Indexing Readiness Score
IRS evaluates the technical infrastructure of a journal's website for academic discovery. It assesses OAI-PMH availability, sitemap structure, DOI resolution health, and metadata standards used for Google Scholar, Crossref, and aggregator indexing. Inside the PQF formula this same figure is labeled the Technical Discoverability Factor (TDF); IRS is its standalone name when published on this page.
14
A
13–15 pts
10
B
10–12 pts
6
C
7–9 pts
1
D
< 7 pts
IRS Scoring Criteria
| # | Criterion | Why It Matters | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | sitemap.xml accessible, valid, and up to date | Required for all major search engine crawlers | 2 |
| 2 | robots.txt permits academic crawlers (Googlebot, CrossrefBot) | Blocking academic bots reduces indexing reach | 2 |
| 3 | OAI-PMH endpoint active and returns valid Dublin Core records | Standard metadata harvesting protocol; required by many aggregators | 3 |
| 4 | Schema.org JSON-LD structured data on article pages | Enables Google Scholar, Bing Academic, and rich search results | 2 |
| 5 | Google Scholar citation meta tags on article pages | Highwire Press / PRISM tags for Google Scholar indexing | 2 |
| 6 | DOI links resolve correctly (< 5% broken DOIs) | Broken DOIs prevent citation tracking and reader access | 2 |
| 7 | Journal pages accessible without broken links or 404 errors | Stable URL structure required for persistent discoverability | 2 |
| Total (TDF subfactor) | 15 | ||
IRS Grade Scale
How IRS Is Assessed
IRS is checked via automated crawls and manual verification of journal websites. The OAI-PMH endpoint is tested using the official OAI-PMH validator protocol. Sitemap validity is checked against the Sitemaps.org schema.
Google Scholar meta tags are checked against the Highwire Press citation_title / citation_doi standard. Schema.org JSON-LD is checked for ScholarlyArticle type markup on article pages.
DOI resolution is sampled across recently published articles. A journal with more than 5% unresolvable DOIs receives 0 points for that criterion.