University Of Madras University of Delhi University of Kalyani Other Organisations ---- Mahiti (software developer for civil sector http://www.mahiti.org/) National Agricultural Technology Project (NATP, National Co-ordinator of 104 partners), Sir Ganga Ram Hospital --- Les Carr Intelligence, Agents, Multimedia (IAM) group Electronics and Computer Science University of Southampton http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~lac/ Friends: This is especially meant for those who attended the Open Access Workshops at MSSRF held in May last year in which Prof. T B Rajashekar was a facilitator (in the first workshop). Eight days ago Prof. Rajashekar was killed in a road accident a few miles from Bangalore while he was returning to his office after attending a wedding. May his soul rest in peace. A very large number of people, including many who attended the workshops at Chennai, have sent condolence messages. But the best tribute we could pay a great man like Rajashekar is to follow his example and keep our promise to him. Rajashekar had conducted many other workshops too. In particular, he conducted one on OA especially for INDEST librarians. I would also urge them to set up institutional archives as soon as possible. I know that archives have been set up at NCL, IIMK, NIC-Indian Medlars Centre, etc. Here is the report by Les Carr of the University of Southampton, another facilitator at our workshops, on the two workshops on Open Access held at MSSRF, Chennai in 2004. Virtually every one who attended the workshop promised that s/he will set up an archive within a few months at his/her institution. Now more than a year later, let us take stock. How many archives have been set up and how many papers have been deposited inthem so far? How many of those who attended the MSSRF workshops have not set up an archive so far and what are the reasons? Is there anything that I can do to help. Best wishes. Subbiah Arunachalam ------- Workshop on Open Access https://mx2.arl.org/Redirect/www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/365... http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/3650.html Executive Summary : (a) Indian Open Access Workshops a Great Success (b) Open Source Development Company offers pPrints Support for Very Modest Fee (c) Further plans to promote Eprints across India, China and Brazil. The Open Access workshops in Chennai, India 2-4 May 2004 and 6-8 May 2004 were conceived and organised by Subbiah Arunachalam, on a suggestion from Prof. M S Valiathan, President of the Indian National Science Academyand held at the Bioinformatics Centre of the M S Swaminathan Research Foundation The workshops were attended by 50 scientists, research managers and librarians from a wide range of research institutions from India (below). The aim of the workshops was to enable each organisation to set up an institutional EPrints archive; we confidently expect to see at least a dozen sustainable, populated archives to appear within the next three months. More than 150 people applied for the available places which were limited by the requirement to provide hands-on access to computers for instruction in the practical aspects maintaining an EPrints archive. The workshops covered essential background (Open Access philosophy, the theory of the Open Archiving Metadata Protocols, issues of document and metadata formats) but majored on the practical aspects of using, installing and configuring EPrint archives, with a particular focus on the budgetary and management resources required for setting up a pilot project within each organistaion to establish an institutional archive. The participants were all highly motivated and technically very competent. Indian researchers and institutions are particularly keen not only to obtain more access to high quality research, but also to provide access to high quality Indian research which they feel is under-represented in international journals. Many of the participants have Linux servers, excellent network infrastructure and a large number of publications to hand, and consequently anticipate no difficulty in setting up an EPrints server themselves, or in arranging institutional support for doing so. One of the participants was the head of an Open Source Software company operating in the not-for-profit and NGO sector with whom we are in discussion about a service for installing, configuring, maintaining and upgrading EPrints archives. The organiser of the workshop, Professor Subbiah Arunachalam from the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation, is next organising a meeting of government officials representing India, China and Brazil to discuss national and international policies for promoting Open Access and Research Archiving. I have been invited to the annual ICCC Electronic Publishing conference in Brazil to give a keynote, to meet Brazilian government officials and to run a workshop on EPrints Archiving. Research Institutes attending Workshops ================================ Bose Institute, Calcutta Central Electro Chemical Research Institute, Karaikudi Central Institute of Psychiatry, Kanke Central Leather Research Institute Central Potato Research Institute Central Research Institute for Dryland Agriculture Entomology Research Institute Indian Agricultural Research Institute Indian Agricultural Statistics Research Institute Indian Institute of Technology (reps from each of 5 cities) Indian National Science Association Indian Institute of Astrophysics Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode International Crops research Institute for the semi-Arid Tropics M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation National Academy of Agricultural Sciences National Brain Research Centre, Nainwal National Chemical Laboratory National Informatics Centre National Institute of Nutrition Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology Tuberculosis Research Centre Universities ------------ Anna University Central Institute of Fisheries Education, Mumbai Deemed University Govind Ballabh Pant University Of Agriculture and Technology Kerala Agricultural University Maharashtra Animal and Fishery Sciences University Shivaji University Tamil Nadu Agricultural University University Of Madras University of Delhi University of Kalyani Other Organisations ---- Mahiti (software developer for civil sector https://mx2.arl.org/Redirect/www.mahiti.org/ http://www.mahiti.org/ ) National Agricultural Technology Project (NATP, National Co-ordinator of 104 partners), Sir Ganga Ram Hospital --- Les Carr Intelligence, Agents, Multimedia (IAM) group Electronics and Computer Science University of Southampton https://mx2.arl.org/Redirect/www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~lac/ http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~lac/