Handle identifiers for non-production studies/datasets

[Ben Companjen]

Hi,

DANS, provider of DataverseNL (formerly Dutch Dataverse Network),
controls two Handle prefixes. One is used for our production DVN
service, the other has been used for the 'sandbox' instance of DVN that
our users can use for demonstrations and testing.

The handles for the studies in the sandbox instance are not as stable as
the ones in the production DVN instance. Ideally, these should not be
registered at all, or be fake handle IDs (like Dataverse 4 registers
fake DOIs for datasets in the test environments).

How do others, err, handle Handle for sandbox data? Don't use a Handle
prefix? Use a dedicated test prefix? Other options?

Thanks in advance!

Ben

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Ben Companjen
Information systems engineer / Information manager
ben.co...@dans.knaw.nl
+31 6 1334 9717
Skype: bencompanjen

Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS)
DANS promotes sustained access to digital research data. See www.dans.knaw.nl for more information and contact details. DANS is an institute of KNAW and NWO.

DANS | Anna van Saksenlaan 51 | 2593 HW The Hague | P.O. Box 93067 | 2509 AB The Hague | +31 70 349 44 50 | in...@dans.knaw.nl | www.dans.knaw.nl

[Ben Companjen]

Hi all,

I'm still interested in any Dataverse (DVN) specific answers, but in the meantime I got a reply from the people at CNRI who run the Handle service.

I asked [1]:

We run an application that assigns handles to datasets to make them
persistently identifiable. We have a production system and a sandbox
system, and whereas the production system must register the handles, the
sandbox datasets are expected to not be persistent and therefore the
assigned handles are not expected to be persistent.

Are there any best practices for handle in a sandbox environment?
For example, assign the handle, but not register it? Use a template
handle that always resolves to a message "this is a sandbox dataset"?
Have strict procedures to update the handle to point to a "this used to
resolve to sandbox dataset" message?

Robert R Tupelo-Schneck answered [2]:

One system I have worked with assigns but does not register handles in its sandbox environment. In fact, the sandbox is periodically refreshed with recent production data, so that "sandbox handles" largely overlap with "production handles". This is probably the simplest arrangement, and if you do not need registered handles for your sandbox, I recommend it.

Any of your suggestions would work. The only real problem is if a sandbox handle somehow escapes into the wild such that people expect it to resolve. Probably that is unlikely as long as your sandbox environment makes it reasonably obvious that it is not production data.

It appears (as I more or less expected) that we should change our configuration.

Regards,

Ben

[1]: http://www.handle.net/mail-archive/handle-info/msg00686.html
[2]: http://www.handle.net/mail-archive/handle-info/msg00687.html

Ben Companjen schreef op 10-04-15 om 11:27:

[Philip Durbin]

Hi Ben,

For a DVN-specific answer, can you please email sup...@dataverse.org?

I know out of the box real handles aren't used in DVN 3.x. I believe the authority is set to "TEST".

Thanks,

Phil

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Philip Durbin
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