By Ian Scott and Bonnie Russell
Out of Beta
As we have taken stock and planned our next steps (“On the NEH and Our Path Forward”), we have realized that KCWorks is now a robust and fully-functional platform. Version 0.5.0, released this week, already has the features and stability people rely on in an Open Access repository, and KCWorks has had a great reception from our members. So we’ll be removing the “Beta” label from the site, recognizing that KCWorks is a solid, proven home for scholarly output of all kinds.
We’ll still be adding new features in regular releases, moving toward our planned version 1.0 in the fourth quarter of 2025. We are pushing ahead with the features we had planned for the NEH Public Access Repository, but we’ll be making these available more broadly–some to all of our users and some to our institutional and organizational partners.
New in Versions 0.5.0 and 0.4.0
Full release notes can be found in our GitHub repository, released on April 30th and May 7th 2025. But here are a few highlights:
View all your work from your dashboard
The newest feature added to KCWorks in version 0.5.0 is a new “My Works” tab on your KCWorks dashboard. Clicking on that tab brings up a search for all of the works you have contributed to, regardless of whether or not you uploaded them. Many members have asked for this, and we’re pleased to announce it today. The renamed “My Uploads” tab will still list all of the items (draft and published) that you have uploaded yourself.
Collection controls for orgs and others
Coming out of our work for the NEH, we have added the ability for some collection owners to control the editing of certain metadata fields on works they accept for publication. This will allow, e.g., institutions to ensure that works they have funded continue to be included in their organizational collections. It also allows ejournal editors to ensure that works published as part of their journal collection remain included, and that the journal information is not changed. We are committed to transparency, and to empowering researchers. So we provide alerts highlighting any editing restrictions, and we require that you clearly opt in to the limitations before you submit work to such a collection. The feature will, though, provide the stability that some kinds of collections need.
Bug Fixes, Stability, and the Road Ahead
Release 0.5.0 also brings with it fixes to more of the bugs our users have uncovered. Under the hood it includes stability enhancements that you won’t notice because the system will just work even more smoothly. We continue to expand our technical documentation, and add more automated tests to monitor system performance. All of this is an expression of our commitment to keep on making KCWorks the solid and feature-rich platform you want to use.
We have lots of upcoming features that we’re dying to tell you about, but we’re still adapting our roadmap in response to our changing landscape and the great feedback of our members. We can at least give you two words to whet your appetite: “stats dashboards.” Stay tuned and keep in touch!