LASSO
The LASSO (LEAP Aggregated Search Service On-line) project was the third phase of SHERPA-LEAP, the London Eprints Access Project. The project created a shared, cross-searching interface to the SHERPA-LEAP repositories, employing the Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH) to aggregate metadata from the contributing institutions.
LASSO had 4 main aims:
- To design and implement a single interface to allow cross-searching of the content of the SHERPA-LEAP eprints repositories. View test-demonstrator.
- To employ user testing techniques to inform the design of the shared interface.
- To ensure that the project takes account of relevant national and international initiatives in aggregated search of repository content.
- To investigate the feasibility, desirability and cost of maintaining a shared interface to the SHERPA-LEAP eprints repositories beyond the lifetime of the project, and to recommend an appropriate Exit Strategy to the SHERPA-LEAP Steering Group.
The project ran from March 2007 until 31 July 2008.
June 2009: LASSO is back under construction as part of the Metadata Enrichment for Repositories in a London Institutional Network (MERLIN) project. MERLIN will use text-mining techniques to enhance the functionality of LASSO, enabling better discovery of the full-text material held in the LEAP repositories.