Implementation: Custom Website URLs and custom Researcher URLs for the Discovery Module

This article covers the options for:

Setting the website URL (also includes useful supporting information for your IT / website team)
URL configurations for Researchers (For Elements System Administrators and HR Feed owners)

Setting the Website URL for the Discovery Module

Symplectic can work with your technical team to connect your custom institutional URLs with the Discovery Module using an invisible redirect system.

There are two steps to configure this:

Symplectic provides you with a URL for the public instance of the Discovery Module that will form the basis of the redirect. This will be something like: https://yourorganisation.discovery.symplectic.org
Your technical team can then add a CNAME record to your DNS servers that will point to the A record that Symplectic registered for your server on our DNS servers. This creates the redirect. For example: https://people.yourorganisation.website will invisibly re-direct to https://organisation.discovery.symplectic.org

This redirect works for all subpages as well as the top-level landing page. It allows institutions to seamlessly use custom institutional URLs across the Discovery Module.

Example: Lilliput University

Has an underlying URL of: https://lilliput.discovery.symplectic.org
Uses the public-facing custom URL of: https://people.lilliput.ac
The URL for a researcher's profile page will be: https://people.lilliput.ac/user/nick.anderson
If a member of public searches for Nick Anderson, they will see the following URL: https://people.lilliput.ac/user/nick.anderson
If a member of public enters the URL as https://lilliput.discovery.symplectic.org/nick.anderson this will also resolve correctly.

How does this work?

Symplectic wants to make the setup of the Discovery Module as simple and as quick as possible. To achieve this we use the Let’s Encrypt certificate authority to automatically provision and renew SSL certificates of your Discovery instance.

The entire process is automated, transparent to the users and is included in the hosting costs for Discovery.

Once you have completed point 2 (above- CNAME record creation) the certificate renewal process is automated, renewing the certificate after 60 days. Symplectic manages all of this on your behalf and has alerting and monitoring in place to ensure that your custom URL always has a valid certificate.

In the event that you would like to use your own certificate authority to automatically provision the certificates for your custom URL you will need to contact us.

Setting Researcher URLs for the Discovery Module: Choosing how researchers names are displayed

Your organisation has a choice at the configuration stage as to how your organisation wants the user URL to display on your site.

These URLS are important for search engine optimisation (SEO) and should ideally include at least the researcher's first name and surname to maximise discoverability on search engines.

URL config uration:	"Out of the box" The out of the box configuration uses the Elements User ID and the users first name and surname.	Customised URLs This optional configuration can be used for your Live instance.For this option, institutions can choose to manage their users URLs internally, by using their HR Feed to supply a custom URL of your choice. Ideally this should be short and easily memorable. First name and surname should be included to maximise the SEO benefit.
Examples:	`lilliput.discovery.symplectic.org/5448-nick-anderson`	`lilliput.discovery.symplectic.org/dr‑nicholas‑anderson‑md` `lilliput.discovery.symplectic.org/dr.nicholas.anderson` `lilliput.discovery.symplectic.org/nick.anderson`
Effort required:	None, this format is natively supported by the Discovery Module. It is automatically maintained by Elements and is SEO friendly.	Manual management and deduplication within the HR Feed which populates the Public URL Path fragment field per user (via System Admin > User Management > Add New User). Note: Symplectic strongly advises against the use of the Elements Username and/or your organisational staff ID to create the URL.

URL config uration:

"Out of the box"

The out of the box configuration uses the Elements User ID and the users first name and surname.

Customised URLs

This optional configuration can be used for your Live instance.For this option, institutions can choose to manage their users URLs internally, by using their HR Feed to supply a custom URL of your choice.

Ideally this should be short and easily memorable. First name and surname should be included to maximise the SEO benefit.

Examples:

lilliput.discovery.symplectic.org/5448-nick-anderson

lilliput.discovery.symplectic.org/dr‑nicholas‑anderson‑md
lilliput.discovery.symplectic.org/dr.nicholas.anderson
lilliput.discovery.symplectic.org/nick.anderson

Effort required:

None, this format is natively supported by the Discovery Module. It is automatically maintained by Elements and is SEO friendly.

Manual management and deduplication within the HR Feed which populates the Public URL Path fragment field per user (via System Admin > User Management > Add New User).

Note: Symplectic strongly advises against the use of the Elements Username and/or your organisational staff ID to create the URL.

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