University of Houston Libraries

By default, works deposited in UHIR are openly and freely accessible via the World Wide Web, supporting UHIR’s mission to distribute, disseminate, promote, and facilitate the use of research and scholarship produced at the University of Houston.

However, depositors may impose access restrictions on a work or individual file during the deposit process, based on specific needs or requirements. UHIR offers the following levels of access restrictions:

• Level 1: Open Access
  The work is openly accessible to anyone with internet access.
• Level 2: Lease
  Access to the work is restricted until a specific date, after which it becomes publicly available. This level is commonly used to protect intellectual property or to provide temporary access for a select group. It is not intended to fulfill publisher requirements.
• Level 3: Embargo
  Access is delayed until the embargo period expires. The content will remain restricted until a specific date and will only be made publicly accessible after that period.
• Level 4: Administrator Access
  The work is accessible only to UHIR administrators.

Depositors are encouraged to select the least restrictive access level possible to maximize the reach and impact of their work. For assistance or additional information, refer to the Access and Use Guidelines.

By default, all works deposited in UHIR are openly accessible to anyone with an internet connection. Depositors may choose to apply access restrictions to their work (see the Access Restriction), but we strongly encourage minimizing such restrictions to maximize accessibility and impact.

Items are made available online in at least the original format in which they were deposited. When feasible and easily automated, proprietary formats (see the Digital Preservation Guidelines) may be converted to formats compatible with freely available software to enhance accessibility.

Additionally, some items may be converted to more preservable formats to ensure long-term usability, while others will remain available only in their original format. For more details on preservation support, refer to the UHIR Digital Preservation Guidelines. If you encounter any issues with accessing a file, please contact the UHIR Administrator (cougarroar@uh.edu).

All works deposited in UHIR are protected by copyright unless explicitly stated otherwise. The copyright owner is typically indicated in the metadata accompanying the work. If no copyright owner is specified and the item is not in the public domain, it should be assumed that the work is under copyright, with the author(s) or publisher likely holding the rights.

Users may reuse copyrighted works under the Copyright and Fair Use For Reserves doctrine. Still, they are responsible for assessing whether their use qualifies as fair use or obtaining any necessary permissions for further publication or distribution.

Some works in UHIR may be in the public domain or made available under a Creative Commons license, explicitly defining permissible uses. Such information will be included in the metadata and/or stated on the item itself.

For more details, refer to the UHIR Copyright and Intellectual Property Guidelines.

A core mission of UHIR is to provide broad access to the research and scholarship produced at the University of Houston, ensuring it receives the widest possible recognition. To achieve this goal, UHIR employs multiple dissemination strategies, including:

• Facilitating the indexing of metadata and items by major search engines.
• Assigning persistent Handle identifiers to ensure reliable citation and discovery of content.
• Encouraging depositors to include their ORCID, linking their work to their research profiles.

UHIR remains dedicated to exploring and adopting new methods to enhance the dissemination and visibility of its content.

Each Collection of works must meet the following criteria:

• Part of a Community: Every Collection must belong to a designated Community.
• Digital Format: Collections must accept digitally formatted works. Print materials may sometimes be digitized for inclusion. Contact the UHIR Administrator (cougarroar@uh.edu) for guidance.
• Metadata Definition: Define the required and optional metadata fields for the Collection. For more details, refer to the Metadata Guidelines.
• Submission Workflow: Establish the workflow for submissions to the Collection if needed.
• Additional Policies: Create Collection-specific policies as needed, ensuring they align with UH Institutional Repository Submission Instructions.
• Reporting: Provide a brief report on your Collection upon request from UHIR, focusing on usability and discoverability. 

By default, Collections do not impose access restrictions on their work, as UHIR is committed to providing open access to the digital scholarship of the University of Houston. In exceptional cases, access restrictions may apply to individual works or an entire Collection. These restrictions must be defined during the Collection's creation process.

For more details on access restriction options, refer to the Access and Use Guidelines.

The UHIR ACCEPTS digital content reflecting the scholarly, educational, and administrative output of the university from faculty, students, staff, and campus units, including:

1. Pre-/post-prints, and/or previously published materials (e.g., books, journal articles, music scores, poetry, fiction and creative non-fiction, art, music and dance recordings).
2. Unpublished works (e.g., technical reports, white papers, research posters, symposia proceedings, capstone projects, or other creative work).
3. Electronic theses, dissertations, and capstone projects.
4. Learning objects, including syllabi, instructional materials, and primary sources organized for teaching purposes.
5. Electronic administrative records produced by university units to document actions and/or decisions.
6. Student organization digital objects, including rosters, meeting minutes, and event publicity materials.

The UHIR CAN NOT accept:

1. Works to which the author does not own the copyright.
2. Works that infringe upon the copyright of others.
3. Works that contain confidential or sensitive information.

UHIR adheres to the directives on copyright and intellectual property outlined in the UH System Board of Regents Policies, Section III – Academic and Student Success, 21 Academic Affairs. The management of digital rights for repository materials will evolve in alignment with University of Houston policies and legal requirements. For detailed guidelines, refer to the Copyright and Intellectual Property Guidelines.

By default, all materials in UHIR are accessible worldwide. However, restrictions may be applied when necessary. For more information, see the Access and Use Guidelines. 

UHIR accepts works in any digital format; however, submission in a recommended file format is strongly encouraged. These recommended formats are considered relatively stable and are better suited for long-term preservation. For further details, please refer to the Digital Preservation Guidelines.

Metadata is descriptive information about an object, such as the details recorded for a book in a library catalog. UHIR defines a baseline set of metadata fields for all works deposited. Utilizing the required metadata elements ensures enhanced user access to archived works and supports ongoing management of access rights and preservation activities.

For more information on metadata requirements and recommendations, please refer to the Metadata Guidelines.

UHIR utilizes the DSpace software, which operates on a straightforward hierarchical structure of Communities and Collections. Communities contain Collections, and Collections house digital items. Roles are associated with this hierarchy to manage the repository effectively:

• UHIR Administrator (cougarroar@uh.edu)
• Community Administrator
• Collection/Subcollection Administrator
• Submitter
• Reader

For further information regarding the management of community, collection, and item, please refer to the DSpace Wiki.

Faculty, staff, and students retain their copyright while granting non-exclusive rights to the University of Houston (UH) and the Texas Digital Library (TDL) to copy, display, perform, distribute, and publish their work, in compliance with copyright law and any applicable license agreements.

The UH Libraries are responsible for managing these non-exclusive rights. Additionally, as part of the UH or TDL repository efforts, copyright owners grant the right to migrate their work to different formats as needed for preservation and usability.

If an electronic thesis or dissertation (ETD) has a pending patent, the author may request an embargo on display and distribution rights through the UHIR. Coordination with the committee chair and ETD coordinators is required for embargo approval. For more information about embargoes, please refer to the UH Graduate School.

Submitters are required to warrant the following when depositing work in UHIR:

• They are the copyright owner of the work or have permission from the copyright owner(s) to submit it.
• The work does not infringe any copyright, patent, trade secrets, or privacy rights, and does not contain libelous material.
• The work is free from all exclusive claims and has not been sold, mortgaged, or otherwise disposed of.

If any work does not meet these warranties, submitters should contact Xiao Zeng (xzeng4@central.uh.edu), Open Publishing Librarian, for alternative licensing options.

Important Note: Any copyright violations are the responsibility of the authors/depositors. If UHIR receives proof of a copyright violation, the relevant item will be removed immediately.

A non-exclusive license is a type of license where the copyright holder (the person or entity that owns the rights to a creative work) grants permission for others to use or reproduce the work without transferring ownership. This means that the copyright holder RETAINS the rights to the work and can continue to use it and license it to others. To complete the deposit, the license must be signed as the final step.

The details of the Non-exclusive Distribution License:

I grant the Texas Digital Library (hereafter called "TDL"), the University of Houston (hereafter called "Institution"), and my academic department (hereafter called "Department") the non-exclusive rights to copy, display, perform, distribute and publish the content I submit to this repository (hereafter called "Work") and to make the Work available in any format in perpetuity as part of a TDL, Institution or Department repository communication or distribution effort.

I understand that once the Work is submitted, a bibliographic citation to the Work can remain visible in perpetuity, even if the Work is updated or removed.

I understand that the Work's copyright owner(s) will continue to own copyright outside these non-exclusive granted rights.

I warrant that:

1. I am the copyright owner of the Work, or
2. I am one of the copyright owners and have permission from the other owners to submit the Work, or
3. My Institution or Department is the copyright owner and I have permission to submit the Work, or
4. Another party is the copyright owner and I have permission to submit the Work.

Based on this, I further warrant to my knowledge:

1. The Work does not infringe any copyright, patent, or trade secrets of any third party,
2. The Work does not contain any libelous matter, nor invade the privacy of any person or third party, and
3. That no right in the Work has been sold, mortgaged, or otherwise disposed of, and is free from all claims.

I agree to hold TDL, Institution, Department, and their agents harmless for any liability arising from any breach of the above warranties or any claim of intellectual property infringement arising from the exercise of these non-exclusive granted rights.

UHIR is committed to the responsible and sustainable management of submitted works. The Texas Digital Library (TDL) hosts UHIR within a secure, professionally managed environment, utilizing TDL's infrastructure and systems, which are aligned with best practices for digital preservation. Regular and automatic backups are maintained for a minimum of one year, ensuring the long-term accessibility of deposited works. For detailed information on security protocols and backup practices, please refer to the TDL Systems and Security Information Wiki.

UHIR’s long-term preservation strategies are guided by the Open Archival Information System (OAIS) Reference Model (ISO 14721:2012), which ensures a systematic approach to digital preservation. These strategies are implemented through TDL's systems, which adhere to OAIS principles, providing a robust and scalable framework for preservation.

In addition to these technical practices, UHIR’s preservation efforts are fully aligned with the University of Houston’s Digital Preservation Policy, which supports the mission of UH Libraries and underscores our commitment to preserving digital assets. This policy directs the preservation of both digitized and born-digital resources, ensuring they are systematically managed, stored, and made accessible over time. UHIR follows this policy to maintain consistency with broader university-wide standards and ensures long-term access to the intellectual and cultural materials in its collections.

As part of the University of Houston Libraries, UHIR encompasses the following content types for digital preservation:

• Digital versions of resources owned and reformatted by UH Libraries and that fall under the parameters of UH Libraries’ UH Libraries’ Digital Collection Development Policy.
• Unique born-digital resources that are part of UH Libraries’ archival/manuscript collections and which are unlikely to be preserved anywhere else.
• Digitized master files of extremely high-risk audiovisual content, representing a significant financial and institutional investment.
• Any other content acquired or digitized by UH Libraries that falls under the parameters of UH Libraries’ Digital Collection Development Policy.

Content acquired exclusively by repositories that are governed by partner organizations, including Texas Digital Library, will be deferred to those organizations for ongoing preservation and/or management. This content includes electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs). The preservation and retention policy will be reviewed by the end of each calendar year to ensure timely updates as technology and experience mature, or more often if the need arises.

UHIR accepts work in any digital format; however, submission in the file format listed below is strongly encouraged. The formats listed below are considered relatively stable and therefore facilitate long-term preservation efforts.

These formats exhibit all or many of the following characteristics:

• Open documentation
• Support across a range of software platforms
• Wide adoption; no compression (or lossless compression)
• No embedded files or embedded programs/scripts
• Non-proprietary format.

File Size:

• File uploads greater than 50 MB must be pre-approved by UH Libraries staff since large uploads require a mediated deposit process.
• Projects (including those for individuals, classes, departments, and research centers) are subject to a 2 GB maximum limit.

Recommended File Formats:

Textual Formats

• Acrobat Adobe PDF — .pdf
• Comma Separated Values — .csv
• Open Office Formats — .odt, .ods, .odp
• Plain Text (US-ASCII, UTF-8) — .txt
• XML — .xml

Image/Graphic Formats

• JPEG — .jpg
• JPEG2000 — .jp2
• PNG — .png
• GIF — .gif
• TIFF — .tif, .tiff

Audio Formats

• AIFF — .aif, .aiff
• WAVE — .wav

Video Formats

• AVI (uncompressed) — .avi
• WebM — .webm
• QuickTime — .mov
• Video MP4 — .mp4

If the format is not listed above, please refer to the DSpace Bitstream Format to verify whether DSpace supports the submission of that file format.

For non-recommended formats, derivative files in more stable formats may be created. Whenever possible, both the original file and its derivative will be preserved, along with their associated descriptive and administrative metadata. Users are encouraged to maintain their archival master files in addition to the access copies, potentially storing them in separate locations outside of UHIR.

UHIR employs a multi-faceted strategy to ensure the long-term access and usability of submitted works and their associated metadata. Key elements include:

• Persistent Identifiers: All works submitted to UHIR are assigned a persistent URL to ensure reliable access and citation, even as systems and technologies evolve.
• Secure Backup: Regular backups to ensure data integrity and availability.
• Storage Media Refreshment: Periodic updating of storage media to prevent data degradation.
• File Format Migration: Conversion of files into more stable or standard formats during submission or preservation as needed.

At this time, UHIR guarantees the preservation of the bitstream (the binary form of the data). When resources permit, efforts will also be made to maintain as much of the original file’s functionality, “look and feel,” as possible, with priority given to works submitted in a File Format Recommendations.