New ORCID Functionality

As part of our ongoing partnership with ORCID, we have updated the Hub’s connection to ORCID. Previously, researchers could link their ORCID iD to their Local Contexts account. With these updates, researchers can now also connect their Local Contexts account to their ORCID record as an external ID.

To utilize this update:

• Researcher accounts who previously connected their ORCID will need to re-establish this connection. To do so, go to your researcher account settings in the Hub and click “Reconnect your ORCID iD.”
• Researcher accounts who had not previously connected their ORCID can go to their researcher account settings and click “Connect your ORCID iD.”
• New researcher accounts can connect their ORCID record during registration.

The Local Contexts Hub-ORCID connection will continue to be expanded. If you are an ORCID user, we would appreciate hearing from you with what you would like to see as part of this connection.

Project Updates

Project Contributors

Based on your feedback, we have updated the contributors section within Hub Projects with the options to add individual users and to specify contributor roles.

When adding contributors, you can now search by name or email. If the email is already associated with a Hub profile or account, that profile or account can be selected. If the email is not associated with the Hub, you can add the person’s name and email along with their role as an external contributor. 

Emails will not be shown publicly. Users logged into the Hub can contact individuals with the button on the Project page. Their email will not be shown unless the contributor chooses to respond.

Additionally, you can now specify contributor roles for researcher accounts, Hub profiles, and external contributors. This is to add more specificity to individuals who are added as Project contributors. When adding an individual as a contributor on a Project, you have the option to select that person’s role, or write your own.

For existing Projects with contributors:

• All individual contributors on existing Projects will be designated as an “Additional Contact.” This can be updated by editing the Project.
• If any individuals were added as an external contributor who have since joined the Hub, their Hub profile will be added to the Project.

The added roles will also appear in v2 of the API as additional information for contributors.

External ID Types

To accommodate different types of IDs that may be associated with a Project, we have expanded the options for the external ID field within Projects.

In addition to Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs), Globally Unique Identifiers (GUIDs), award IDs, and provider’s IDs, you can now also add Archival Resource Keys (ARKs) or input your own. You can also add multiple IDs of the same type.

If a selected ID type has a set pattern (such as a DOI), then the ID added will need to match that pattern.

The expanded options for external IDs will also appear in v2 of the API, though the old fields that were previously used here will remain. We will reach out to API users in the coming months with updates on these fields.

Hub Tutorial Videos

In addition to the continued development of the Hub, the Local Contexts team has published a series of Hub tutorial videos. These videos introduce Local Contexts and the Hub and walk through many of the processes and activities to join and use the Hub. See the playlist of the videos on our YouTube channel.

---