Digital Archiving and Long-Term Preservation Policy

The Herald of the National Children's Medical Center is committed to preserving its published scholarly record and maintaining the long-term accessibility, integrity, authenticity, and retrievability of published articles and associated metadata.

Digital preservation is treated as a function distinct from ordinary website hosting and routine technical backup. The journal therefore seeks to combine operational backup, preservation of publication files and metadata, version control, and independent long-term preservation arrangements appropriate to its publishing infrastructure.

This policy should be read together with the journal’s Open Access Policy, Repository Policy, Copyright and Licensing Policy, and Corrections, Retractions and Post-Publication Updates Policy.

Scope of Preservation

The preservation framework covers, where technically and legally applicable:

  • published articles;
  • article metadata;
  • abstracts and keywords;
  • author and affiliation metadata;
  • DOI and other persistent identifier information;
  • issue and volume metadata;
  • final publication files, including PDF and/or HTML;
  • supplementary files that form part of the scholarly publication;
  • corrections;
  • retraction notices;
  • Expressions of Concern;
  • other formal post-publication notices;
  • licensing and copyright information necessary to interpret the published record.

Preservation of confidential submission files, reviewer reports, internal editorial correspondence, or sensitive participant-level research data is governed separately by the journal’s confidentiality, research ethics, and data-management requirements.

Preservation of the Version of Record

The journal seeks to preserve the Version of Record of each published article together with the metadata necessary to identify, cite, retrieve, and interpret that publication.

Preservation should maintain the relationship between an article and any subsequent:

  • correction;
  • retraction;
  • Expression of Concern;
  • replacement or updated version;
  • other formal notice affecting its publication status.

Post-publication changes should not silently erase the history of the scholarly record.

Electronic Backup

The journal maintains operational backup procedures intended to reduce the risk of data loss resulting from:

  • server failure;
  • software malfunction;
  • accidental deletion;
  • data corruption;
  • unauthorized alteration;
  • cybersecurity incidents;
  • infrastructure failure;
  • other technical disruptions.

Backups should, where practicable, be separated from the primary production environment and maintained in a manner that permits restoration of journal content and essential metadata.

Operational backups are periodically reviewed as part of the journal’s technical maintenance procedures.

Backup Is Not Long-Term Preservation

Routine server or database backups are important for disaster recovery but are not, by themselves, considered sufficient long-term scholarly preservation.

Long-term preservation requires arrangements designed to keep published content accessible and verifiable beyond the failure, migration, replacement, or discontinuation of the journal’s current website or publishing platform.

The journal therefore distinguishes between:

  1. operational backup and disaster recovery, which support restoration of the current system; and
  2. long-term digital preservation, which protects the scholarly record independently of the continued operation of the current platform.

Independent Long-Term Preservation

The journal seeks to maintain its published content in an appropriate independent long-term digital preservation service or recognized preservation infrastructure.

Where such a service has been formally activated and successful preservation has been verified, the journal will publicly identify the preservation service and, where available, provide verifiable information about its preservation status.

The journal will not claim participation in PKP Preservation Network, LOCKSS, CLOCKSS, Portico, PubMed Central, or another preservation network unless participation and preservation are actually active and verifiable.

DOAJ recommends continuous deposit of journal content in a recognized long-term digital archive and identifies archives listed in the Keepers Registry, Internet Archive, and PubMed Central as examples of appropriate preservation routes.

Keepers Registry and Preservation Verification

Where the journal uses a preservation service represented in the Keepers Registry, preservation status may be verified through that infrastructure.

The Keepers Registry, operated by the ISSN International Centre, monitors which preservation organizations are preserving continuing resources and helps identify journals that remain at risk of digital loss.

A preservation service should not be presented on the journal website as active merely because a plugin has been installed or a service has been selected in the journal platform. The journal should verify that actual deposits or preservation records have been successfully created.

OJS and Preservation Infrastructure

The journal is published through an electronic journal-management platform that supports structured article and issue metadata and digital publication workflows.

Platform-based publication supports preservation activities but does not replace an independent preservation arrangement.

Where an OJS-compatible preservation service or plugin is used, its status should be monitored to ensure that published content is actually being deposited and preserved.

Preservation During Platform Migration

When the journal moves to a new server, domain, publishing platform, OJS version, or technical provider, preservation of the scholarly record should be treated as a priority.

Migration procedures should protect:

  • published articles;
  • article URLs where reasonably possible;
  • DOI resolution;
  • bibliographic metadata;
  • issue and volume structure;
  • supplementary files;
  • copyright and license information;
  • post-publication notices.

Existing DOIs should continue to resolve to the appropriate publication or successor location.

Historical content should not be unnecessarily removed merely because the platform or website design changes.

Persistent Identifiers

Persistent identifiers contribute to the durable identification and retrieval of scholarly content.

Where a DOI has been assigned, the journal should maintain accurate DOI metadata and update destination URLs when the location of the article changes.

A change of server, website design, domain, or publishing platform should not result in the creation of a new DOI solely for the same Version of Record.

Metadata Preservation

Long-term preservation should include not only publication files but also sufficient metadata to identify and reconstruct the scholarly record.

Important metadata may include:

  • article title;
  • author names;
  • affiliations;
  • abstract;
  • keywords;
  • publication date;
  • journal title;
  • volume and issue;
  • DOI;
  • license;
  • article status;
  • links to corrections or retractions.

Metadata should remain internally consistent with the Version of Record.

File Integrity and Authenticity

Preserved files should accurately represent the published scholarly record.

The journal seeks to prevent unauthorized or undocumented alteration of archived publication files.

Where a material change to a published article is necessary, it should be managed through the journal’s formal post-publication procedures rather than by silently replacing the original publication without explanation.

Corrections, Retractions, and Version Control

Corrections, retraction notices, Expressions of Concern, and other post-publication updates form part of the scholarly record and should themselves be preserved.

A retracted article should normally remain identifiable as part of the publication record while being clearly marked and linked to its retraction notice.

Where a corrected or updated version is issued, the relationship between the original publication and the subsequent notice or version should remain transparent.

Detailed procedures are provided in the journal’s Corrections, Retractions and Post-Publication Updates Policy.

Repository Copies

Author self-archiving provides an additional route for dissemination and resilience but does not substitute for the journal’s own responsibility for preservation of the Version of Record.

Authors may deposit permitted versions of their articles in appropriate repositories in accordance with the journal’s Repository Policy.

Repository copies should link back to the Version of Record and should not obscure corrections, retractions, or other changes in article status.

Open Access and Preservation

The journal’s Open Access model supports broad access to published articles, but current accessibility alone does not guarantee long-term preservation.

The journal therefore treats:

  • Open Access as a policy governing access and reuse;
  • repository/self-archiving as a policy governing author deposit and dissemination; and
  • digital preservation as a policy governing survival and authenticity of the scholarly record over time.

These functions complement one another but are not interchangeable.

Continuity if the Journal Ceases Publication

The journal’s preservation strategy is intended to protect published scholarly content even if:

  • publication is suspended;
  • the journal ceases operation;
  • the owner or publisher changes;
  • the journal changes platform or technical provider;
  • the current website becomes unavailable.

Published scholarly content should, as far as reasonably possible, remain recoverable through established preservation and archival arrangements.

The Transparency Principles developed by COPE, DOAJ, OASPA, and WAME specifically call for journals to disclose a plan for electronic backup and long-term digital preservation in the event that the journal or publisher ceases operating.

Monitoring and Review

The journal periodically reviews its preservation arrangements to determine whether:

  • backups are being created as intended;
  • recovery procedures remain functional;
  • publication files and metadata remain complete;
  • DOI links remain operational;
  • preservation deposits are being completed where an external archive is used;
  • changes in publishing infrastructure require updated preservation procedures.

Where an external preservation service is discontinued or becomes unsuitable, the journal should seek an appropriate alternative.

Transparency of Preservation Status

The journal should publicly identify only those long-term preservation systems in which its content is actually being preserved or deposited successfully.

A logo, plugin installation, configuration setting, application, or planned participation should not be represented as completed preservation.

When the journal’s preservation infrastructure changes, the public policy should be updated accordingly.

Responsibilities

The Editor-in-Chief and editorial leadership retain oversight of the integrity and continuity of the scholarly record.

The publisher and technical support team, within their assigned responsibilities, support:

  • platform continuity;
  • electronic backup;
  • metadata integrity;
  • DOI maintenance;
  • migration;
  • technical recovery;
  • implementation and monitoring of preservation mechanisms.

Technical responsibility does not authorize alteration of the scholarly record without appropriate editorial oversight.

Policy Application

This policy applies to the journal’s published scholarly content and associated publication metadata.

The journal’s objective is to preserve a complete, authentic, traceable, accessible, and durable scholarly record, including appropriate relationships between original publications and subsequent corrections, retractions, Expressions of Concern, and other formal updates.

The preservation mechanisms publicly identified by the journal must correspond to the journal’s actual and verifiable preservation practice.


ISSN 2181-3353 (Online)