On september 15, the CCSD organized a webinar on technical validation (or moderation), an essential step in the dissemination process for deposits in HAL. This meeting brought together many institutions involved in the process with a clear objective: to accelerate the transition to shared and consistent technical validation on a national scale
Faced with changes in the scientific publishing ecosystem and growing expectations regarding the quality of the deposits, the CCSD is pursuing an ambitious project: expanding the network of validating institutions. After welcoming 16 new institutions in 2024-2025, it wishes to continue this momentum and present this initiative.
The aim of the webinar was to present the national roll-out project and provide a progress report. It also sought to explain this activity, its challenges and the services offered by the CCSD.
The speakers: Hélène Bégnis, Pascal Lubino and Sébastien Mazzarese.
A favourable context for open science
Driven in particular by the various national plans for open science (PNSO), the movement towards the free dissemination of scientific publications continues to gather momentum. More and more universities, “grandes écoles”, and research organizations are devoting specific resources to the green route.
In this context, the CCSD has been supporting institutions for several years in the implementation of effective and compliant technical validation processes
What is « Technical Validation » ?
This term now replaces the term ‘moderation’, and is neither a scientific evaluation nor metadata curation. It involves verifying the technical and legal compliance of submitted files before they are posted online, such as ensuring consistency between the metadata and the file content, ensuring the document is readable, ensuring compliance with the legal framework and publisher policies, and ensuring the document type is eligible.
The validator can communicate with the depositor, request corrections, refuse an ineligible deposit (with reason provided) or convert a deposit containing an ineligible file into a record.
The goal is simple: to guarantee the quality and free accessibility of research publications.
Train, harmonize, facilitate
The national deployment project is structured around four main areas:
- Training and support
The training offering has already evolved in 2025 with in-person sessions that train an average of ten validators, and will continue to expand. Self-training modules ar currently being designed and are expected to be available in early 2026. Tutorials, recommendations, exercices and practical cases will be offered to strenghten the autonomy of teams.
- Developing common recommendations
Guidelines and best practices are being drafted to ensure consistent validation accross institutions, based on typical situations encountered on a daily basis.
- Raising awareness among institutions
Throughout 2024-2025, individual meetings and feedback workshops were held. These events enabled institutions to share best practice, discuss specific case studies, clarify the scope of validation and disseminate common benchmarks.
- Structure a national network of technical validators
The CCSD is working to structure a national network of technical validators with the aim of promoting the sharing of experiences, pooling of ressources and consistency of processes.
Concrete benefits for institutions
Becoming a validating institution increases autonomy and responsiveness by controlling the online publication process, while ensuing quality and compliance through upstream control and the development of team skills. Taking charge of validation also makes it possible to contribute to the development of HAL and provide researchers with targeted support (raising awareness, offering advice and providing training).
With around 40 institutions already involved, and with a ramp-up planned for late 2025 to early 2026, technical validation is set to become a strategic pillar of the service provided to scientific communities. Alongside its partners, the CCSD will continue its training, harmonisation and facilitation efforts to ensure this step is seamlessly integrated into the HAL submission process.