Research Commons: Tukunga Mahi Rangahau | Deposit for Staff

The University supports and promotes Open Research to enhance collaboration, resulting in a more vibrant, diverse and inclusive research culture that can expand beyond the academy and ultimately translate into societal impact. Research Commons is the university's institutional repository and supports this goal by making publicly available the full text of research outputs of University of Waikato staff as well as our Higher and Masters Degree theses. Learn more about how the Library is committed to open research in our Commitment to Open Research [link to we page] page.

Research Commons holds a range of scholarly materials and creative works including journal articles, books, chapters, visual media, conference presentations/slides, reports, compositions, and art works.

• Items in Research Commons are publicly available and open to internet search engines such as Google – your items benefit from this increased visibility.
• Items in Research Commons are open access, meaning more people around the world can access your work.
• Items in Research Commons will be preserved for long-term access and discovery as part of the University Library’s digital collections.

Research is primarily deposited into Research Commons through the University of Waikato's research management system IRIS.

IRIS holds bibliographic details of your publications, but you can also use your IRIS account to upload publication evidence files for PBRF and to push full-text files across to Research Commons to be made publicly available. The bibliographic information also transfers across to Research Commons, eliminating double-handling.

Material deemed to be research is collected. The collection predominantly consists of:

• Journal articles
• Conference contributions (full papers, presentations)
• Research and technical reports
• Working papers
• Book chapters
• Reviews (substantial works – book, music, theatre, dance etc.)
• Non-traditional research outputs (NTROs)
• Pre-prints

To be eligible, deposits must:

• Be authored by at least one current (at the time of publication) University of Waikato staff member
• Contain a full-text file (where possible)

General instructions on how to use IRIS are located in the IRIS Help page.

1. Locate Item

Through the tabs open ‘Menu’ – ‘Publications’ to locate the item you would like to appear on Research Commons. If you have many publications you can search by title in the filters on the right.

If the publication is not there, you will need to “Claim as mine” from your pending tab or manually submit it (talk to your Faculty Research Administrator if unsure).

2. Go to Deposit Page

From the item record select the “Go to the deposit page” icon (see image below):

“Go to the deposit page” icon is circled.

3. Check status

The Deposit Page will have a message at the top displaying the current status of your item and if it is available in the repository (Research Commons).

• “This publication has not been deposited” — no files have been sent through to Research Commons. Please upload your files and click the “Deposit my publication” button (see point 5).
• “This publication is pending review in the repository” — The item is awaiting review from a Research Commons administrator. They will confirm your submission is in scope and copyright compliant before making it publicly available. You can add more files at this time.
• “This publication is live and available in the repository” — All done! You can continue to add files if you wish.

4. Upload your Files

   Any files that you upload will be added to the IRIS record. They will not be deposited through to Research Commons at this stage. Select file version labels at this stage (for more information see the section on file versions). If you do not want your item to be available in Research Commons, take no further action.

5. Enter an OA Location (optional)

   If your publication is available elsewhere in an Open Access format, you can enter the location and version information in the same way you would add files. This information will be displayed in the public-facing Research Commons item page. It is ok for items to have both files and an Open Access location attached.

6. Deposit

   After you have uploaded files and/or entered an OA location, you will be given the option to ‘Deposit my publication’. In doing so your files will be sent through to a Research Commons Administrator. They will assess the item for inclusion in Research Commons. If there are multiple files, they will ensure the correct ones are made live, and that other files (such as evidence files) are hidden from public view. You can add more files at a later date. Any added files will be automatically sent through to Research Commons staff to be assessed. You do not need to (and will not be prompted to) click the ‘Deposit my publication’ button again.

When a piece of research is published, the author often assigns copyright to the publisher. The rights retained by the author will depend on the type of agreement signed. Publishers sometimes require that we deposit a particular version of the article.

See the following list for a description of file versions:

Submitted Version

The author-created version submitted to a journal for peer review.

Accepted Version

The final author-created version incorporates referee comments and is the accepted-for-publication version. It is not yet in the format in which it will be published. Often publishers prefer that we host this version on Research Commons. It is sometimes known as a postprint or an author's version. Wherever possible, we link the repository version to any traditionally published version.

Published Version

This is often referred to as the publisher's PDF. It is the final published version and has been morphed into the style and format of the journal in which it is to appear. Many publishers stipulate that this version may not be hosted on repositories, but we will use it wherever we can.

Library staff will assess every deposit before it goes live so if you are unsure whether you have uploaded the correct version, we encourage you to submit what you have and we will be in touch if a different version is required. 

Need Help?

For assistance, reach out to the Open Research Team at library@waikato.ac.nz.