Digital Object Identifier - Resolution

Resolution

DOI name resolution is provided through the Handle System, developed by Corporation for National Research Initiatives, and is freely available to any user encountering a DOI name. Resolution redirects the user from a DOI name to one or more pieces of typed data: URLs representing instances of the object, services such as e-mail, or one or more items of metadata. To the Handle System, a DOI name is a handle, and so has a set of values assigned to it and may be thought of as a record that consists of a group of fields. Each handle value must have a data type specified in its "" field, that defines the syntax and semantics of its data.

To resolve a DOI name, it may be input to a DOI resolver (e.g., at www.doi.org) or may be represented as an HTTP string by preceding the DOI name by the string

http://dx.doi.org/

For example, the DOI name 10.1000/182 can be resolved at the address "http://dx.doi.org/10.1000/182". Web pages or other hypertext documents can include hypertext links in this form. Some browsers allow the direct resolution of a DOI (or other handles) with an add-on, e.g., CNRI Handle Extension for Firefox. The CNRI Handle Extension for Firefox enables the browser to access handle or DOI URIs like hdl:4263537/4000 or doi:10.1000/1 using the native Handle System protocol. It will even replace references to web-to-handle proxy servers with native resolution.