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Ag Data Commons migration begins October 18, 2023

The Ag Data Commons is migrating to a new platform – an institutional portal on Figshare. Starting October 18 the current system will be available for search and download only. Submissions will resume after the launch of our portal on Figshare in November. Stay tuned for details!

October 16, 2023

The Ag Data Commons is migrating to a new platform – an institutional portal on Figshare.

The current system will be unavailable to create, edit, or publish datasets starting October 18. Users will be able to search for and download published datasets as usual during this period. All content, including draft datasets, will be migrated to the new platform.

Account holders will be able to edit and publish existing datasets again and submit new ones when the new repository platform is launched in November. Stay tuned for details!

Please contact the curation team at NAL-ADC-Curator@usda.gov with any questions about the migration. We apologize for any inconvenience.

envelope icon
August 22, 2023

Stay up to date about the changes and enhancements coming to the Ag Data Commons by signing up for our email list.

To sign up:

  • Go to the ARS email list subscription page

  • Enter your email address and select Next

  • Choose the Ag Data Commons Announcements topic listed under the National Agricultural Library News and Information and select Submit

Figshare logo and slogan reading "Credit for all your research"
January 18, 2023

The National Agricultural Library (NAL) is excited to announce that the Ag Data Commons data repository and catalog will be moving to a new platform hosted by Figshare. We expect to launch our new repository and submission portal in October 2023.

All published catalog records and datasets with their associated DOIs will be migrated to the new platform. The team here at NAL will continue to provide curation and administration services for the Ag Data Commons.

Moving to the new platform will allow us to offer many improvements for our users, such as:

• automatic versioning,
• ease of submission, especially for larger data files (up to 50 GB),
• dataset-level citation counts and Altmetric scores,
• support for double-blind peer review process,
• integration with GitHub, and
• robust bi-directional API capabilities.

Stay tuned for more information! We welcome your comments and questions at NAL-ADC-Curator@usda.gov.

Diagram of data annotation workflows for the ARDN project
October 7, 2022

The National Agricultural Library hosted a conference and workshops on June 7-9, 2022 to wrap up a three-year collaboration with the University of Florida on a NIFA-funded project titled Agricultural Research Data Network for Modeling and Analytics (ARDN).

The goal of the project was to increase interoperability and re-use of publicly available datasets by the crop modeling community. The ARDN team developed tools and protocols to annotate research data with a common vocabulary, such as ICASA. This annotated data can then be easily aggregated and re-used in models and other quantitative analyses. Annotated datasets created during this project can be found on the ARDN program page on the Ag Data Commons.

To learn more about ARDN and how their tools can help make data more re-usable, you can view selected presentations from the conference on NAL’s YouTube channel.

April 11, 2022

Datasets in Ag Data Commons have now been cited over 600 times since 2017 and new citations are recorded weekly. Ag Data Commons helps scientists increase the impact of their research by making their data findable and easily citable. Data citations give credit to data producers and make science more transparent and reproducible.

Visit our up to date Zotero library to see how Ag Data Commons data is being re-used in scholarly literature. Watch our "Submitting Data to the Ag Data Commons” webinar to learn how to deposit your USDA supported data into the Ag Data Commons.

Laptop and cell phone linked by an arrow pointing to each with a checkmark above
October 15, 2021

To comply with federal mandates, two-factor authentication (2FA) is now required to log into the Ag Data Commons.

2FA adds an extra layer of protection to keep your information secure. Each time you log into the Ag Data Commons with your username and password, you will be prompted to enter a code generated by the Google Authenticator app. If you do not have a smartphone, you can use a windows/palm os/java phone client.

If you have not already set up 2FA for your account, you will be prompted to do so the next time you log in to the Ag Data Commons. A short video walking you through the process is available on YouTube. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact us at NAL-ADC-Curator@usda.gov.

July 14, 2020

UPDATE: This event has passed, but you can view the webinar recording on the NAL YouTube channel!

Join us for our next webinar and learn the basics of submitting data to the Ag Data Commons. After a brief introduction and review, we will provide a live demo of the data submission process. We will answer questions during the last portion of the hour.

On Tuesday, July 28, 2020 at 2PM Eastern Time, the Ag Data Commons team will offer “Submitting Data to the Ag Data Commons”. Space for this event is limited, so please register in advance.

Federal Register
January 29, 2020

The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy is seeking public comments on a draft set of desirable characteristics of data repositories used to locate, manage, share, and use data resulting from Federally funded research. The purpose of this effort is to identify and help Federal agencies provide more consistent information on desirable characteristics of data repositories for data subject to agency Public Access Plans and data management and sharing policies. Responses are due by 6 March 2020 -- visit RFC link below:

Ag Data Commons Submission Quick Start workflow diagram
December 4, 2019

Ag Data Commons has added a Quick Start summary to provide contributors with a brief overview of the data submission process. The diagram serves as an introduction to the full, step-by-step Data Submission Manual. If a dataset DOI is required, it is necessary to save the data files with Ag Data Commons.

Ag Data Commons - Relaunch
August 5, 2019

The National Agricultural Library’s Ag Data Commons has deployed updates to our look, feel, and function. And the BETA tag is gone!

Submit data* to the Ag Data Commons to meet FAIR data requirements of journals when you submit manuscripts, or public access requirements of funders such as NIFA.

Updates include:

  • New home page design and custom theme
  • Improved support for dataset collections
  • Added new 'Agricultural Economics' category
  • Added 'Software & Tools' tab
  • Improved citation of scholarly publications
  • Re-engineered field collections to support DKAN Paragraphs
  • Added ability to filter by Resources in addition to Datasets, with counts of each content type displayed

Watch for new webinars and training opportunities covering these changes. We welcome your comments and questions at: https://www.nal.usda.gov/ask-question.

*Or pointers to your data or software