Responsible Thesis-Writing Process

Requirements for the PDF file

The PDF file has to be in PDF/A format in order to be archived (Archives Act, 1994).

The PDF file has to be accessible (Act on the Provision of Digital Services, 2019; Directive (EU) 2016/2102, 2016).

If you have to choose one or the other, for example as a Mac user, choose accessibility, as the file to be made accessible may be able to be converted to PDF/A afterwards.

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Act on the Provision of Digital Services. (15.3.2019/306). Finlex. https://www.finlex.fi/fi/laki/ajantasa/2019/20190306

Archives Act. (23.9.1994/831). Finlex. https://www.finlex.fi/fi/laki/ajantasa/1994/19940831#a16.12.2016-1146

Directive (EU) 2016/2102. (2016). Directive (EU) 2016/2102 of the European Parliament and of the Council on the accessibility of the websites and mobile applications of public sector bodies.. EUR-Lex. http://data.europa.eu/eli/dir/2016/2102/oj

Accessibility

Name of the PDF file

Name your thesis as Uwasa_year_Familyname_First-name.pdf

• do not use full stops other than for file extension

• characters allowed are numbers, letters, _ and -

• avoid å, ä, ö, special characters and space (~ ! @ # $ % ^ & * ( ) ` ; < > ? , [ ] { } ' " | )

That your thesis is finished, and that

• you have submitted it for plagiarism check in Moodle according to your supervisor’s instructions
• you have received permission from your supervisor to submit your thesis for review

that you can submit your thesis only once, and

• that submitting the wrong file will cause the review period to start over
• that you cannot edit your thesis after submitting it unless you request it to be rejected
• that your thesis will not be visible in Osuva until it has been officially approved

that your thesis data can be found online, e.g. by Google search, and that

• although access to your thesis is limited to Tritonia’s network, the abstract and other data entered in the form will be publicly available
• if someone is searching for your name with a search engine, data on your thesis will be included in the search results

If you have written your thesis for a company, ensure that the company is aware of the online visibility of thesis data.

Visibility of the thesis

• The thesis is always a public document that anyone interested has access.
• Only the visibility of old bachelor's theses is completely hidden, not even the author's name can be found online. The restricted access collection the PDF file can only be read online at the Tritonia library and the completely open collection is available everywhere.
• Master's theses are generally openly available.
• In exceptional cases, with the supervisor's permission, you can limit the availability, i.e. the PDF file can only be read online at the Tritonia library.
• Licentiate theses are always openly available.
• Theses completed at School of Technology and Innovation can include a secret attachment. For more information, contact School of Technology and Innovation.

1. Read these instructions and save your PDF file in the right format.
2. Go to Osuva and log in with your student credentials. The links below take you directly to the collection's submission form.

• Prefer browsers like Chrome or Firefox. Submitting might not be possible with Internet Explorer.

3. Choose the collection, where you want to save your work.

• recommended Master's theses
• with permission from the supervisor Master's theses (restricted access) or
• Licentiate theses.

4. Drag and drop or browse and add your PDF file.
5. Fill in the form.
6. Read and grant the license.
7. Check that the information you gave is correct and fix them if needed.
   • If you want to leave the submission incomplete and return to it later, press the Save for later button. You can continue your submission by clicking the profile button in the upper right corner of the page → My DSpace → Click the edit button for the incomplete submission.
8. Send.
   • You will no longer be able to edit your work; its status will change to "Workflow" in your own submissions.
9. Email the exact same file to your supervisor and Study and Education services (see the contact list). The evaluation begins after this.
10. Your work will be public after it is evaluated and approved by the school.

Osuva is using automated keywords. Only words that can be found in YSO are accepted as keywords.

When you save your thesis to Osuva, you have to choose with which rights the reader can use your work.

The purpose of the keyword is not to be unique but to help the reader find jobs related to a specific field and topic.

Osuva uses FintoAI, a service for automated subject indexing based on machine learning and language technology, which makes keyword suggestions based on the file. In addition to these, you can also save other words found in the General Finnish Ontology YSO.

If you copy the abstract from a word processing program such as Word, remove the hyphenation lines in the form. If you copy from a PDF file, remove any extra line breaks.

Insert one blank row between paragraphs. In the preview of the saving, Osuva will show the summary without the paragraph spacing, even though the final version will include it.

If the thesis is written in English, the abstract should be written in Finnish or Swedish. If the author's language of education is not Finnish or Swedish, the abstract can be written in English or in a language agreed with the supervisor. If you wish to save the abstract in another language, please use the same field. If there is more than one abstract, the abstract in the same language as the thesis must be added to Osuva first, even if the order in the thesis is different.

After you have submitted your thesis, it will be reviewed. When you have submitted your thesis in Osuva and emailed it to your supervisor and Study and Education Services, a 30 day review period starts, during which your thesis will be graded (University of Vaasa Degree Ordinance, Section 16). The examiner of a Bachelor’s thesis is the teacher (supervisor) of the thesis. The thesis will be graded on a scale from 0 to 5 (failed, sufficient, satisfactory, good, very good, excellent) or i, a, b, nons, c, m, exim and l.

In case of any ambiguity, the file saved in Osuva can be compared with the version returned to the supervisor, for example.

When your thesis is graded, the grade will be recorded in the student data system and you will receive a copy of the review.

When your Master’s thesis is graded, the examiner(s) will send it to Study and Education Services and the proposed grade will be emailed to you before approval by the Dean of the School. The Dean will confirm the grade according to a timetable announced on the university website. Study and Education Services will send you a copy of the review form after the Dean’s decision.

Master’s theses are visible in Osuva when they have been approved at the university unit.

If you notice an error in your work after submitting it to Osuva, but before it has been approved for publication, you can contact Study and Education Services to request rejection of the submission. The submission will then be returned to you for editing. Please note that the 30-day evaluation period will restart if you replace the file itself.

If you find errors in your thesis after it has been approved and published in Osuva

• if the error is in the form data you have filled in, contact Study and Education Services and osuva@uwasa.fi
• if the error is in the file, make an erratum and ask Study and Education Services to add it to Osuva, in addition to the file