Repository interoperability

The  Open Archives Initiative  develops and promotes interoperability standards that aim to facilitate the efficient dissemination of content. OAI has its roots in the open access and institutional repository movements. Continued support of this work remains a cornerstone of the Open Archives program. Over time, however, the work of OAI has expanded to promote broad access to digital resources for eScholarship, eLearning and eScience. 

The Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH) is a low-barrier mechanism for repository interoperabilitay. Records are encoded according to Dublin Core metadata schema, ISO 15836, which makes it possible descriptions in a simple and very flexible way.