This viewpoint is not intended as a part of the reference model. However, it appeared that mechanisms like persistent identification and federated authentication are important components of todays data infrastructures, but are neither part of the enterprise viewpoint, the information viewpoint or the computational viewpoint. These systems merely overcome the fact that users and resources of data infrastructures exist in different and multiple virtual, physical and organisational locations. As such, they need to be described by the engineering viewpoint. The current reference model does not yet cover this viewpoint. However, as these mechanisms are very typical for data infrastructures in social sciences and the humanities, we use this page to identify them as part of the (to be developed) engineering viewpoint.
Common mechanisms in data infrastructures that deal with distributed interactions are (a.o.):
Persistent Identification. Resources within a data infrastructure change their physical and organisational location for different reasons. Data infrastructures in social sciences and humanities acknowledge the need for persistent identification and location of resources by means of persistent identifier mechanisms. These mechanisms provide systems for (a) globally unique identification of resources and (b) registration of the resources current locations and (c) automatic redirection to a resource location using its unique identifier.
Metadata Aggregation. Resources are managed by different systems, owned by different organisations from different countries. The mechanism of metadata aggregation typically provide systems for (a) describing metadata in standardised formats, (b) systems for harvesting the metadata from different locations, (c) systems for converting the harvested metadata to a common format and (d) systems that index the metadata and allow users to search and browse the metadata.
Federated Authentication. It is difficult for services to determine the authenticity of a user, merely by its credentials. Federated authentication is a mechanism that delegated the authentication of a user to its home organisation (and trusts this organisation for reliable authentication).
Single Sign On. Resources are hosted by different systems that require authentication of its users. The usage of multiple resources requires authentication with each of the systems that hosts a relevant resource. Single Sign On is a mechanisms that allows different systems to share the same authentication of a user.