Software tools for checking originality
Slovak University of Agriculture in Nitra has implemented the use of the anti-plagiarism systems Theses.cz and Odevzdej.cz as a support and control tool in education. These are tools designed to check for potential similarities between texts, expressed as a percentage score. The result of the check is an originality report in the form of a list of similarities with a quantification of the overlap (similarity) of the checked text with other texts in the form of a similarity score (similarity index) expressed as a percentage. Like all anti-plagiarism systems, they do not identify plagiarism, but only suspicious parts of texts. These parts must then be evaluated, with the aim of identifying critical parts of the text from the point of view of violating the principles of publication ethics, rather than identifying plagiarism. The results from different systems cannot be compared with each other; the result is always the result of a check against a specific database (corpus).
The basic ethical framework for publishing at SUA in Nitra is defined by Directive No. 11/2021 on publishing ethics and plagiarism at the Slovak University of Agriculture in Nitra.
Theses.cz
Theses.cz is a tool for checking the final versions of theses before they are submitted to the Central Register of Theses (CRZP). It should help supervisors detect potential threats of ethical violations when writing theses. Access to the service (submission of thesis text) is via the UIS web interface, section Final Theses. The reports are also available in this interface.
It is not recommended to upload theses to the Odevzdej.cz system before uploading them to Theses.cz, as they use a common database/corpus and entering text into this shared text core will subsequently result in a high similarity score (percentage in the report) when uploading the thesis to Theses.
Odevzdej.cz
Odevzdej.cz is a tool for checking the originality of various types of student written work as part of the ongoing system for assessing the fulfillment of study obligations (e.g., seminar papers, term papers, etc.). It is not intended for checking the texts of final theses for the reason described above. The system can be accessed via the web interface at https://odevzdej.cz.
iThenticate
iThenticate is the most widely used software solution for detecting and checking originality in academic publishing. It allows texts to be checked in more than 30 languages, including Czech and Slovak, but English is dominant. The corpus it uses includes a broad database of globally published academic content, including texts published in various repositories or on the internet. iThenticate allows you to check a wide range of documents – not only articles, but also selected types of administrative, scientific, technical, and medical documentation, research reports, and projects. The iThenticate full-text database is also used by Crossref as part of its Similarity Check service. This is how SUA in Nitra also has access to the iThenticate tool.
Eligible users of the system are members of the editorial boards of scientific journals published by SUA in Nitra, or persons affiliated with these editorial boards, as well as selected staff of the University.
Administration at SUA
The system works on the principle of an administrator and delegated users who work within their own groups. Based on the application received (an email stating the specific name, email address, and position associated with performing checks in the system is sufficient), the administrator will create a work account and automatically send the access data to the authorized person via the system.
Contact: PhDr. Ľubica Jamborová, PhD., lubica.jamborova@uniag.sk