Milestones for different repository content types were drawn up with the help of input from the questionnaire survey and workshop. Twelve people attended the workshop, excluding JISC staff, and eleven (different) people responded to the questionnaire from a total of nineteen contacted (58%).
Participants were asked to respond to the following questions from the viewpoint of the content type with which they were most familiar:
- Where do we want to be in 2013? What are the main business functions that repositories should fulfil in five years time (from the perspective of the domains you represent)?
- Where are we now as regards fulfilling these functions?
- How do we get to where we want to be? What barriers need to be overcome and how?
Responses to these questions differed significantly depending on the repository content type under consideration. For example responses relating to learning materials indicated the need for a fundamental re-thinking of the higher level objectives, whilst discussion of repositories for data, in particular scientific datasets, acknowledged that the field was immature and that those in the ‘repository community’ could usefully contribute to the initial strategic planning work underway.
Overall the responses showed that it is no longer helpful to concentrate on the future of the ‘repository’ in isolation. As stated above in Recommendation 3 we need to consider a wider picture of where we want to be in 2013 in terms of a renewed vision of scholarly communication. The future of repositories depends on how they can contribute to associated higher level objectives (open access, well managed digital collections, Web based research environments etc). Rather than concentrating on the technology, such ‘business functions’ would be a better starting point for discussion of the future. Such an approach may be taken up in any further Roadmap activity, as discussed in the conclusion to this Review.