Internet Draft Norman Paskin
Document: draft-paskin-doi-uri-01.txt IDF
Expires: March 2003 Eamonn Neylon
Manifest Solutions
Tony Hammond
Elsevier Science
Sam Sun
CNRI
September 2002
The "doi" URI Scheme for Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
Status of this Memo
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Abstract
This document defines the "doi" Uniform Resource Identifier (URI)
scheme for Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs). The DOI system was
developed by the International DOI Foundation (http://www.doi.org),
an open membership-based organization founded to develop a
framework of infrastructure, policies and procedures to support the
identification needs of providers of intellectual property. DOI
identifiers are persistent across time and unique across network
space. The "doi" URI scheme allows a DOI to be referenced by a URI
for Internet applications.
The key words "MUST", "MAY", and "SHOULD" used in this document are
to be interpreted as described in [RFC2119]. Compliant software
MUST follow this specification.
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction..................................................2
2. The "doi" URI Scheme..........................................3
2.1 "doi" URI Syntax Definition...............................3
2.2 Reserved and Excluded Characters under "doi" scheme.......3
2.3 Examples of "doi" URIs....................................4
3. Security Considerations.......................................4
4. Further Information...........................................4
5. Acknowledgements..............................................5
References.......................................................5
Author's Addresses...............................................5
1. Introduction
DOI stands for Digital Object Identifier [DOI], which is a managed
identifier of an intellectual property entity across a common
business sector. The DOI identifier enables the network retrieval
of a set of related services. The DOI identifier is not constrained
to a network application context. DOI identifiers have been widely
deployed by the publishing industry. This specification defines the
"doi" URI scheme for DOI identifiers referenced within Internet
applications.
DOI identifiers are globally unique across the URI namespace and
persistent over time. A DOI identifier can "be used as a reference
to a resource well beyond the lifetime of the resource it
identifies or of any naming authority involved in the assignment of
its name" [RFC1737]. A "doi" URI has associated data related to the
entity that the DOI identifies.
The "doi" URI scheme defines a standard way to represent a DOI
identifier under URI namespace. A "doi" URI may serve as a pure
name or may be de-referenced by a network service. When used as a
name, a "doi"-based URI is independent of any service protocol and
accordingly, is not network de-referenceable. When used within a
network reference (e.g. within a hyperlink), a DOI identifier does
not have a native resolution system. It is instead transported
using a network protocol to a specific service (e.g. the Handle
System [HS], or a HTTP request to a proxy). Such service requests
may also include supplemental query components specific to that
service.
DOIs must be registered through an appointed registration agency.
The International DOI Foundation, which is the maintenance agency
for the DOI, is responsible for the appointment of registration
agencies.
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The "doi" URI scheme defined in this document conforms to the
generic URI syntax as specified in RFC2396 [RFC2396]. UTF-8 [UTF-8]
encoding is mandated for any DOI transmitted between "doi" user
agent and any DOI service. Syntax for DOI identifier within the
"doi" scheme is defined in accordance with ANSI/NISO Z39.84
[NISO39.84] standard for Digital Object Identifier Syntax.
2. The "doi" URI Scheme
2.1 "doi" URI Syntax Definition
doi = scheme ":" doi-identifier
scheme = "doi"
doi-identifier = prefix "/" suffix
prefix = chars-no-slash
suffix = chars
chars-no-slash = 1*(%x00-2E / %x30-FF)
; any character of the UCS [ISO10646] of
; U+00A0 and beyond, except the '/'
; character.
chars = 1*(%x00-FF)
; any character of the UCS [ISO10646] of
; U+00A0 and beyond.
The prefix is always assigned to a registrant by a registration
agency. The registrant is responsible for the creation of a valid
suffix. The prefix corresponds to the creator naming authority at
the time of construction only. The administration of any particular
DOI may be transferred to another party at any time, so the prefix
does not denote the administrative ownership of a particular DOI.
NISO Z39.84 is the authoritative reference that specifies the rules
for constructing a DOI. Once constructed, a DOI is to be
interpreted as an opaque identifier. The minimum constraints for
validation of a DOI string are that the prefix and suffix
components be non-empty.
2.2 Reserved and Excluded Characters under "doi" scheme
The "doi" syntax abide by the same set of excluded US-ASCII
characters as specified in RFC2396. It further reserves the
following characters that are used in common service requests that
may be used to append information to a DOI in certain circumstances
(e.g. adding parameters resolution instructions to a HTTP URL
encoded service request):
reserved = "?" | "&" | "=" | "#"
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If the data for a "doi-identifier" component would conflict with
the reserved purpose, then the conflicting data must be escaped
before forming the URI. Details of the escape encoding can be found
in RFC2396, section 2.4.
2.3 Examples of "doi" URIs
Some examples of syntactically valid "doi" URIs are given below:
(a) doi:alpha-beta/182.342-24
where "alpha-beta" is the prefix and "182.342-24" is the suffix.
(b) doi:10.abc/ab/cd/ef
where "10.abc" is the prefix and "ab/cd/ef" is the suffix.
(c) doi:1.23/2002/january/21/4690
where "1.23" is the prefix and "january/21/4690" is the suffix.
(d) <element xmlns="doi:1.23/2002/january/21/4690">
The acquisition of DOI services can be achieved through the use
other protocols as a proxy to transfer to dedicated networked
service components.
Examples of such use are given below:
(e) http://my.resolver.inc/resolve?id=doi%3Aalpha-beta%2Fmsws
is an OpenURL [OPENURL] service request for "doi:alpha-beta/msws".
(f) rtsp://service.net/query?doi%3A10.abc%2Fab%2Fcd%2Fef
is a service request for "doi:10.abc/ab/cd/ef".
3. Security Considerations
The "doi" URI scheme is subject to the same security implications
as the general URI scheme described in [RFC 2396].
When DOI values are used in resolution services, retrieval of DOI
data will be subject to the security considerations of the
underlying protocol used to access the DOI service.
4. Further Information
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The "doi" URI Scheme October 2002
The authors gratefully acknowledge the contributions of Larry
Lannom and Jason Petrone, of the Corporation for National Research
Initiatives, to this specification.
5. Acknowledgements
The authors gratefully acknowledge the contributions of Larry
Lannom and Jason Petrone, of the Corporation for National Research
Initiatives, to this specification.
References
[DOI] The DOI System http://www.doi.org/
[HS] The Handle System http://www.handle.net/
[RFC2396] Berners-Lee, T., R. Fielding and L. Manister, "Uniform
Resource Identifiers (URI): Generic Syntax", August 1998.
[HTTP] R. Fielding, J. Gettys, J. Mogul, H. Frystyk, T. Berners-
Lee, "Hypertext Transfer Protocol - HTTP/1.1", January, 1997.
[RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key Words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", March 1997.
[NISO39.84] ANSI/NISO Z39.84-2000 Syntax for Digital Object
Identifier.
[OPENURL] OpenURL specification. http://www.sfxit.com/OpenURL
[ISO10646] Information Technology - Universal Multiple-Octet Coded
Character Set (UCS) - Part 1: Architecture and Basic Multilingual
Plane", ISO/IEC 10646-1:2000.
[UTF-8] Yergeau, Francois, "UTF-8, A Transformation Format for
Unicode and ISO10646", October 1996.
[RFC1737] K. Sollins and L. Masinter "Functional Requirements for
Uniform Resource Names", December 1994.
Author's Addresses
Norman Paskin
The International DOI Foundation
PO Box 233, Kidlington
Oxford, OX5 1XU, UK
n.paskin@doi.org
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Eamonn Neylon
Manifest Solutions
John Eccles House, Oxford Science Park
Oxford, OX4 4GP, UK
eneylon@manifestsolutions.com
Tony Hammond
Elsevier Science Ltd
84 Theobald's Road
London WC1X 8RR, UK
t.hammond@elsevier.com
Sam Sun
Corporation for National Research Initiatives
1805 Preston White Dr., Suite 100
Reston, VA 20191, USA
ssun@cnri.reston.va.us
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