Frequently Asked Questions

Benefits of submitting your research to LMU’s IR

  • Makes research available outside of LMU, including to potential employers
  • Increased potential for your research to be cited by others
  • Work can be found through popular search engines such as Google and Bing
  • Permanent URL that will not change
  • Accessible from any computer at any location
  • Provides faculty a single location to aggregate and showcase research and publications

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How do I submit my work?

    Option 1:
  1. Go to digitalcommons.lmunet.edu
  2. Click 'Quick Submit' under 'Author's Corner' on the left side bar.
  3. Fill out Quick Submit Form and upload or email your submission. Theses and dissertations should have the signature page on front.
  4. Submit
    Option 2:
  1. Go to digitalcommons.lmunet.edu
  2. Click the link for My Account
  3. Click the link for Sign Up. Fill out the online form and click Create Account
  4. Click Collections-->Select appropriate School, College, or Division-->Select appropriate collection
  5. In the lower left corner, click Submit Research
  6. Fill out the electronic form and upload your submission. Theses and dissertations should have the signature page on front.
  7. Submit
    Option 3:
  1. Go to digitalcommons.lmunet.edu
  2. Click the link for My Account
  3. Click the link for Sign Up. Fill out the online form and click Create Account
  4. Click 'Submit Research' under 'Author's Corner' on the left side bar.
  5. Select appropriate collection
  6. Fill out the electronic form and upload your submission. Theses and dissertations should have the signature page on front.
  7. Submit

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I plan to publish my work. Can I still submit?

Yes, but if you plan to publish your work, you need to apply for an embargo. An embargo keeps anyone from downloading the submission while your work undergoes the publication process regardless of access type. When the embargo period has expired, your work will automatically be made available based on your access preference unless you request an extension. To request an extension, email LMUIR@lmunet.edu.

To apply for an embargo, find the Embargo Period section on the submission form and select the amount the amount of time you want the submission embargoed

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Access Options

You can provide access to your work in one of three ways: Open Access, Restricted Access, or Abstract/Link to work.

If you plan to publish, you should still select the embargo option regardless of what access type you choose.

  1. Open Access – Open access is the most beneficial option because it will allow more researchers to access and read your work. Anyone can access the abstract and download the submission online and on campus. If you are publishing, check with your publisher to see if they will allow your submission to be available through our IR as an open access work. To submit an open access work, select the document or degree type on the submission form. Please choose this option when possible.
  2. Restricted Access – Restricted access may be ideal if you have work that has already been published or is in contract, and your publisher will not allow your work to be uploaded to the repository as an open access submission. Off campus, students and faculty can access/download restricted submissions online by logging into the library's EZproxy. Anyone, including library community patrons, can access/download submissions by connecting to LMU's WIFI. The abstract will still be available for everyone. Please check with your publisher to see if your submission can be made available through our IR as a restricted work. To submit a restricted work, select the restricted option under document/degree type on the submission form.
  3. Abstract/Link to Work – This method is ideal if you have work that cannot be uploaded to the IR, but you still want to showcase your work. This method provides individuals a link to the entity responsible for distributing the content. To submit an abstract/link, fill the submission form out like you would for an open access submission then choose ‘Link out to file on remote site’ under ‘Upload Full Text’.

If you need to change access type for submitted documents, please email LMUIR@lmunet.edu with the email associated with your submission.

If you do not see the access options outlined above in the section you are submitting to, please email LMUIR@lmunet.edu.

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I don't have electronic versions of old working papers that I'd like to include in the repository. Is it okay to scan the printed page to a PDF file?

Yes--scanning printed pages is a great way to create PDF files for inclusion in the repository. There are two ways to scan a page: using OCR (Optical Character Recognition) or scanning the page as an image. Making OCR scans requires careful proofreading and loses the original formatting of the documents. Image scans cannot be searched. The best solution takes advantage of both of these methods. Many software applications allow for the OCR capture of image scans. When documents are scanned this way, users see the image scan but search the full-text of the document. This is the preferred method for scanning documents for the repository.

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When I copy and paste abstracts into the Submit form, some formatted text reverts to plain text. What's going on?

When copying abstracts from a word processing file or a PDF file, and pasting the text into the submission form, you are taking text from an environment that supports fonts and text style changes. Because the abstract is intended to be presented on the web, text styles must be specified using HTML codes.

If submitting an abstract in HTML format, please be sure to select the corresponding option on the submission form.

The following HTML tags are recognized by the system and may be used to format an abstract (use lowercase tags):

  • <p> - paragraph
  • <br> - line break
  • <strong> - strong/bold
  • <em> - italics/emphasis
  • <sub> - subscript
  • <sup> - superscript

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How do I include accents and special characters in the abstracts and titles?

The repository software supports the worldwide character set (Unicode, utf-8). Accents, symbols, and other special characters may be copied and pasted into the abstract or title field from a word processing file or typed in directly. Windows users may also use the Character Map to insert these characters. Macintosh users may use the Character Palette (available via Edit > Special Characters in the Finder).

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How do I revise a submission?

To revise a submission that has been posted to the repository, contact the repository administrator with the new version.

If the submission has been submitted, but not yet posted, you may revise it via your My Account page:

  1. Locate the article on your My Account page, and click the title.
  2. Click Revise Submission from the list of options in the left sidebar.
  3. Enter your changes in the Revise Submission form, and click Submit at the bottom of the page to submit your changes. (You only need to modify the portion of the form that corresponds to the changes you wish to make.)

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How can I submit a multi-part file, such as multiple chapters for a book?

Combine all the sections together as one Microsoft Word file or PDF file and submit that.

To make one PDF file from multiple files, open the first PDF file, then choose Document>Insert Pages from Acrobat's menus to insert the second file (indicate it should go after the last page of the first file), and repeat for all documents. The result will be one compound PDF file which may then be submitted.

If you feel that the one large PDF file might be too large for some people to download, we suggest that you submit the consolidated file as the full text of the article, and then upload the separate chapters or sections of the document as Associated Files. These files will appear on the web page alongside the complete document. For more information about uploading associated files, see "Can I post related files..." below.

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Can I post related files (sound clips, data sets, etc.) alongside the published article?

Yes. The bepress system refers to these supplementary items as Associated Files. You will be prompted to submit Associated Files when you upload your submissions. The name of the files you upload will appear on the web site along with your short description of it. Viewers must have the necessary software to open your files; that is not provided by the bepress system.

Please be sure that there are no permissions issues related to use of the associated material. Sometimes, especially with images, you must write a letter seeking permission to use the material before it can be posted.

Also note that where possible, items such as images, charts and tables that are referenced in the document (or otherwise an integral part of the document) should be included directly in the article itself and not posted just as associated files.

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Can I post a reprint from a journal?

It depends on what the journal allows, which is usually specified in their agreement with the author. If it would not violate copyright to post the reprint on your repository site, you're welcome to do so. Permissions for many publishers can be found at SHERPA RoMEO.

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A working paper in our repository site has been published in a slightly revised form in a journal. What should I do?

Many journals do not have any restrictions on working papers that preceded an article, especially if substantial revisions were made. You should check your author agreement with the journal to confirm that there is no problem with leaving the working paper on the site. The repository would constitute noncommercial use.

Assuming the working paper does remain on posted in the repository, it is a good idea to include the citation to the published article on the cover page of the repository working paper. Please contact the repository administrator to request this change.

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