Retrievo

Content aggregation and federated search

Single point of access to all information assets in your organisation

Retrievo

Content aggregation and federated search

Retrievo is a software capable of collecting and providing access to heterogeneous information assets from various different sources of information existing in an organisation. For example, Retrievo can be used to simultaneously search a library catalogue, a document management system and the institution’s website through a unique and uniform search interface.

Retrievo is not intended to replace existing information systems, but rather to provide a unique and privileged access point to information that is stored in different silos within an organisation.

After discovering information in Retrievo, the user will be redirected to the system that contains the original information in order to view it in context and in a complete way.

Ideal for creating networks of information sources

Retrievo is perfectly suited for the creation of multifaceted networks of information sources, scaling from local to international levels. This versatile platform excels in curating and integrating diverse information, fostering enriched informational ecosystems.

Locally, Retrievo can amalgamate cultural and heritage assets from a single municipality, creating a centralized digital repository that celebrates and preserves local history and culture. This unified platform simplifies access to vital local resources, thereby enhancing community engagement and cultural continuity.

At national or international levels, Retrievo transcends borders, providing a dynamic portal to information aggregated from a multitude of organizations. Its sophisticated design allows it to harmonize diverse data types such as reports, documents, and multimedia objects into a cohesive and intuitive user experience. This fosters global collaboration and shared knowledge, promoting cross-cultural understanding and interconnected research.

Advantages

01. Simple, attractive and intuitive

The entire graphical interface of Retrievo looks simple and intuitive. It can be completely configured to meet your institution’s graphical identity. Search options include basic search, full-text search, faceted search and advanced search.

02. Increase your institution’s visibility

In addition to consolidating information from multiple systems, Retrievo is able to validate it, clean it and enhance it to provide a better experience to the user. Retrievo can also provide the consolidated information to external services that will add value via a new set of enhanced services, e.g. statistics, specialized portals, advanced analytics, etc.

03. Fast as a blink of an eye

The large number of records managed by Retrievo that result from a constant aggregation of the new information forced us to come up with innovative and scalable solutions. Aggregations are now more efficient than ever as they allow the aggregation of information in parallel and provide faster and more accurate search results due to the new search engine adopted.

04. All your information assets under control

Retrievo provides a wide set of statistics and reports that reflect the operating status of the system. It allows each source of information to be monitored providing statistics such as number of records per system, most accessed records, montly growth, aggregation reports, access statistics, among others. The statistics system is configurable and can responde more easily to the needs of those who manage software.

05. Quality of information

To ensure the quality of the information, Retrievo has a compliance check engine that will validate the information collected according to stablished criteria. The criteria are completely configurable by the system administrator and adaptable to any organizational requirement or context. Additionally, the system can be configured to “clean” the collected information and even enhance it, producing results with higher quality that are more uniform across the board.

06. Make heterogeneous systems more manageable

Retrievo is compatible with several standardised communication protocols (e.g. OAI-PMH, Z39.50, SRU), as well as SOAP and REST services, SQL connectors and a wide set of access gateways to scientific articles databases (e.g. EBSCO, ABI, ProQuest, etc.) Regardless of the protocols implemented and of the system that supports the information, Retrievo will be able to collect, clean, index and present information in a convenient and straight forward way to the end-user.

Characteristics

Discovery

A single access point for finding and retrieving information originating from different sources

The Discovery module provides a single access point for finding and retrieving information originating from different sources. The main objective is to facilitate access to information since it provides on a single interface data discovery and retrieval capabilities from heterogeneous data sources.

Users can perform cross-sectional searches on all collected records from multiple sources, carry out more specific filtering using existing information fields, define which information sources to search on, or by combining all of the above.

Typically, search results only show a subset of the metadata of the original record, which should be sufficient to identify the information being sought. To help users understand the information, a thumbnail of the associated document can also be displayed.

Administration

Configure and manage the entire system

Retrievo is accompanied by an Administration module that allows the systems administrator to configure and manage the entire system.

Among the available operations, it is possible to list, modify and add new sources of information for aggregation, as well as configure their aggregation parameters.

It also allows users to view aggregation statistics, problem reports, growth statistics, as well as other indicators.

REST API

Integration with other systems

In addition to supporting all the functionality of the previous two modules, the REST API broadens horizons by enabling the system to be integrated with other applications. This API enables third parties to control Retrievo and its information through programmatic interfaces.

Based on standards and best practices, Retrievo’s REST API has been documented using OpenAPI (also known as Swagger), making its documentation available online in a format that is easy to read and test.

Retrievo’s REST API is completely secure as only authenticated users can use the API using JWT authentication method.

OAI-PMH Data Provider

Collects and concentrates information from various information sources

Retrievo collects and concentrates information from several sources of information. This information is validated, cleaned and properly indexed to support searches done via the Discovery module.

Once the previously dispersed information is collected, Retrievo can also provide information to other content aggregation portals (e.g. Europeana, Archives Portal Europe, OpenAire, etc.).

This module enables the creation of a single channel for providing information to other portals, avoiding the need to establish individual connections for each available data source.

References