Who are the Bodleian Libraries?
The Bodleian Libraries is the integrated library service of the University of Oxford. Established in 2000, it comprises nearly 40 libraries. Among these are major research libraries - including the Bodleian Library, which has been a library of legal deposit for almost 400 years - as well as libraries attached to faculties, departments and other institutions of the University. The combined collections of the Bodleian Libraries number more than 11 million printed items, and include extensive special collections and manuscripts and digital holdings.
How will you archive my website?
We will archive your website via the Archive-It service, which uses crawlers to collect copies of the files that compose your website. There should be no need for you, or others responsible for maintaining your website, to be involved.
Can I be certain that you are able to archive my website?
Some websites are more difficult to archive than others. There are a variety of reasons for this, but most relate to the capabilities of our current web archiving toolset. We don’t always know how easy it will be to archive your website until we try to do it. Examples of website design that can hamper our tools include Javascript-based navigation, Macromedia Flash and proprietary video formats or players. (Most embedded video can be archived using the web archiving toolset, but some formats like Microsoft Silverlight are difficult to archive). You can help to make your website "archive friendly" by ensuring that any robots.txt files do not block our crawler entirely or do not block stylesheet/image content that would prevent our crawler from capturing files that are necessary for the accurate display of your website.
Will there be any impact on my website's performance?
The Heritrix web crawlers used by our web archiving service provider, ‘Archive-It’, are set to very polite crawling settings and should not significantly impact your website. Only one request at a time is made to each server, and these requests are 1-5 seconds apart depending on the speed of the server's response. The crawlers have the user-agent name: Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; archive.org_bot; Archive-It; +http://archive-it.org/files/site-owners.html) and their IP range is 207.241.226.0/23 (207.241.226.0 - 207.241.226.255).
How often will my website be archived?
Our curators will assess how much and how frequently your website changes. Based on this information they will select a frequency at which to archive your website, which could range from weekly to annually. If your site is particularly active during a special period, the curator may schedule additional archiving to reflect this.
Is there a benefit to me as a website owner?
Having your website included in the Bodleian Libraries' Web Archive will create a historical record of your website, showing how it has changed over time.
How will archived versions of my website be used?
Your website will be included in a publicly accessible archive which is being created for research use. You can browse and search the archive at Bodleian Libraries' Web Archive.
Will users become confused between archived versions of my website and the live version?
We believe not. When a user accesses your archived website in the Bodleian Library Web Archive they will see clearly that they are viewing an archived copy of the website which was made on a specific day. Users of the Bodleian Library Web Archive will be alerted to the fact that information contained on the website may be out of date and will also have the opportunity to see other versions of the site archived at different times.
What do I need to do to ensure that my website is included?
You can nominate your website for inclusion in the Bodleian Libraries archive by completing our online nomination form. If we have already contacted you about archiving your website, all you need do is complete and submit the online licence form at the link provided to you. If you are not the sole holder of intellectual property rights (IPRs) in your website, please be sure to clear permissions with other contributors to your site before completing the licence form.
What are intellectual property rights?
Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs) are composed of a group of rights all relating to the protection of intellectual property. Examples of IPR include copyright, patent, trademark, design, and database right.
Who can I contact should I have further questions?
Please contact us at blwa@bodleian.ox.ac.uk . We will be glad to answer any questions you may have.