PIDs as IRO Infrastructure - Early Findings

The Persistent Identifiers as IRO Infrastructure project was launched in January 2020, funded under the UKRI Arts and Humanities Research Council’s Towards a National Collection programme. Our aim is to explore persistent identifiers as a foundational infrastructure for the programme, using their power to provide a long-lasting click-able link to a digital object. They are recognised by UKRI as a tool for enabling data discovery, access and citation. Supporting wider use of PIDs for collection objects, environments, specimens and related items will allow long-term, unambiguous linking of collections that will create a digital National Collection. This project is bringing together best practices in the use of PIDs, building on existing work and projects. We will share expertise and provide recommendations on the approach to PIDs for colleagues in institutions across the UK heritage sector. Through a mixture of workshops, desk research and case studies, the project will answer questions such as 'What are the gaps in the existing PID landscape for heritage collections, buildings and environments?' and 'What should a PID infrastructure, strategy and governance framework look like for a unified national collection?'. This report outlines those activities to date and provides an overview of the awareness of PIDs across the sector based on the findings at this stage in the project. It also showcases the requirements of the sector and barriers to adoption we face. In turn, it aims to offer initial solutions to the challenges identified in our activities so far. This report’s timing is designed to ensure that Discovery Projects have an opportunity to address some of the questions and issues identified so far.