Research Intelligence (CRIS) and the Cloud: A Review

TL;DR

This paper reviews how cloud computing impacts research information systems (CRIS), discussing benefits, challenges, implementation aspects, and future perspectives to guide administrators, users, and scholars.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of cloud integration in CRIS, highlighting characteristics, challenges, and implementation considerations based on literature and empirical surveys.

Findings

Cloud offers flexible delivery models and benefits for CRIS.

Challenges include networking issues, data ingestion, and security risks.

Implementation requires careful assessment of service models and potential barriers.

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to explore the impact of the cloud technology on current research information systems (CRIS). Based on an overview of published literature and on empirical evidence from surveys, the paper presents main characteristics, delivery models, service levels and general benefits of cloud computing. The second part assesses how the cloud computing challenges the research information management, from three angles: networking, specific benefits, and the ingestion of data in the cloud. The third part describes three aspects of the implementation of current research systems in the clouds, i.e. service models, requirements and potential risks and barriers. The paper concludes with some perspectives for future work. The paper is written for CRIS administrators and users, in order to improve research information management and to contribute to future development and implementation of these systems, but also for scholars and students who want to have detailed knowledge on this topic.