14 Post-publication tasks
Introduction
Now that the book is published, it’s time to ensure that readers can easily find it and that it remains a valuable resource. This chapter outlines the following post-publication tasks:
- organising MARC records
- listing in OER directories
- fulfilling legal deposit requirements
- managing maintenance and updates
- tracking usage
- archiving book files.
Organising MARC records
Creating MARC records is essential to ensure a book is discoverable in Library catalogues.
Monash University Library (MUL) has an internal process for creating MARC records and sharing them with union catalogues.
MUL books are listed in:
Listing a book in OER directories
MUL books are added to the following directories:
- Pressbooks Directory
- Open Textbook Library (books with an ND license are not listed under the rules of the Open Textbook Library)
- OER Commons
- Merlot.
Check each directory for its submission instructions.
To list a book in the Pressbooks Directory, select ‘Yes. I want this book to be listed in the Pressbooks directory’ in the book’s Sharing and Privacy settings.
Fulfilling legal deposit requirements
Australian legislation requires publishers to lodge their work with the National Library of Australia and the state or territory library where the publisher is based.
National edeposit (NED) is a service publishers can use to fulfil legal deposit requirements in Australia. NED is a collaboration between the National Library of Australia and state and territory libraries.
Victorian publishers that deposit electronic publications in NED meet their legal deposit requirements, as copies of files are transferred to the State Library of Victoria. Publishers from other states and territories may have additional obligations, so they should check their legal deposit obligations on the NED website.
Managing maintenance and updates
Open textbooks require regular maintenance to ensure they remain a valuable resource.
Maintenance tasks include:
- addressing and responding to reader feedback
- fixing minor errors (for example, typos)
- periodically running a link checker
- liaising with authors regarding content errors or pedagogical issues
- re-exporting the book files (for example, PDF, EPUB) that are available on the book’s homepage
- updating the version history if required.
Readers can report errors and accessibility issues via a book’s feedback form. Errors can be addressed immediately or handled during regular maintenance processes, depending on the nature of the problem. Simple mistakes, such as typos and broken links, can be corrected immediately. Content errors are referred to the authors.
Flexible publishing platforms like Pressbooks make updating or revising an open textbook possible. Updates can be managed by releasing a new version (increasing the version number by 1.0). Significant content revisions and additions may require a new edition. Meeting with authors annually is an opportunity to discuss any plans for updates or revisions and address any questions or concerns.
All MUL books include a version history page in the back matter.
- Maintenance edits (for example, corrections of typos, grammatical errors, and broken links) are not recorded in the version history.
- Minor improvements to content (for example, correcting factual errors, adding a sentence/paragraph, or removing content) are noted. This increases the version number by 0.1.
Tracking usage
Koko Analytics is a WordPress plugin that provides statistics for individual books and network pages over time. Because it is integrated with Pressbooks Enterprise networks, it does not need to be turned on like other plugins on the CAUL Collective’s Pressbooks network.
Koko Analytics is accessed from a book’s admin dashboard. You can view:
- total visitors and pageviews
- total visitors and pageviews for individual pages/chapters
- total visitors and page views for each referrer, and referrer URL.
Configure the Koko Analytics settings as follows, using the Settings function at the top right:
- exclude pageviews from administrator, editor, author, collaborator and subscriber user roles
- set ‘yes’ to use a cookie to determine unique visitors and pageviews
- change the data storage setting from 60 to 0 so that older data is not deleted.
Archiving book files
Each Library has its own approach to archiving a book’s files.
The Council of Australasian University Librarians recommends archiving exported book files on an institutional repository.
At MUL, we archive exported book files (PDF, EPUB, and XHTML) on a network drive. We have considered the risk of a book on the Pressbooks network becoming unrecoverable, but we believe this is an unlikely scenario. We have explored the possibility of archiving and curating all files associated with each book to allow for complete restoration, but this would involve managing hundreds of individual files per title. Given our staffing capacity, we are unable to support a preservation approach.
