DOI
Digital Object Identifiers (DOI)
Scope
- This wiki page summarises relevant facts about DOI and related persistent Identifiers (PID) for the OSGeo communities.
- A DOI is a persistent identifier (PID).
- More infomation about PID for OSGeo is available here in the wiki
Useful background information
- Introduction to DOI (NASA)
- DOI registration 101 @ UC Berkeley (wayback machine memento)
- Introduction to the Zenodo open access repository
- Zenodo FAQ
Howto information for GitHub Repo maintainers (source Zenodo FAQ)
My organizational repository does not show up on the GitHub list
"In order to see and archive your organizational repositories on Zenodo you will need to have "Admin" permissions on said repository, either as an Admin of the organization or an Admin of one of your organization's repositories. Additionally, please make sure that the OAuth application on GitHub is granting permissions not only to your personal repositories but also to your organizational ones - to verify that go to your GitHub OAuth settings in your profile, and click on the Zenodo application to see more details. Make sure that Zenodo is given access (green tick) to your organization under "Organization access".
After that, navigate to your Zenodo GitHub settings page and click the "Sync now" button at the top."
I made a GitHub release, but it does not show up on Zenodo.
"Make sure the repository was enabled before the release was made, otherwise feel free to contact ZENODO."
Is it possible to archive a GitHub repository, before it was enabled on Zenodo?
"Only the repositories which were enabled before a release was made will be archived automatically. If you want to archive some of your old releases, you can always download a release ZIP from GitHub and upload it to Zenodo using our web interface as a regular upload."
How to change the default metadata for my GitHub releases?
"You can include metadata in a .zenodo.json file at the root of your GitHub repository. This file's contents should be in line with the Zenodo deposit metadata schema and will be used to update the metadata from future GitHub releases. For more information on how to create a .zenodo.json file, you can have a look at our GitHub integration documenation."
Do you support other software metadata files, like CITATION.cff or codemeta.json?
"Part of our plans and ongoing work is to take into account or improve our integration of other software metadata schemas such as the Citation File Format (CFF) and CodeMeta. We are working closely with our users and scholarly software and citation communities to figure out exactly when, in what form, and how all these different metadata schemas and their files will be integrated into Zenodo."
How does a CITATION.cff file affect the metadata of my GitHub release?
"When we find a CITATION.cff file in your GitHub repository's root folder, we make a best-effort attempt at parsing Zenodo-compatible metadata from it. For backwards-compatibility, if you have a .zenodo.json file in the repository, only the .zenodo.json's metadata will be taken into account. Of course, any existing valid CITATION.cff file will still be used to display the citation box on the GitHub repository page, but will not affect in any way the metadata we extract for your published release Zenodo record."
Do you support versioning for already existing records?
"Yes. However, for uploads published before the 30th of May 2017, you have to first upgrade your record to support versioning. This is done by clicking the “Upgrade to versioned record” button on the record page.
IMPORTANT If you have previously uploaded multiple versions of an upload as individual records on Zenodo, then DO NOT click the button to upgrade your record with versioning support. Please contact us so we can link the records under one versioning scheme.
Clicking the “Upgrade to versioned record” button on any of the records you would like to link, will irreversibly register them as individually-versioned records.
If you used the GitHub integration to archive your software on Zenodo, then we have already migrated and linked your records to support versioning."
Usage examples to cite OSGeo projects by DOI in scientific publications (both Open Access and closed access)
DOI
How to include a DOI-based reference to a LaTEX/Overleaf document.
BEWARE: As of now (2023-03-27) it remains to be confirmed that DOI-tags in citations work without the https://doi.org-header. This might (just) result in human readable information, but not machine-readable.
Publication DOI
@article{Chen_2003_Giants, title={On the Shoulders of Giants}, url={\url{https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4471-0051-5_5}}, DOI={10.1007/978-1-4471-0051-5_5}, journal={Mapping Scientific Frontiers: The Quest for Knowledge Visualization}, publisher={Springer London}, author={Chen, Chaomei}, year={2003}, pages={135–166} }
Video DOI
@article{Inman_1987, title={GRASS}, url={https://av.tib.eu/media/12963}, DOI={10.5446/12963}, abstractNote={Video presentation explaining the features and capabilities of this computer-based mapping system.}, publisher={Moving Pictures, US Army Construction Engineering Research Laboratory}, author={Inman, Roger J.}, year={1987}, language={en} }
Software Concept DOI (a reference to a software project as a whole)
@article{GRASS_CONCEPT_DOI, title={OSGeo/grass: GRASS GIS 8.2.0}, url={https://zenodo.org/record/5176030}, DOI={10.5281/ZENODO.5176030}, abstractNote={ .. CONTENT OMMITTED FOR BREVITY ..}, year={2022}, month={Jun} }
Software Version DOI (a reference to a particular software release)
@article{QGIS_Contributors_2022, title={QGIS}, url={https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5869837}, DOI={10.5281/ZENODO.5869837}, publisher={Zenodo}, author={QGIS Contributors}, year={2022}, month={Jan} }
Added-value services based on DOI
Personal due credit from DOI via ORCID
ORCID (Open Researcher and Contributor ID) is a persistent identifier (PID) like DOI. It is used to identify a human person.
DOI and ORCID can be interlinked via the digital infrastructure services provided by the organisations DataCite and CrossRef.
If a OSGeo-related software DOI is minted in Zenodo, the DataCite infrastructure can automatically forward and register this information in the ORCID accounts of the code authors. For this to work, two requirements are needed:
- Code authors ORCIDs must be provided via the CITATION.cff file in the codebase.
- A code author with an ORCID must have added Zenodo as a trusted organisation in the ORCID account settings, as described here.
Once a scientific publication is published (journal article, book, book chapter, etc.) and has received a publication DOI via CrossRef, this information can also be automatically forwarded to registered in ORCID. This requires, that CrossRef is added to the list of accepted parties in the ORCID account settings.
==
OSGeo Projects with DOI
The following citation listings for OSGeo projects are curated both manually and using automated data-harvesting from CrossRef. The lists are currently updated at least once per year. The listings are not complete. The total number of scientific publications referencing OSGeo projects by their DOI is most likely much larger. Publications such as FOSS4G Proceedings in The International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information Sciences are currently not referenced by CrossRef and must be added manually.
OSGeo
Zenodo OSGeo Community: many Zenodo deposits related to OSGeo, citeable by DOI
actinia 
DOI first minted: 2022
(search for this DOI on Google Scholar)
eodash 
DOI first minted: 2022
GDAL 
DOI first minted: 2022
(search for this DOI on Google Scholar)
| Year | Publications |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 10 (and counting) |
| 2024 | 18 |
| 2023 | 9 |
| 2022 | 6 |
| 2021 | 0 |
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
GeoNetwork 
DOI first minted: 2024
GeoMoose 
DOI first minted: 2023
Geopaparazzi 
DOI first minted: 2022
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
GEOS 
DOI first minted: 2023
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
GeoServer 
DOI first minted: 2022
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
GeoTools 
DOI first minted: 2022
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
GMT 
DOI first minted: 2019
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
GRASS GIS 
DOI first minted: 2021 (search for this DOI on Google Scholar)
Zenodo GRASS Community: many Zenodo deposits related to GRASS GIS, citeable by DOI
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
gvSIG 
DOI first minted: 2022
Hortonmachine 
DOI first minted: 2022
istSOS 
DOI first minted: 2022
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
Leaflet 
DOI first minted: 2022
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
Mapbender 
DOI first minted: 2022
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
MapServer 
DOI first minted: 2021
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
MovingPandas 
DOI first minted: 2020
MOSS 
DOI first minted: 2022
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
Orfeo Toolbox 
DOI first minted: 2018
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
OSGeoLive 
DOI first minted: 2022
MapServer
PDAL 
DOI first minted: 2019
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
pgRouting 
DOI first minted: 2023
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
PostGIS 
DOI first minted: 2021
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
PROJ 
DOI first minted: 2022
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
pycsw 
DOI first minted: 2023
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
pygeoapi 
DOI first minted: 2022
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
QGIS 220px
DOI first minted: 2022
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
rasdaman 
DOI first minted: 2017
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
SMASH 
DOI first minted: 2022
WRADLIB 
DOI first minted: 2021
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
ZOO 
DOI first minted: 2022
Latest Software-DOI-based citations report (FAIR4G project)
<Add your project DOI here, while maintaining alphabetical order>
Hint: to automate the Zenodo integration, connect to it to GitHub (see above).
This is an incomplete overview over geospatial data sources which can be referenced by DOI. Many more datasets are available in Open Access repositories such as Zenodo
GRASS GIS
- Spearfish Dataset for GRASS GIS v4.x - v8.x https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7930522
- New Orleans Dataset for GRASS GIS https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3359642
- Hilltop Arboretum Landform Dataset for GRASS GIS https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3749397
- Sichuan Dataset for GRASS GIS https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3359645
- The Hills of Governor's Island Dataset for GRASS GIS https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5248688
- Louisiana Dataset for GRASS GIS https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3359620
- Natural Earth Dataset for GRASS GIS https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3968936
- Global Dataset for GRASS GIS https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3359632
- Governor's Island Dataset for GRASS GIS https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5248419
(add datasets here)
QGIS
- Governor's Island Dataset for QGIS https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5701115
- Louisiana Dataset for QGIS https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3359620
(add datasets here)
DOI for OSGeo Video Recordings
- Wiki-page: FOSS4G Video Recordings
- Presentation about OSGeo videos with DOI (2016, german)
- Presentation about OSGeo videos with DOI (2017, german)
- Wiki-page: DOI-based Video Quotes
add your DOI badge to your project pages
- please add your DOI badge to your project
See Example Mapbender
- OSGeo project page for Mapbender https://www.osgeo.org/projects/mapbender/
- Mapbender website https://mapbender.org
- Mapbender Repository README https://github.com/mapbender/mapbender-workshop
You badge looks like this (replace your DOI in the Link and svg name)
<a href="https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5887014"><img src="https://zenodo.org/badge/DOI/10.5281/zenodo.5887014.svg" alt="DOI"></a>
DOI acknowledgement by Publishers and Journals
References in indexed scientific literature to research software, including the OSGeo software projects, can be counted as citations and due scientific credit for the persons developing and maintaining the research software).
The emerging best practice for software references is reference by DOI. Such a DOI reference can either refer to the software project as a whole (concept DOI), or a particular release of the codebase (version DOI).
Keeping track of DOI-based software citations can both be done manually or by automated analysis of metadata about the publication provided centrally by CrossRef or DataCite.
The prerequisite for automated analysis and reporting (as in FAIR: machine-actionable and interoperable) is the provision of a full references list for the publication as a complete set of metadata to CrossRef.
If only a limited subset of the reference list is provided to CrossRef, metadata-based automated analysis and reporting will return no result, meaning no information about the citation.
In such a case, despite the best intentions by the publication authors by using DOI-based software citations in their publication, because of the lack of metadata, automated reporting will return no result and there will be no due credit by citation to the software project.
This also affects the software developer team, as there will be no credit / recognition of their roles as (research-)software authors, because there is no automated transitive credit to their individual ORCID accounts will be triggered.
Currently it is difficult at best for propective authors to assess prior to a publication whether software-references by DOI will be indexed by CrossRef, resulting in FAIR credit.
To mitigate this, incomplete lists are being compiled (below) of journals, for convenience of prospective authors, to assess wheter software-references will result in credit propagation to the software project and developer team.
- A greenlist collects journals and publications with confirmed software citations derived from CrossRef metadata.
- A whitelist compiles journals and publications with identical metadata practices to the greenlist, but where no DOI-based software citation has been confirmed yet.
- A greylist collects journals, where OSGeo-DOI have been used in publications, yet currently are not being indexed by CrossRef.
For scientific authors, the difference between a publication in a green-, whitelist or greylist journal is wether DOI-based references to OSGeo software, -data or -video will be automagically attributed ("due scientific credit") to the respective OSGeo community / persons. For greylist journals, such attribution needs to be compiled manually.
Publisher statements about software citation by DOI
- American Geophysical Union (AGU): Data & Software for Authors
- Springer Nature: Springer Nature announces unified open code policy to better support open research practices
Greenlist: Journals and Publications with confirmed CrossRef-listed software DOI references to OSGeo Projects
| Publisher | Journal / Publication |
|---|---|
| American Geophysical Union (AGU) | Earth and Space Science |
| American Geophysical Union (AGU) | Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems |
| American Geophysical Union (AGU) | GeoHealth |
| American Geophysical Union (AGU) | Geophysical Research Letters |
| American Geophysical Union (AGU) | Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface |
| American Geophysical Union (AGU) | Journal of Geophysical Research: Physics |
| American Geophysical Union (AGU) | Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets |
| American Geophysical Union (AGU) | Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth |
| American Geophysical Union (AGU) | Tectonics |
| American Geophysical Union (AGU) | Water Resources Research |
| American Meteorological Society | Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society |
| Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) | Transactions on Spatial Algorithms and Systems |
| Copernicus GmbH | Earth System Science Data |
| Copernicus GmbH | Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences (EGU) |
| Copernicus GmbH | The Cryosphere |
| Elsevier | Agricultural Water Management |
| Elsevier | Ecological Indicators |
| Elsevier | Global Ecology and Conservation |
| Elsevier | Journal of Hydrology |
| Elsevier | Ocean & Coastal Management |
| Elsevier | Science of Remote Sensing |
| Elsevier | Sustainable Cities and Society |
| Geomatik | Geomatik |
| Informa UK Limited | Annals of GIS |
| Informa UK Limited | International Journal of Remote Sensing |
| Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) | IEEE Transactions on Signal and Information Processing over Networks |
| IOP Publishing | Environmental Research Communications |
| McGill University Library and Archives | Seismica |
| MDPI AG | Agronomy |
| MDPI AG | Remote Sensing |
| MDPI AG | Sensors |
| Oxford University Press (OUP) | Forestry: An International Journal of Forest Research |
| SAGE Publications | Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and City Science |
| Seismological Society of America (SSA) | Seismological Research Letters |
| Springer Nature Switzerland | Earth Science, Systems and Society |
| Springer Science and Business Media LLC | Landscape Ecology |
| Springer Science and Business Media LLC | Rules and Reasoning |
| Springer Science and Business Media LLC | Springer Handbook Series |
| Springer Science and Business Media LLC | Springer Scientific Reports (Nature) |
| Springer Science and Business Media LLC | Springer Scientific Data (Nature) |
| The Open Journal | Journal of Open Source Software |
| University of Toronto Press Inc. (UTPress) | Cartographica: The International Journal for Geographic Information and Geovisualization |
| Wiley | Crop Science |
Whitelist: Journals and Publications with CrossRef-enabled workflows to acknowledging DOI-based software citations (not yet confirmed but should apply)
| Publisher | Journal / Publication |
|---|---|
| American Geophysical Union (AGU) | DOI-based software citations via CrossRef should work for ALL indexed peer-reviewed journals by AGU: A full references list is provided to CrossRef when an article is published (Sole exception: AGU Radio Science) |
| tbd | tbd |
Greylist: Journals and Publications reporting DOI references to CrossRef
| Publisher | Journal / Publication |
|---|---|
| Copernicus GmbH | The International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information Sciences |
| American Geophysical Union (AGU) | EOS.org (note: EOS is a sceience news magazine published by AGU. It is not a indexed peer-reviewed journal) |
| Earth and Space Science Open Archive https://essopenarchive.org/ | Preprints, presentations from major scientific meetings, and important documents of scholarly societies (with DOI) |
Related Identifiers
Research Organisiation Registry (ROR): An ID for the OSGeo Foundation
ROR is a global, community-led registry of open persistent identifiers for research organizations.
OSGeo ROR
The OSGeo Foundation is a research organisation.
The ROR ID for OSGeo is https://ror.org/00cjqbk89
Usage of ROR
Many scholarly communication systems are already using ROR, and many others are working on integrating ROR.
Background Information (ROR Community) =
ORCID (Open Researcher and Contributor ID) - a PID for people
- ORCID FAQ
- ORDID introduction video
- HOWTO: Register an ORCID (Video tutorial)
- How to set up an ORCID account for credit propagation (e.g. Version-DOI of OSGeo project software releases will automagically appear in the "works" section of the associated ORCID accounts)
Authentice an ORCID account with a GitHub
„We’re excited to announce that GitHub is partnering with ORCID. You can now authenticate your ORCID account with your GitHub account, and display your ORCID iD on your public GitHub profile. ORCID provides a persistent unique digital identifier (an ORCID iD) that researchers own and control, and that distinguishes them from every other researcher."
https://github.blog/changelog/2024-03-13-authenticate-orcid-id/
How to include ORCIDs to a LaTEX/Overleaf document
Include these packages: \usepackage{orcidlink} \usepackage[hidelinks]{hyperref}
\author{ Peter Löwe\,\orcidlink{0000-0003-2257-0517}~\textsuperscript{1}\thanks{Corresponding author}, Markus Neteler\,\orcidlink{0000-0003-1916-1966}~\textsuperscript{2} } (Source: OSGEO, PERSISTENT IDENTIFIERS AND THE SHAPE OF THINGS TO COME)