Some Exciting OpenAlex Updates

[Kyle Demes]

Hello OpenAlex Users,

As we approach the end of 2024, we have a few more exciting updates and opportunities for collaboration to share with you.

Guts code rewrite

You may have noticed we haven't shipped many new features in the last two months. That's because the development team is rolling up their sleeves on a significant rewrite to our guts code. The goal: get more data from more sources faster and with fewer bugs and lead the way for some bigger projects we're planning in 2025 (user curation, grants, and more). This rewrite should be finished early in 2025 and we'll be expanding to include some new sources shortly after that-- stay tuned!

OpenAlex Advisory Board Voting

Nominations have now closed for the first OpenAlex Advisory Board. We were thrilled to see so many strong nominations from the diverse OpenAlex user communities and now, we're looking to our communities to help select the Board members. Any OpenAlex user/stakeholder can vote to endorse up to 11 candidates. Please do so by December 15th using this form. We will confirm appointments shortly afterwards and announce the new Advisory Board early in 2025.

New UI developer

Thanks to a new grant from the Navigation Fund (announcement link), we're excited to welcome a new Senior Frontend Developer to the OpenAlex team starting Dec 2nd. Soon, someone will be waking up every trying to figure out how to make insights from OpenAlex even more accessible. We've synthesized the feedback we've received from users so far to get the work started, but if you have additional insights on the User Interface you'd like to share or want to be a development partner on the next gen OpenAlex UI, let us know using this form. 

Seeking collaborations on open funding metadata

Users from all sectors around the world seem to agree on the need for more open metadata on research awards and their connections to research outputs. After a few successful pilot projects with funders this year, we're putting together a pitch to scale this work globally and are looking for ~30-50 funders of all shapes and sizes to collaborate with. If you're a funder who is interested in being part of this work, let us know using this form. To be clear, we're not looking for funding, but to collaborate with funding organizations.

Snapshot pro user for webinar?

We've received a growing number of requests for support and resources for users of the OpenAlex data snapshot. So that's what we'll do. We're planning a webinar for Jan 2025 on the topic with our CTO Casey Meyer and wondered if any of our users would be willing to contribute to this webinar? If you have some tips to share with other users on how you use the snapshot, let me know! If you're someone excitedly waiting for this webinar, let me know if you have specific things you're hoping to see covered.

That's it for now, but please keep the feedback coming: sup...@openalex.org 

-kyle