University of Edinburgh

Edinburgh DataShare OAI-PMH

OAI-PMH 2.0 metadata harvesting endpoint for Edinburgh DataShare. Fully anonymous, no key, twelve metadata prefixes including the UK research formats rioxx and uketd_dc. Records carry DataCite DOIs under prefix 10.7488/ds. Earliest datestamp 2008-01-29. This is the most open machine-readable surface the institution operates.

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OpenAPI Specification

openapi: 3.0.3
info:
  title: Edinburgh DataShare OAI-PMH
  description: >-
    OAI-PMH 2.0 metadata harvesting endpoint operated by the University of
    Edinburgh for Edinburgh DataShare. Probed live on 2026-08-19: verb=Identify returned
    200 with repositoryName "Datashare", protocolVersion 2.0, adminEmail
    data-library-team@mlist.is.ed.ac.uk and earliestDatestamp 2008-01-29T13:47:07Z. verb=ListMetadataFormats
    returned twelve prefixes including oai_dc, qdc, mods, mets, rioxx and
    uketd_dc. Records carry DataCite DOIs under the University of Edinburgh
    prefix 10.7488.

    OAI-PMH is a protocol, not a REST API; this document describes the single
    HTTP entry point and its verb parameter so the endpoint is machine-callable
    from a standard client. Responses are XML.
  version: "2.0"
  contact:
    name: Datashare
    url: https://datashare.ed.ac.uk/
    email: data-library-team@mlist.is.ed.ac.uk
  x-operator: institution
  x-operator-evidence: "host datashare.ed.ac.uk is under ed.ac.uk, Domain Owner: University of Edinburgh (Nominet whois)"
  x-provenance:
    method: probed
    generated: '2026-08-19'
    source: https://datashare.ed.ac.uk/server/oai/request?verb=Identify
servers:
- url: https://datashare.ed.ac.uk/server/oai
  description: Canonical baseURL as self-reported by the Identify response (probed 200)
tags:
- name: OAI-PMH
  description: OAI-PMH 2.0 metadata harvesting for Edinburgh DataShare
paths:
  /request:
    get:
      tags: [OAI-PMH]
      operationId: oaiRequest
      summary: OAI-PMH request entry point
      description: >-
        Single OAI-PMH entry point. The verb parameter selects the operation.
        Identify, ListMetadataFormats, ListSets, ListIdentifiers, ListRecords and
        GetRecord were all reachable anonymously when probed.
      parameters:
      - name: verb
        in: query
        required: true
        description: OAI-PMH verb
        schema:
          type: string
          enum: [Identify, ListMetadataFormats, ListSets, ListIdentifiers, ListRecords, GetRecord]
      - name: metadataPrefix
        in: query
        required: false
        description: Metadata format (observed prefixes on this endpoint)
        schema:
          type: string
          enum: [oai_dc, qdc, dim, mods, mets, ore, didl, xoai, rioxx, uketd_dc, rdf, marc]
      - name: identifier
        in: query
        required: false
        description: OAI identifier, required for GetRecord
        schema: {type: string}
      - name: set
        in: query
        required: false
        description: Set spec to restrict a harvest
        schema: {type: string}
      - name: from
        in: query
        required: false
        description: Selective-harvest lower bound (granularity YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ssZ)
        schema: {type: string}
      - name: until
        in: query
        required: false
        description: Selective-harvest upper bound
        schema: {type: string}
      - name: resumptionToken
        in: query
        required: false
        description: Flow-control token from a previous incomplete list response
        schema: {type: string}
      responses:
        '200':
          description: >-
            OAI-PMH XML response (observed). Protocol-level failures are also
            returned with HTTP 200 and an <error> element carrying an OAI error code.
          content:
            text/xml:
              schema:
                type: string
                description: OAI-PMH 2.0 XML document