Help updating metadata

Here are some common questions (and answers) about updating and maintaining your metadata records.

My content has moved, how do I update my URLs?

You can update your URLs by re-registering your content with the new URLs included, or send us a tab-separated list of DOIs and URLs and we’ll update them for you. If you are providing a tab-separate list, we can usually process your request within 24 hours. If you need your URLs updated on a specific day or have a large number of URLs to update (over 100,000) please to coordinate the update schedule with Support to avoid delays. We can provide a list of your existing DOIs and URLs if needed.

How do I tell you about my title change?

If you need to correct a journal, book, or conference proceeding title, send us the changes and we’ll update our records. If you need to change an article, paper, or chapter title, you must update your metadata with the changes.

Do I need to create a new DOI if I’ve missed something or provided incorrect metadata?

No, you can always update your metadata to make corrections or to provide missing data.

How do I update my metadata?

Re-submit your metadata record with the updates included. Be sure to supply the correct DOI in your submission to ensure we update the appropriate record. You may update your metadata records as often as needed at no additional fee.

Before you update:

• Note that the value included in the <timestamp> element must be incremented each time a DOI is updated.
• When making an update you must supply all the bibliographic metadata for record being updated, not just the fields that need to be changed. During the update process we overwrite the existing metadata with the new information you submit, and will insert null values for any fields not supplied in the update. This means, for example, that if you’ve supplied an online publication date in your initial deposit, you’ll need to include that date in subsequent deposits if you wish to retain it.

Some pieces of metadata may be added or updated independently using a resource-only deposit. These includes funding, license, Crossmark, relationship, and citation list metadata. See our technical documentation for details.

Can I delete records and/or DOIs?

No. DOIs are truly persistent. If you find yourself in a bind, review this topic in our technical documentation then contact us with the details of your problem.

More questions? Review other FAQs or contact our support team.