Communities Endpoints

February 7, 2026 ยท View on GitHub

Back to the list of all defined endpoints

Main Endpoint

/api/core/communities

Provide access to the communities (DBMS based). It returns the list of existent communities.

Example: https://demo.dspace.org/server/#/server/api/core/communities

Single Community

/api/core/communities/<:uuid>

Provide detailed information about a specific community. The JSON response document is as follow

{
  "uuid": "7669c72a-3f2a-451f-a3b9-9210e7a4c02f",
  "name": "OR2017 - Demonstration",
  "handle": "10673/11",
  "archivedItemsCount": 12,
  "metadata": {
    "dc.description": [
      {
        "value": "First description",
        "language": null,
        "authority": null,
        "confidence": -1
      },
      {
        "value": "Second description",
        "language": null,
        "authority": null,
        "confidence": -1
      }
    ],
    "dc.description.abstract": [
      {
        "value": "This is a test community to hold content for the OR2017 demostration",
        "language": null,
        "authority": null,
        "confidence": -1
      }
    ],
    "dc.description.tableofcontents": [
      {
        "value": "",
        "language": null,
        "authority": null,
        "confidence": -1
      }
    ],
    "dc.rights": [
      {
        "value": "",
        "language": null,
        "authority": null,
        "confidence": -1
      }
    ],
    "dc.title": [
      {
        "value": "OR2017 - Demonstration",
        "language": null,
        "authority": null,
        "confidence": -1
      }
    ]
  },
  "type": "community"
}

Exposed links:

  • subcommunities: list of sub-communities within this community
  • collections: list of collections within this community
  • logo: link to the bitstream that represent the community's logo
  • parentCommunity: the community containing this community
  • adminGroup: the Community Administrator group

Other properties:

  • archivedItemsCount - The count of the items in the given container. It returns -1 when counting items feature is disabled at backend.

Linked entities

SubCommunities

/api/core/communities/<:uuid>/subcommunities

Example: t.b.p

It returns the sub-communities within this community

The supported parameters are:

Collections

/api/core/communities/<:uuid>/collections

Example: https://demo.dspace.org/server/#https://demo.dspace.org/server/api/core/communities/7669c72a-3f2a-451f-a3b9-9210e7a4c02f/collections

It returns the collections within this community

The supported parameters are:

GET /api/core/communities/<:uuid>/logo

Example: https://demo.dspace.org/server/#https://demo.dspace.org/server/api/core/communities/7669c72a-3f2a-451f-a3b9-9210e7a4c02f/logo

It returns the bitstream representing the logo of this community. [See the bitstream endpoint for more info](bitstreams.md#Single Bitstream)

POST /api/core/communities/<:uuid>/logo

To be used on a community without a logo

Curl example:

curl 'https://demo.dspace.org/server/api/core/communities/1c11f3f1-ba1f-4f36-908a-3f1ea9a557eb/logo' \
 -XPOST -H 'Content-Type: multipart/form-data' \
 -H 'Authorization: Bearer eyJhbGciOiJI...' \
 -F "file=@Downloads/test.png"
  • The community is determined using the ID in the URL
  • The file is uploaded using multipart/form-data

It returns the created bitstream. [See the bitstream endpoint for more info](bitstreams.md#Single Bitstream)

The REST API can support Content-Length and Content-MD5 headers to verify integrity

Status codes:

  • 201 Created - if the operation succeed
  • 401 Unauthorized - if you are not authenticated
  • 403 Forbidden - if you are not logged in with sufficient permissions
  • 404 Not found - if the community doesn't exist
  • 412 Precondition Failed - if there is a discrepancy between the declared size or checksum and the computed one
  • 422 Unprocessable Entity - if there was no file, or if the community already contains a logo

This endpoint only accepts one file at a time. If multiple files are uploaded, any extra files will be ignored.

PUT /api/core/communities/<:uuid>/logo

To be used on a community with a logo

Curl example:

curl 'https://demo.dspace.org/server/api/core/communities/1c11f3f1-ba1f-4f36-908a-3f1ea9a557eb/logo' \
 -XPUT -H 'Content-Type: multipart/form-data' \
 -H 'Authorization: Bearer eyJhbGciOiJI...' \
 -F "file=@Downloads/test.png"
  • The community is determined using the ID in the URL
  • The file is uploaded using multipart/form-data

It returns the created bitstream. [See the bitstream endpoint for more info](bitstreams.md#Single Bitstream)

The REST API can support Content-Length and Content-MD5 headers to verify integrity

Status codes:

  • 201 Created - if the operation succeed
  • 401 Unauthorized - if you are not authenticated
  • 403 Forbidden - if you are not logged in with sufficient permissions
  • 404 Not found - if the community doesn't exist
  • 412 Precondition Failed - if there is a discrepancy between the declared size or checksum and the computed one
  • 422 Unprocessable Entity - if there was no file, or if the community didn't contain a logo

This endpoint only accepts one file at a time. If multiple files are uploaded, any extra files will be ignored.

DELETE /api/core/communities/<:uuid>/logo

To be used on a community with a logo

Curl example:

curl 'https://demo.dspace.org/server/api/core/communities/1c11f3f1-ba1f-4f36-908a-3f1ea9a557eb/logo' \
 -XDELETE \
 -H 'Authorization: Bearer eyJhbGciOiJI...'
  • The community is determined using the ID in the URL

Status codes:

  • 204 No content - if the operation succeed
  • 401 Unauthorized - if you are not authenticated
  • 403 Forbidden - if you are not logged in with sufficient permissions
  • 404 Not found - if the community doesn't exist
  • 422: if the community didn't contain a logo

Parent Community

/api/core/communities/<:uuid>/parentCommunity

It returns the community containing this communities, e.g. for trail purposes.
If a community is part of multiple parent communities, it only returns one community.

Return codes:

  • 200 OK - if the parent community exists and returned
  • 204 No content - if the current community exists but the parent community doesn't exist
  • 401 Unauthorized - if you are not authenticated and the current community or parent community is not public
  • 403 Forbidden - if you are not logged in with sufficient permissions to retrieve the current community or parent community
  • 404 Not found - if the current community doesn't exist

Groups

Community administrators

/api/core/communities/<:uuid>/adminGroup

Endpoints for managing the Community administrators

Retrieve Community administrators

GET /api/core/communities/<:uuid>/adminGroup

Example: /server/api/core/communities/7669c72a-3f2a-451f-a3b9-9210e7a4c02f/adminGroup

It returns the EPerson Group representing the administrators of this community. See the EPerson Group endpoint for more info

Return codes:

  • 200 OK - if the admin group exists and is returned
  • 204 No content - if the current community exists but the admin group doesn't exist
  • 401 Unauthorized - if you are not authenticated
  • 403 Forbidden - if you are not logged in with sufficient permissions to retrieve the groups. Only admins and (parent) community admins can retrieve the group
  • 404 Not found - if the current community doesn't exist
Create Community administrators group

POST /api/core/communities/<:uuid>/adminGroup

To be used on a community without Community administrators

Perform a post with the JSON below.

{
  "metadata": {
      "dc.description": [
        {
          "value": "Test group",
          "language": null,
          "authority": "",
          "confidence": -1
        }
      ]
  }
}

Contrary to the EPerson Group endpoint, the name cannot be set here

Status codes:

  • 201 Created - if the operation succeed
  • 401 Unauthorized - if you are not authenticated
  • 403 Forbidden - if you are not logged in with sufficient permissions. Only admins and parent community admins can retrieve the group
  • 404 Not found - if the community doesn't exist
  • 422 Unprocessable Entity - if the name was included, if permanent was set to true, or if the community already contains an administrator group
Modifying the Community administrators group

All modifications to the group will be performed directly on the Group endpoint:

Modifying the Community administrators group will be authorized for admins and (parent) community admins

Delete the Community administrators group

DELETE /api/core/communities/<:uuid>/adminGroup

To be used on a community with an administrator group

Status codes:

  • 204 No content - if the delete succeeded (including the case of no-op if the community didn't contain an administrator group)
  • 401 Unauthorized - if you are not authenticated
  • 403 Forbidden - if you are not logged in with sufficient permissions. Only admins and (parent) community admins can delete the group
  • 404 Not found - if the community doesn't exist

Search methods

top

/api/core/communities/search/top

The supported parameters are:

It returns the top level communities in the repository (i.e. the communities that doesn't have a parent)

findAdminAuthorized

/api/core/communities/search/findAdminAuthorized

Get the list of all communities the current user is admin for.

The supported parameters are:

  • query: limit the returned communities to those with metadata values matching the query terms. The query is also used to build a prefix query. It can be used to implement an autosuggest feature over the community name
  • page, size see pagination

Return codes:

  • 200 OK - if the operation succeeds
  • 401 Unauthorized - if you are not authenticated

findEditAuthorized

/api/core/communities/search/findEditAuthorized

Get the list of all communities the current user is authorized to edit.

The supported parameters are:

  • query: limit the returned communities to those with metadata values matching the query terms. The query is also used to build a prefix query. It can be used to implement an autosuggest feature over the community name
  • page, size see pagination

Return codes:

  • 200 OK - if the operation succeeds
  • 401 Unauthorized - if you are not authenticated

findAddAuthorized

/api/core/communities/search/findAddAuthorized

Get the list of all communities the current user is authorized to add collections or communities to.

The supported parameters are:

  • query: limit the returned communities to those with metadata values matching the query terms. The query is also used to build a prefix query. It can be used to implement an autosuggest feature over the community name
  • page, size see pagination

Return codes:

  • 200 OK - if the operation succeeds
  • 401 Unauthorized - if you are not authenticated

Creating communities

Creating top level community

POST /api/core/communities

To create a top level community, perform as post with the JSON below to the communities endpoint when logged in as admin.

{
  "name": "test creation",
  "metadata": {
    "dc.title": [
      {
        "value": "test creation",
        "language": null,
        "authority": null,
        "confidence": -1
      }
    ]
  }
}

Creating subCommunity

POST /api/core/communities?parent=<:communityUUID>

To create a sub level community, perform as post with the JSON below to the communities endpoint when logged in as admin.

{
  "name": "test subcommunity",
  "metadata": {
    "dc.title": [
      {
        "value": "test subcommunity",
        "language": null,
        "authority": null,
        "confidence": -1
      }
    ]
  }
}

Error messages:

  • 200 OK - if the operation succeed
  • 401 Unauthorized - if you are not authenticated
  • 403 Forbidden - if you are not logged in with sufficient permissions
  • 422 UNPROCESSABLE ENTITY - if the parent community doesn't exist (the REST URI /api/core/communities still exists)

Updating a community

PUT /api/core/communities/<:uuid>

Provide updated metadata information about a specific community, when the update is completed the updated object will be returned. The JSON to update can be found below.

{
  "uuid": "b8872eba-1a79-4b8b-a8f6-55fa8f73197b",
  "handle": "123456789/60631",
  "metadata": {
    "dc.title": [
      {
        "value": "test new title",
        "language": null,
        "authority": null,
        "confidence": -1
      }
    ],
    "dc.description": [
      {
        "value": "An example description",
        "language": "en",
        "authority": null,
        "confidence": -1
      }
    ]
  },
  "type": "community"
}

Error messages:

  • 200 OK - if the operation succeed
  • 401 Unauthorized - if you are not authenticated
  • 403 Forbidden - if you are not logged in with sufficient permissions
  • 404 Not found - if the community doesn't exist
  • 422 UNPROCESSABLE ENTITY - Altering one of the non-editable parameters will result in a 422 UNPROCESSABLE ENTITY error. The non-editable parameters are optional, but if they are specified, they have to remain identical to the current value. The id, uuid, handle and type are non-editable.

Deleting a community

DELETE /api/core/communities/<:uuid>

Delete a community.

  • 204 No content - if the operation succeed
  • 401 Unauthorized - if you are not authenticated
  • 403 Forbidden - if you are not logged in with sufficient permissions
  • 404 Not found - if the community doesn't exist (or was already deleted)

Patch operations

Community metadata can be modified as described in Modifying metadata via Patch.