New Features and Improvements
Updated Localisation and New Language Options
With this release, we have updated our localisation and translated message properties for all existing languages, including Chinese (中文简体), Spanish (Español), French (Français), Arabic (العَرَبِيَّة) and Russian (Русский язык), as well as adding Portuguese (Português) with more languages to come.
Much of this localisation has been done using machine translation with a check from a native speaker, however not all elements of the UI have been checked for each language. If you see a term that is not translated correctly or should be improved, please let us know by contacting Support. Please note, the updated localisation does not include PatSeq, PatCite, In4M or individual reports.
Institutional User API
With this release, we have added an option for Institutional Users to request API access to the Scholarly and Patent APIs. Staff and students from institutions subscribing to the Institutional Toolkit (ITK) are eligible for API access as part of your institution’s ITK subscription.
Please note, Institutional User API plans remain active for the duration of the Institution’s ITK subscription. Please ensure you are logged in using your institutional email when requesting access. You can request Institutional User API access here.
Institution Registry
We are also pleased to announce the release of an Institution registry as part of the Lens for Institutions microsite, providing a list of subscribing institutions and supporters. We are grateful to the public good institutions and private companies from around the world who have subscribed to The Lens services to support their communities. To recognise these groups and others who support The Lens, we have released a list of subscribing institutions who agreed to be recognised.
Subscribing institutions can be listed on this registry, along with their contact information, to notify institutional users. To access the toolkit at your institution, please contact the library or administrative office of your subscribing institution.
If you are an ITK subscriber and would like to see your institution listed, please contact us at Support.
Other Improvements and Changes
The Lens is a work in progress and with each release, The Lens team improves on certain features or perfects the quality of the data and the service to provide you with the most comprehensive data we can source. While often these changes stem from users' feedback, they also originate from improved data processing and improvements in the source data. In this release, here is the list of other improvements and changes that were implemented:
- Added collection counts in results list and biblio metadata for both Scholarly Works and Patents to indicate how many public collections an individual Scholarly Work or Patent is in
- Added Record modified date to collection headers to indicate the date the records in a collection were last modified. The Updated date for collections indicates the date the collection was last updated, whether by a record change or a change to the title, description or access settings.
- Added import to Patent collections using Document Identifiers .g. US_5599670_A, EP_0571457_B1, 015-010-565-974-077, WO 2022/167411 A1, etc.
- Updated the patent family table on the Family tab of individual patents to display additional metadata.
- Added Has Abstract pills to Scholarly Works results list and biblio metadata
- Added Has ROR Id to the Scholarly Works Flag filters
Fixes
- Fixed link outs and the display of ROR identifiers on Scholarly Works affiliation tooltips
- Corrected display logic for the Published pills in the results list and biblio metadata
- Fixed 404 styles on extreme widths
API & Data Improvements:
- Updated Lens API to version 2.5.3, Added query parser to normalise string based queries
- Scholarly Works: Added scholarly request field has_affiliation_ror, updated data schema to version 1.6.3
N.B. For guidance navigating the API, please check the API Documentation, and to report bugs/issues, usability related questions, or to request features, please use our GitHub issue tracker.
Interested in supporting the sustainability of The Lens?
- Contact your librarians and let them know about Lens for Institutions and the Institutional Toolkits.
- If you need to use Lens.org for commercial purposes, please comply with The Lens terms of use by subscribing to the individual commercial use licence here.
- Do you know someone who would be interested in The Lens? Share a search or collection with them, or suggest that they register for our newsletter here.
Interested in helping us improve?
- Collective Action needs connected actors. The Collective Action Project provides a number of different activities for all stakeholders to participate in collective problem solving. See how you can participate.
- Are you supportive of The Lens mission and interested in volunteering your expertise and time to support The Lens? We welcome expressions of interest. Please contact us at support@lens.org. We are happy to learn more about your skill sets and see if there is a good fit of skills and timing to contribute to The Lens.
- If you have published using Lens tools or data, or created an application using the API or data from the Lens, please share your work with us so we can share it with others on Lens Labs to help improve The Lens as a public resource.
- Share your use case with us and explore how The Lens can help you and keep sending us your feedback on The Lens features and functionality.
The Lens is a public good project run by Cambia, a global social enterprise that is committed to making the innovation process more transparent, inclusive and effective for those seeking to solve problems and make a social impact and thus, we welcome your active engagement, participation, and support.
