oaipmh

A Python library for working with OAI-PMH version 2 — harvest metadata from existing repositories using the client, or expose your own repository using the server. This is a maintained fork of infrae/pyoai.

Installation

Install the latest release from PyPI:

pip install oaipmh

Requires Python 3.11 or newer. Python 3.11 through 3.15 are supported.

Version 4.0.0 removes Python 3.10 support after its upstream end of life. Upgrade to Python 3.11 or newer, or remain on oaipmh 3.2.1 if you still need Python 3.10.

Quickstart

A minimal client that lists records from an OAI-PMH endpoint using the Dublin Core metadata prefix:

from oaipmh.client import Client
from oaipmh.metadata import MetadataRegistry, oai_dc_reader

URL = "http://uni.edu/ir/oaipmh"

registry = MetadataRegistry()
registry.registerReader("oai_dc", oai_dc_reader)
client = Client(URL, registry)

for record in client.listRecords(metadataPrefix="oai_dc"):
    print(record)

Migrating from pyoai

If you already depend on pyoai, migration is a dependency swap:

• Replace pyoai with oaipmh in your requirements (pip install oaipmh).
• Import paths are unchanged — from oaipmh import ... continues to work.
• The minimum supported Python version is 3.11.

No application code changes are required beyond the dependency rename. See Why this fork for background.

Why this fork

oaipmh is a maintained fork of infrae/pyoai, which has received no substantive changes since March 2022. The public API and import path are unchanged; only the PyPI distribution name has changed, from pyoai to oaipmh, to distinguish the maintained release from the abandoned upstream package.

Maintenance since the fork has focused on bringing the codebase onto current Python infrastructure while preserving behaviour for existing consumers:

• Supported on Python 3.11 through 3.15; legacy Python 2 shims removed.
• Deprecated datetime.utcnow() replaced with timezone-aware alternatives.
• Modern packaging using PEP 621 metadata and the Hatchling build backend.
• CI pipeline rebuilt on uv, replacing the legacy tox configuration.
• Reproducible development environment via a Nix flake and direnv.
• Modernised test suite with CI coverage across the full supported Python range.

Scope

oaipmh is a maintained fork. Bug fixes and compatibility work are the primary focus; well-scoped feature proposals are welcome via GitHub Issues and Pull Requests. See CONTRIBUTING.md for guidelines.

Contributing

Issues and pull requests are welcome. See CONTRIBUTING.md for local development setup, branch naming, commit conventions, and the release process.

Support

Bug reports and questions are accepted via GitHub Issues. Maintenance is best-effort with no formal SLA.

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the original infrae/pyoai authors at Infrae and to the many community contributors who built and maintained this library over two decades; this fork would not exist without their work.

License

Distributed under the BSD-3-Clause License.
Copyright © 2026 ETH Zurich, Jaime Cardozo; ETH Library.
Based on infrae/pyoai by Infrae and community contributors.

See LICENSE for the full license terms and CHANGELOG.md for the release history.