This workshop brought together representatives from Malagasy universities and research institutions to present and promote the DSpace as a Service platform as a shared and sustainable solution for the management, preservation, and dissemination of scientific digital resources in Madagascar.
The workshop was held from 15 to 17 June 2026 at the Ibis Hotel – Ankorondrano, Antananarivo, and was conducted by iRENALA and UbuntuNet Alliance.
TRAINING PROGRAM:
- Clearly and accurately define an open institutional repository.
- Explain why repositories are important for research visibility, access to results, and institutional reputation.
- Describe the librarian’s role as manager, curator, trainer, and advocate for the repository.
- Assess the starting point for their own institution.
- Clearly and accurately explain the basic structure of DSpace.
- Distinguish between communities, collections, records, and digital files.
- Describe the main user roles, permissions, and workflow steps.
- Navigate a DSpace repository with confidence.
- Recognize the librarian’s operational responsibilities within the platform.
- Assess institutional readiness for implementing or strengthening a repository.
- Identify the minimum governance, policy, human resource, and workflow requirements for success.
- Develop advocacy messages tailored to different audiences, including management, researchers, and partner units.
- Outline practical next steps for action within their own institutions.
- Explain what metadata is and why it is important for repository visibility.
- Apply Dublin Core field logic in a DSpace environment.
- Recognize common metadata quality issues and know how to correct them.
- Interpret the FAIR and CARE principles in the practical work of managing a repository.
- Ensure metadata curation based on the FAIR and CARE principles.
- Recommend appropriate licenses and rights.
- Have a clear understanding of the distinct roles of authentication and authorization.
- Understand, assign, and manage appropriate roles and responsibilities within the DSpace environment.
- Explain how metadata aggregation works and why it is essential for research visibility.
- Assess whether their repository is ready for metadata aggregation.
- Identify and correct common metadata quality issues that hinder discoverability.
- Identify the essential policies required for an academic repository.
- Distinguish between mandatory (essential) and recommended (desirable) policies.
- Understand the purpose of each policy and the risks it aims to address.
- Describe the key components that each policy should contain. – Begin drafting or revising institutional policies related to the repository.
All participants will be integrated into the UbuntuNet Pan-African Open Repository Community of Practice.