Simplified Preprint Submission to PCI from HAL

In our continuous efforts to streamline the process for researchers, we are excited to announce a significant development: the integration of PCI with the open repository HAL , resulting in 2 very useful features for researchers:

• a straightforward pathway to submit their preprints to PCI directly from HAL
• the display of the PCI recommendation in HAL

 This collaboration marks a new step towards open and accessible scientific communication.

Seamless Submission Process through HAL

When depositing a document on HAL, authors can now choose to submit it to the PCI of their choice for peer review and recommendation. This process is triggered at the end of the HAL deposit form, provided two conditions are met: the selected document type is “Preprint/Prepublication”, and a full-text file is deposited. Selecting the appropriate thematic PCI from a drop-down list completes the pre-submission process. The authors then receive a link to complete their submission on the corresponding PCI website.

Screenshot of the HAL deposit form

We encourage researchers to take advantage of this streamlined process

Display of the PCI Recommendation in HAL

Following a successful review, PCI not only recommends the preprint but also publishes the reviewers’ comments, editorial decisions, and authors’ responses on the corresponding thematic PCI website. This recommendation is a significant scientific contribution in itself and can be cited independently. When the recommendation is published, an automatic banner is now displayed on the HAL preprint record, indicating that this preprint has been peer-reviewed and recommended by a PCI. This banner provides the hyperlink to the recommendation and evaluation process on the corresponding PCI website, thus creating full interoperability between the two platforms.

See for instance the banner in HAL for the following preprint recommended by PCI Mathematical and Computational Biology:
https://hal.science/hal-04013152v3

COAR-notify initiative and FNSO supports

This interoperability between PCI and HAL has been funded by the French National Fund for Open Science (FNSO) and by the Confederation of Open Access Repositories (COAR). It is part of the international COAR Notify initiative launched by COAR to define protocols and open standards in order to promote the interoperability layer of open repositories (like HAL) and preprint servers to various peer-reviewing services (like PCI).

It is based on the implementation of the COAR Notify protocol, which uses established W3C standards, Linked Data Notifications, and Activity Streams 2.0, to exchange standardized messages between a repository and a pre-publication evaluation service. The exchanges between HAL and PCI, represent a use case for the implementation of this protocol.

Beyond simplifying and streamlining the processes for researchers, the implementation in PCI of the COAR-notify protocol also paves the way for PCI to engage in interoperability with other open repositories and preprint servers.