Since the early 2010s, the Scholars Portal Dataverse network supported by the Ontario Council of University Libraries, has served as a repository for research data collected by individuals and organizations at Ontario universities. In June 2022, this regional service became Borealis, the Canadian Dataverse Repository / le dépôt Dataverse canadien , a shared national service with technical infrastructure hosted by Scholars Portal and the University of Toronto Libraries. As the name evokes connections to the Canadian landscape, this new national service reflects the growth of research data management and expanding partnerships with Canadian regional academic library consortia, institutions, research organizations, and the Digital Research Alliance of Canada. Borealis supports open discovery, management, sharing, and preservation of Canadian research data.
York U Dataverse is part of this growing Borealis network and functions as a dedicated research data repository for York University researchers. The Borealis team is responsible for setting up institutional and organizational collections in the repository. The Research Data Management (RDM) team at York University Libraries (YUL) provides data curation and user support and serves as local institutional and organizational collection managers.
The data deposit workflow in the York U Dataverse is semi-mediated. To deposit data, researcher(s) will need to request the RDM team to create a Dataverse and assign a contributor role to the requesting researcher. The researcher can then create a dataset under their Dataverse, upload data files to their dataset, and provide supporting metadata. Once the researcher is ready to publish the dataset, select Submit for Review and the RDM team will review and check the deposited data files and metadata, and provide a curation report with recommendations to the researcher. Based on the curation report, the researcher can modify the data and metadata. Once the feedback from the curation report is addressed, the RDM team will then publish the dataset, at which time it will be available publicly.
This change will provide opportunities for the RDM team to work together with York researchers in this semi-mediated process. This ensures that data published in the York U Dataverse adheres to data curation best practices as specified in our new collections policy for the repository as well as the updated deposit guidelines.
The data curation processing time depends on the number of submissions and completeness of metadata and documentation. The RDM team aims to review and provide a curation report within 3-5 business days. Please contact yul_rdm@yorku.ca if you need an expedited curation review. Following the resubmission, expect 1-2 business days for the final publication of the dataset.
The RDM team at YUL are the administrators of York U Dataverse including all sub-Dataverses and datasets created under York U Dataverse. The RDM team consists of research data management librarians and library staff. If you have any questions about the Dataverse roles or permissions, please contact yul_rdm@yorku.ca.
Research team members can be assigned roles depending on the requirements of their position and work with the research data. The RDM team will be responsible for assigning roles that apply to the dataset and Dataverse. To set up a Dataverse, please sign up for a Borealis account first and then contact yul_rdm@yorku.ca. Generally, researchers will be assigned as contributor roles to their Dataverse. The contributor role enables researchers to:
- create datasets under their Dataverse
- delete dataset drafts
- edit and view datasets, including license and terms
- upload and download files
- submit datasets for review and publishing by the York U Dataverse administrators
Note that contributors are not able to publish datasets directly. The York U Dataverse follows a semi-mediated data curation process that allows the RDM team to help enhance the quality of the metadata and datasets before publication.
Yes, each individual must have their own Borealis account tied to their email address. Roles can then be assigned to account for better privacy practices. It is not recommended that a team use one account for the group.
Yes. York University affiliated researchers will need to create a Borealis account and request to set up the Dataverse(s). They will be the main contact person of the Dataverse(s). Additional team members can be added as contributors to the Dataverse(s) once they have registered for a Borealis account.
A Dataverse can be thought of as a digital collection for the datasets. This can be created for individual researchers, research groups, labs, departments, etc. A Dataverse can have sub-Dataverses and multiple datasets. A dataset is a container of data files, documentation, and their metadata.
To request a Dataverse under the York U Dataverse, please sign up for a Borealis account first and then contact yul_rdm@yorku.ca.
The York U Dataverse accepts research data that are created or co-created by York University faculty, graduate students, staff, librarians, and affiliated researchers and research groups. Researchers should deposit finalized datasets for curation and publication. It is strongly encouraged to follow best practices in research data management, such as the documentation of the data through a ReadMe file.
The York U Dataverse is primarily a platform for publishing and sharing datasets. It is not appropriate for the storage of highly sensitive or confidential data. Datasets must not contain information that could directly or indirectly identify a subject, except where the release of such identifying information has no potential for constituting an unwarranted invasion of privacy and/or breach of confidentiality.
Dataverse supports a wide range of data types and formats. Single data file size limit for deposits in Dataverse is 3GB. Researchers interested in depositing large file size data sets are invited to discuss their options by consulting the RDM team at yul_rdm@yorku.ca. The RDM team will consider large datasets on a case-by-case basis and help determine the suitability for the national Federated Research Data Repository (FRDR). To learn more about FRDR, please review the terms of their data submission policy.
In the York U Dataverse, all published datasets will receive a DOI (Digital Object Identifier). This is a persistent link that makes it easy to share and cite data. At the top of each dataset page, there is an automatically generated citation that can be copied and used to reference the data. The citation for the entire dataset is located in the light blue box, which includes the author(s), year, dataset title, the globally persistent identifier (hyperlink), the name of the repository, the version number, and the UNF (universal numerical fingerprint).
When citing or sharing data, DOI should always be used for linking to datasets because it is the digital identifier designed to be persistent even if URLs or websites change or get replaced. It is highly recommended that researchers check, update, and replace URLs to datasets with DOIs.
Research data files and metadata made available through the York U Dataverse will generally be retained for the lifetime of the repository as per the level 1 preservation activities described in the Borealis preservation plan.
Updated Sept. 2023