These slides about the COUNTER Code of Practice Release 5 reflect recent clarifications and amendments. They provide an overview of Release 5 metrics and reports.

1. Release 5
COUNTER Code of Practice-
Release 5
Oliver Pesch, Product Strategy, EBSCO Information Services
Based on slides created by Senol Akay, American Chemical Society and adapted by Kornelia Junge, Senior
Research Manager, Wiley
COUNTER R5 Technical Working Group

2. Release 5
Agenda
• Introduction
• COUNTER Code of Practice
• COUNTER CoP5 Scope
• COUNTER CoP5 Reports & Metrics
• Questions

3. Release 53
Community

4. Release 5
The COUNTER Code of Practice
COUNTER
Counting Online Usage of Networked Electronic Resources
• COUNTER is a non-profit organization supported by a global community of
library, publisher and vendor members. Members contribute to the
development of the Code of Practice (COP) through working groups and
outreach.
• COUNTER was founded in 2002. COUNTER provides guidance on consistent
and credible usage data, reporting, and formats.
• COUNTER Release 4 has been the current Code of Practice since 2014.
• Release 4 is an integrated Code of Practice covering journals, databases, books,
reference works and multimedia items.
• COUNTER Release 5 has been published in July 2017 and will become
mandatory in January 2019.
Consistent
ComparableCreditable

5. Release 5
Developed by the COUNTER Community
The COUNTER R5 working group is
comprised of librarians,
publishers, representatives of
ERM systems, and other usage
service providers.
The members of the group who
contributed their time and
expertise are:
•Oliver Pesch (Chair)
•Senol Akay
•Daniel Albertsson
•Irene Barbers
•Simon Bevan
•Sarah Bull
•Andrew Goldthorpe
•Enrique Gonzales
•Kornelia Junge
•Sonja Lendi
•Tasha Mellins-Cohen
•Paul Needham
•Bernd Oberknapp
•Heather Staines

6. Release 56
Release 5 Scope

7. Release 5
The COUNTER Code of Practice 5
• The COUNTER Code of Practice has been developed over more
than a decade.
• Over the last 15 years, with the development of new technologies
and needs, COP has incorporated more reports, and new formats
and metrics types.
• This natural growth has increased complexity, and it has reduced
consistency among reports. As a result, compliance has become
more difficult for publishers and other content providers and
analysis has become more challenging for libraries.
• COUNTER launched a survey about the current usage reports in
2016. Based on survey results from libraries, publishers and other
vendors, COUNTER has started working on a new COP focusing on
reducing the complexity of the current reports, increasing the
focus on consistency and clarity of metric types, reports and
report formats.
• The aim of the new Code of Practice is to introduce flexibility that
reduces the number of reports while making the COP more
adaptable for future changes to requirements.
Consistency
Simplicity
Transparency & Flexibility
Clarity

8. Release 5
Consistency
Addressing changing needs and reducing the complexity of the Code of
Practice to ensure publishers and content providers are able to achieve
compliance.
• Reporting Layout
• Reporting Formats
• Vocabulary & Terminology
The COUNTER Code of Practice 5
Consistency
Simplicity
Transparency & Flexibility
Clarity

9. Release 5
Simplicity
Four Master Reports streamlined for the most common reporting needs for
librarians, publishers and content providers.
• Four Master Reports
• Pre-set, Filtered Standard Views
• Fewer Metric Types
• New Item & Usage Attributes
The COUNTER Code of Practice 5
Consistency
Simplicity
Transparency & Flexibility
Clarity

10. Release 5
Flexibility
Comprehensive reporting attributes empower users to generate necessary drill-
down reports with ease.
• Granular Reports with Attributes
• Specific Reporting for Data Needs
• Reduce Redundancy
The COUNTER Code of Practice 5
Consistency
Simplicity
Transparency & Flexibility
Clarity

11. Release 5
Clarity
Using clear and consistent terminology on all metrics types and attributes
brings clarity.
• Reducing and renaming
metrics types for clarity
• Using consistent metric types
across all reports, as applicable
The COUNTER Code of Practice 5
Consistency
Simplicity
Transparency & Flexibility
Clarity

12. Release 512
Reports & Metrics

13. Release 5
Four Master
Reports are the
Foundation of
COUNTER R5
Reports
13
Platform Master Report
Database Master Report
Title Master Report
Item Master Report

14. Release 5
COUNTER Release 5:Reports
Example of
user
interface
01/01/2017 12/31/2017
Total_Item_Request
Journal
Controlled
Regular

15. Release 5
“Standard Views”
Address the Most
Common Use
Cases
15
Platform Master Report
• Platform Usage
Database Master Report
• Database Search and Item Usage
• Database Access Denied
Title Master Report
• Book Requests (Excluding OA_Gold)
• Book Access Denied
• Book Usage by Access Type
• Journal Requests (Excluding OA_Gold)
• Journal Access Denied
• Journal Usage by Access Type
• Journal Requests by YOP Requests (Excluding OA_Gold)
Item Master Report
• Content Item Requests
• Multimedia Item Requests

16. Release 5
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types
Metric_Type identifies activities and the
nature of the activity being reported on.
In COUNTER Release 5, three activity groups
are reported:
• investigation & requests
• access denied
• search
Metric_type attribute is in all COUNTER
reports and Standard Views.
• Searches_Regular
• Searches_Federated
• Searches_Automated
• Searches_Platform
• Total_Item_Investigations
• Total_Item_Requests
• Unique_Item_Investigations
• Unique_Item_Requests
• Unique_Title_Investigations
• Unique_Title_Requests
Metric Types
• No_License
• Limit_Exceeded

17. Release 5
Investigations & Requests
Investigations report user actions related to a content item or title. Actions on part of
an item or information about an item or the item itself are reported.
Total_Item_Investigations
the total number of times a content item or information related to a content item was accessed.
Unique_Item_Investigations
the number of unique content items investigated by a user in a session.
Unique_Title _Investigations
the number of unique titles investigated by a user in a session (only applies to Books).
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types

18. Release 5
Investigations & Requests
requests report user requests for a content item or chapter of a book. A request is
specifically related to viewing or downloading the full content item.
Total_Item_requests
the total number of times the full text of a content item was downloaded or viewed.
Unique_Item_requests
the number of unique content items requested by a user in a session.
Unique_Title _requests
the number of unique titles requested by a user in a session (only applies to Books)
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types

19. Release 5
Metric Types:
Investigations
vs
Requests

20. Release 5
Example
Susan is researching on Publisher Platform. From a list of search results, she opens three article
abstracts and a video record. All four records are different, but two of the articles are from the
same book. The counts are:
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types
Publisher.org
Publisher
Abstract Abstract Abstract

21. Release 5
Example
The counts are:
Total_Item_Investigations: 4
Unique_Item_Investigations: 4
Unique_Title_Investigations: 3 (Note: Unique_Title _Investigations only apply to Books)
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types
Abstract Abstract Abstract

22. Release 5
Example (book content)
After reading the abstracts, Susan downloads the PDFs for two different chapters from the same book. The
counts change to:
Total_Item_Investigations: 6 Total_Item_Request:2
Unique_Item_Investigations: 4 Unique_Item_Request:2
Unique_Title_Investigations: 3 Unique_Title_Request:1
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types
Full-text Full-text
Abstract Abstract Abstract
Investigation
Requests

23. Release 5
Example (journal content)
After reading the abstracts, Susan downloads the PDFs for two of the articles, both from the same journal. The
counts change to:
Total_Item_Investigations: 6 Total_Item_Request:2
Unique_Item_Investigations: 4 Unique_Item_Request:2
(Note, because this is journal content we do not capture Unique_Title metrics)
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types
Full-text Full-text
Abstract Abstract Abstract
Investigation
Requests

24. Release 5
Access Denials
In Release 5, two types of access denial metrics are tracked.
No_license
user is unable to retrieve full-text of a unique content because his/her
institution does not have a license to the content.
Limit_Exceeded
user is unable to retrieve full-text of a unique content because his/her
institution has exceeded access limits.
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types

25. Release 5
Example
Susan is researching the history of antibiotics on Publisher Platform. From a list of search results, she
opens three article abstracts and two video records. She intended to view video records, however her
institution has not subscribed to the video database, and she is therefore denied access. The counts are:
No_License : 2
Limit_Exceeded : 0
Susan repeats her attempt to access one of the video records five minutes later. The counts are:
No_License : 3
Limit_Exceeded : 0
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types

26. Release 5
Example
Susan is researching the history of antibiotics on Publisher Platform. From a list of search
results, she opens three article abstracts and two video records. She intended to watch both
video records. Her institution has a limited subscription to the video database, and Susan’s
usage exceeds that cap.
The counts are:
No_license: 0
Limit_Exceeded: 2
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types

27. Release 5
Searches
There are four different types of search metrics in Release 5.
Searches_Regular
the number of times a user searches a database, where they have actively chosen that database from
a list of options OR there is only one database available to search. Metric captured at the database level.
Searches_Automated
the number of times a user searches a database, where they have not actively chosen that database
from a list of options. Metric captured at the database level.
Searches_Platform
the number of times a user performs a search on the platform, regardless of the number of databases involved in
the search. Metric captured at the platform level.
Searches_Federated
the number of times a search is run through Federated Search Service/Engine. Metric captured at the database level.
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types

28. Release 5
Example
Susan is researching the history of antibiotics on a discovery platform, which
includes multiple (5) databases. She runs a search for “history AND antibiotics.” The
counts are:
Searches_Regular: 0
Searches_Automated: 5 (each of the 5 databases get credit for the search)
Searches_Platform: 1
Searches_Federated: 0
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types

29. Release 5
Example
Susan then selects the ‘History of Medicine’ database and reruns her search. The
updated counts are:
Searches_Regular: 1 (Only History of Medicine gets credit for the search)
Searches_Automated: 5
Searches_Platform: 2
Searches_Federated: 0
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types

30. Release 5
Example
Susan searched for "comedy plays” on a publisher platform. She gets a list of comedy plays on
the search result page. From the search result list, she clicks on "Production A" that opens in a
new tab.
On the Production A page there are many links related to content such as fragments, interviews,
etc. along with actual video content. Susan clicks 5 unique links on the "Production A" page and
she read content related to the production before playing the video. Then she clicked on “play”
and she watched the whole video. After she finished the video, she goes back to the search
result page and clicks on "Production B". The counts are:
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types

31. Release 5
Example
Search Counts:
Searches_Regular: 1
Searches_Automated: 0
Searches_Platform: 1
Searches_Federated: 0
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types
Publisher.org
Publisher
Comedy plays

32. Release 5
Example
Investigations & Requests:
Total_Item_Investigations: 8 Total_Item_Requests: 1
Unique_Item_Investigations: 7 Unique_Item_Requests: 1
(Note Unique_Title metrics excluded since content isn’t book material)
COUNTER Release 5: Metric Types
Production A
Production A
Link 1
Production A
Link 2
Production A
Link 3
Production A
Link 4
Production A
Link 5 Production A Production B

33. Release 5
COUNTER Release 5: Data Types
Data_Type identifies the general type of content being
accessed or for which usage is being reported.
This attribute is used when creating Standard Views for
Books and Journals and is an optional parameter for the
Title Master Report and can be used to generate
summaries in a Database Master Report or Platform
Master Report.
• Article
• Book
• Book Segment
• Database
• Dataset
• Journal
• Multimedia
• Newspaper or Newsletter
• Platform
• Other
• Repository Item
• Report
• Thesis or Dissertation
Data_Types

34. Release 5
COUNTER Release 5: Section Types
Section_Type identifies whether content is delivered in
“chunks” (sections) or item level. This describes what
that section is, e.g. a book may be accessed by the
chapter; content in a journal is accessed by article.
This attribute is an optional parameter for the
Title Master Report.
• Article
• Book
• Chapter
• Other
• Section
Section_Types

35. Release 5
COUNTER Release 5: Access Types
Access_Type describes the nature of access control that
was in place when the content item was accessed.
This attribute is in “filtering” for Standard Views and
Master Reports and is included in Book Usage by Access
Type and Journal Usage by Access Type Standard Views.
It’s primary role is to differentiate usage of gold open
access content from content that requires a license.
OA_Delayed is content that became open access after
an embargo period has expired.
* OA_Delayed is NOT part of the initial release of
R5. It will be introduced at a future date (with
sufficient advance notice) after further study.
• Controlled
• OA_Gold
• Other_Free_to_Read
(repositories only)
• OA_Delayed* (reserved
for future use)
Access_Types

36. Release 5
COUNTER Release 5: Access Methods
Access_Method indicates whether the usage related to
investigations and requests activities were conducted
by a human user browsing and searching a website
(“regular”) or by Text and Data Mining processes
(TDM).
This attribute appears as an optional parameter in the
four Master Reports.
TDM usage is excluded from the standard views for
Journal and Book usage.
• Regular
• TDM
Access_Method

37. Release 5
COUNTER Release 5: Year of Publication
YOP is the year of publication for the content item
accessed.
If content is available in print and online format and the
publication dates of these two formats differ, the year
of publication of version of record (normally the format
that is published first) is used.
YOP is an option attribute in Title Master Report,
Database Master Report and Platform Master Report.
It appears as a column in the Journal Requests by YOP
(Excluding OA_Gold) Standard View.
• yyyy
• 0001 (unknown)
• 9999 (articles in press)
YOP

38. Release 538
Release 5 Reports

39. Release 5
COUNTER Release 5:Title Report |Standard
View Reports
Report ID
TR_B1
TR_B2
TR_B3
TR_J1
TR_J2
TR_J3
TR_J4

40. Release 5
COUNTER Release 5:Reports
JR1 – Release 4
TR-J1 Release 5

41. Release 5
COUNTER Release 5:Reports
Consistent Header
Consistent Vocabulary,
Metrics & Attributions
Consistent Details

42. Release 5
COUNTER Release 5:Reports
Consistent Header
Relevant
Metric Types
Consistent Detailed Information

43. Release 5
COUNTER Release 5:Reports
Consistent Header
Relevant
Metric
Types
Consistent Detailed Information

44. Release 544
SUSHI for COUNTER R5
COUNTER
Reports
Delivery

45. Release 5
COUNTER_SUSHI for Release 5
RESTful interface
returning JSON-
formatted reports
Familiar to most
web developers
Allows retrieval of
full reports, or
snippets of usage
Allows usage
display to be
embedded in
other applications

46. Release 5
COUNTER_SUSHI for Release 5
Reporting Header

47. Release 5
COUNTER_SUSHI for Release 5
Reporting Details

48. Release 5
COUNTER_SUSHI for Release 5
Reporting Metrics

49. Release 549
Implementation and Transition Timelines

50. Release 5

51. Release 5
Contact to COUNTER with further
questions/requests:
lorraine.estelle@counterusage.org
Additional information:
https://www.projectcounter.org