Category: Digital Curation & Digital Preservation

Perspectives on Personal Digital Archiving

The National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program has released Perspectives on Personal Digital Archiving

Here's an excerpt:

Our digital preservation blog, The Signal, is a major outlet for addressing personal digital archiving. Over the last two years, the blog has featured three categories of stories on the topic:

  • Discussions about applying the guidance listed in the Preserving Your Digital Memories section of our website.
  • Narratives about real-world encounters with personal digital preservation issues.
  • Descriptions of the outreach we have undertaken to connect with institutions and individuals to promote personal digital archiving.

We have gathered the most useful posts in each of these categories into this electronic publication. Perspectives on Personal Digital Archiving is intended as resource for individuals—and the institutions that serve them—to meet a critical challenge. Our aim is for it to be a primer for the digital archive novice, as well as a refresher for those with more experience.

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Report on Research Libraries Readiness for Sustainable Digital Preservation

APARSEN has released the Business Preparedness Report.

Here's an excerpt:

This report presents the results of a European-wide online survey for assessing the preparedness of research libraries (as represented by the members of LIBER) in regard to economically-sustainable digital preservation. The survey investigated the preparedness in accordance to the recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Task Force and the results have been mapped to these recommendations to identify Implementation Gaps. The further analyses of these Gaps will allow key stakeholders to intervene in a prioritized way and to facilitate progress of digital preservation to become an economically sustainable practice.

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Report on Cost Parameters for Digital Repositories

APARSEN has released the Report on Cost Parameters for Digital Repositories.

Here's an excerpt:

The purpose of this report is to present our analysis of published cost models. A review of cost parameters for the selected models focused on how cost parameters mapped to the International Standard for Trusted Repositories (ISO 16363) which enabled us to assess the areas of; Organisational Infrastructure, Digital Object Management and Infrastructure and Security Risk Management. The purpose was to assess whether cost models were measuring, through their parameters, the relevant activities for a trusted digital repository.

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What EDINA Does: A Community Report

EDINA has released What EDINA Does: A Community Report.

Here's an excerpt:

Universities and colleges across the UK making use of our services enjoy high quality online support documentation and helpful case studies. Flagship services include JISC MediaHub, Digimap Collections, and SUNCAT (with respective focus on multimedia, geo-spatial data and mapping for teaching and research, and the scholarly statement made in journals). . . .

What follows in this booklet also acts as a showcase for our current project activities; the key investments for present and future services. These include innovation to support use on the 'mobile Internet', both mobility and multi-platform delivery and interaction, as part of the national and international development of the 'spatial data infrastructure', including leadership in the citizen observatory (COBWEB) project funded by the EU. There is also significant contribution to the wider definition of digital infrastructure, geared to ensure ease and continuity of access, both for discovery and for stewardship (preservation) of the digital resources that research and education require, such as The Keepers Registry (for e-journals) and now the UK RepositoryNet+ initiative and its service components to assist universities and research institutes with the Open Access agenda and research reporting. More about the product of our research and development project activity is found in the project archive pages of our website.

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Current News: DigitalCurationNews Twitter Updates for 3/21/13

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Digital Curation Bibliography, 2012 Supplement

Digital Scholarship has released the Digital Curation Bibliography: Preservation and Stewardship of Scholarly Works, 2012 Supplement, which presents over 130 English-language articles, books, and technical reports published in 2012 that are useful in understanding digital curation and preservation. This selective bibliography covers digital curation and preservation copyright issues, digital formats (e.g., media, e-journals, and research data), metadata, models and policies, national and international efforts, projects and institutional implementations, research studies, services, strategies, and digital repository concerns.

It is a supplement to the Digital Curation Bibliography: Preservation and Stewardship of Scholarly Works, which covers over 650 works published from 2000 through 2011.

The bibliography includes links to freely available versions of included works. If such versions are unavailable, italicized links to the publishers' descriptions are provided.

The bibliography is available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License.

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Appraising our Digital Investment: Sustainability of Digitized Special Collections in ARL Libraries

ARL and Ithaka S+R have released Appraising our Digital Investment: Sustainability of Digitized Special Collections in ARL Libraries .

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

The research reveals that understanding the continuing costs for sustaining digital collections is a challenge across libraries. Responsibility is frequently dispersed among departments, and staff time and other costs are rarely allocated expressly to these activities or accounted for project-by-project. Almost universally, libraries are funding this activity out of their base budgets, suggesting that they will continue to need to shift funds from other things in order to support this as a priority.

While libraries are supporting these collections within their operations, the study's findings also reflect concern over sustainability, with librarians citing lack of funding and staff capacity as major challenges to sufficient investment in their digital collections. . . .

The three-part survey, designed with input from the ARL community, was sent to all ARL member libraries in the US and Canada and completed by 89 library directors, a response rate of 70%. In addition to the institutional perspective provided by library directors, library staff responded to other sections to offer insight into activities and costs for all of their institution's digitized collections, and questions about individual projects.

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The Preservation of Complex Objects: Volume 2, Software Art

Preservation of Complex Objects Symposia (POCOS) has released The Preservation of Complex Objects: Volume 2, Software Art.

Here's an excerpt from:

This volume considers the preservation of software art. At first inspection, preservation of software art may seem like an esoteric concern for ephemeral objects. But, as with all of POCOS, it challenges many of our expectations about collection management and preservation. There are complex technical challenges about the interdependencies of software, operating systems, hardware and users. It introduces the inter-subjectivity of meaning and the contexts of performance which defy simplistic approaches to documentation and representation. It crosses the boundaries of institutional genre and raises disconcerting questions about policy and competence. So there is a real sense that software art is a topic for the avant-garde of digital preservation: it pushes the boundaries not for its own sake but in order that all can progress,

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Removable Media and the use of Digital Forensics

Miriely Guerrero has self-archived Removable Media and the use of Digital Forensics in Deep Blue.

Here's an excerpt:

Overview of preservation threats facing removable media, both magnetic (such as 3.5 and 5.25 floppy disks) and optical (CD-ROMs, DVDs, etc.). Includes a literature review of digital forensic techniques relevant to the ingest and accession of born-digital content on removable media.

| Digital Curation Bibliography: Preservation and Stewardship of Scholarly Works (EPUB file, PDF file, paperback, and XHTML website; over 650 entries) | Digital Scholarship |

The Library of Congress National Recording Preservation Plan

The Library of Congress has released the The Library of Congress National Recording Preservation Plan.

Here's an excerpt:

In the digital age, new technology offers great promise for preservation initiatives. Transitioning to digital audio preservation, however, has created significant technical, organizational, and funding challenges for those institutions responsible for preserving recorded sound history for future generations.

The National Recording Preservation Plan has been devised to provide a blueprint to “implement a comprehensive national sound recording preservation program,†as mandated in the National Recording Preservation Act of 2000. . . .

The National Recording Preservation Plan’s recommendations for implementing a coordinated preservation effort fall into four interrelated categories: preservation infrastructure, preservation strategies, access challenges, and long-term national strategies for preservation and access.

| Digital Curation Bibliography: Preservation and Stewardship of Scholarly Works (EPUB file, PDF file, paperback, and XHTML website; over 650 entries) | Digital Scholarship |

National Digital Stewardship Alliance Glossary

The National Digital Stewardship Alliance has released the National Digital Stewardship Alliance Glossary.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

Glossaries are important. . . .

With that in mind, today we're announcing the release of a National Digital Stewardship Alliance glossary to support the work being done in the NDSA on the Levels of Preservation. The Levels of Preservation activity is working to provide basic digital preservation guidance on how an organization should prioritize its resource allocation. The NDSA glossary strives to provide a common language for NDSA members to communicate about the levels work and should also be useful as a general digital stewardship glossary.

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NEH 2013 Preservation and Access Research and Development Grant Guidelines

The National Endowment for the Humanities has released its 2013 Preservation and Access Research and Development grant guidelines.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

The 2013 guidelines for Preservation and Access Research and Development grants are now available. You will also find sample project descriptions, sample narratives, and a list of frequently asked questions. The deadline for applications is May 1, 2013.

These grants support projects that address major challenges in preserving or providing access to humanities collections and resources. Challenges include the need to find better ways to preserve materials of critical importance to the nation's cultural heritage—from fragile artifacts and manuscripts to analog recordings and digital assets subject to technological obsolescence—and to develop advanced modes of searching, discovering, and using such materials.

| Digital Curation Bibliography: Preservation and Stewardship of Scholarly Works (EPUB file, PDF file, paperback, and XHTML website; over 650 entries) | Digital Scholarship |

Model Language for Research Data Management Policies

The Association of Southeastern Research Libraries and the Southeastern Universities Research Association have released Model Language for Research Data Management Policies.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

The Association of Southeastern Research Libraries (ASERL) and the Southeast Universities Research Association (SURA) have endorsed language to assist their member institutions in drafting sound policies to govern the uses and management of research data generated by university faculty and staff. . . .

Over the past few years, many major research funding agencies have started requiring a comprehensive data management plan as part of all new funding proposals. Additionally, researchers are seeking to re-use existing data sets to determine the replicability of results and reduce duplication of effort. The ASERL-SURA model draws upon the work of a variety of sources, including the University of Cambridge, Monash University, the Council on Government Relations, the National Science Board, and the National Science Foundation.

| Research Data Curation Bibliography, Version 2 (XHTML website; over 200 entries) | Digital Scholarship |

The Web as Infrastructure For Scholarly Research and Communication (Video)

The Digital Curation Centre has released The Web as Infrastructure For Scholarly Research and Communication, a video of a keynote presentation by Herbert Van de Sompel at the 8th International Digital Curation Conference. His presentation slides are also available.

| Research Data Curation Bibliography, Version 2 | Digital Scholarship |

Born Digital: Guidance for Donors, Dealers, and Archival Repositories

The MediaCommons Press has released a draft for comment of Born Digital: Guidance for Donors, Dealers, and Archival Repositories .

Here's an excerpt from the announcement :

Co-authored by a team of ten archivists and curators from the Beinecke, the Bodleian, the British Library, the Harry Ransom Center, Emory's Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library, and the Rubenstein Library at Duke, the report is the outcome of a series of conversations about how born-digital materials are acquired and transferred to archival repositories.

The main body of the report surveys the primary issues and concerns related to born-digital acquisitions and is intended for a broad audience with varying levels of interest and expertise, including donors, dealers, and archival repositories, as well as scholars, students, and researchers. Appendices provide information about how to prepare for the unexpected and possible staffing costs, as well as ready-to-use checklists that incorporate recommendations from throughout the report.

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Digital Forensics and Preservation

The Digital Preservation Coalition has released Digital Forensics and Preservation.

Here's an excerpt:

In recent years, digital forensics has emerged as an essential source of tools and approaches for facilitating digital preservation and curation, specifically for protecting and investigating evidence from the past. Institutional repositories and professionals with responsibilities for personal archives can benefit from forensics in addressing digital authenticity, accountability and accessibility. . . . .Forensic technology makes it possible to: identify privacy issues; establish a chain of custody for provenance; employ write protection for capture and transfer; and detect forgery or manipulation. It can extract and mine relevant metadata and content; enable efficient indexing and searching by curators; and facilitate audit control and granular access privileges. . . . The purpose of this paper is to provide a broad overview of digital forensics, with some pointers to resources and tools that may benefit cultural heritage and, specifically, the curation of personal digital archives.

| Digital Curation Bibliography: Preservation and Stewardship of Scholarly Works (EPUB, PDF, paperback, and XHTML) | Digital Scholarship |

Developing an Institutional Research Data Management Plan Service

EDUCAUSE has released Developing an Institutional Research Data Management Plan Service.

Here's an excerpt:

Institutions should consider the following as they plan how to best support researchers in preparation of their proposed DMP:

  • Identify a model for local administration of research data management plan services.
  • Provide resources that can be accessed conveniently by researchers during the proposal development process.
  • Designate one or more dedicated staff to be available for a range of consulting needs.

This white paper includes the following sections:

  • What Should Be Included in the DMP
  • Developing a DMP Service at Your Institution
  • Skill Sets Required to support a DMP Consulting Service

| Research Data Curation Bibliography, Version 2 | Digital Scholarship |

Research Data Curation Bibliography, Version 2

Digital Scholarship has released version 2 of the Research Data Curation Bibliography. This selective bibliography includes over 200 English-language articles and technical reports that are useful in understanding the curation of digital research data in academic and other research institutions. It has doubled in size since version 1.

Most sources have been published from 2000 through 2012; however, a limited number of earlier key sources are also included.

The bibliography includes links to freely available versions of included works. If such versions are unavailable, italicized links to the publishers' descriptions are provided.

It is available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License.

"Examining Attributes of Open Standard File Formats for Long-Term Preservation and Open Access"

Eun G. Park and Sam Oh have published "Examining Attributes of Open Standard File Formats for Long-Term Preservation and Open Access" in the latest issue of Information Technology and Libraries.

Here's an excerpt:

This study examines the attributes that have been used to assess file formats in literature and compiles the most frequently used attributes of file formats in order to establish open standard file format selection criteria. A comprehensive review was undertaken to identify the current knowledge regarding file format selection criteria. The findings indicate that the most common criteria can be categorized into five major groups: functionality, metadata, openness, interoperability and independence. These attributes appear to be closely related. Additional attributes include presentation, authenticity, adoption, protection, preservation, reference and others.

| Digital Curation Resource Guide | Digital Scholarship |

"DMP Online and DMPTool: Different Strategies Towards a Shared Goal"

Andrew Sallans and Martin Donnelly have published "DMP Online and DMPTool: Different Strategies Towards a Shared Goal" in the latest issue of The International Journal of Digital Curation.

Here's an excerpt:

This paper provides a comparative discussion of the strategies employed in the UK's DMP Online tool and the US's DMPTool, both designed to provide a structured environment for research data management planning (DMP) with explicit links to funder requirements. Following the Sixth International Digital Curation Conference, held in Chicago in December 2010, a number of US institutions partnered with the Digital Curation Centre's DMP Online team to learn from their experiences while developing a US counterpart. DMPTool arrived in beta in August 2011 and released a production version in November 2011. This joint paper will compare and contrast use cases, organizational and national/cultural characteristics that have influenced the development decisions, outcomes achieved so far, and planned future developments.

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Purdue University Libraries Launches the Data Curation Profiles Directory

The Purdue University Libraries have launched the Data Curation Profiles Directory

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

Data Curation Profiles (DCP) are in-depth publications which provide detailed descriptions of research data sets and collections. The DCP, and the associated Toolkit which provides instructions and advice on composing them, are the results of research funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS).

Working with Purdue University Libraries Scholarly Publishing Services, the Data Curation Profiles Directory provides a suite of services to support publication, including: assigning a DOI and citation for each published DCP, improved visibility for Profiles through inclusion in indexing and discovery tools, and a commitment to the preservation of DCPs through CLOCKSS and Portico.

Digital Curation Bibliography: Preservation and Stewardship of Scholarly Works Cover

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Digital Preservation Coalition Announces Winners of DCP Digital Preservation Awards

The Digital Preservation Coalition has announced the winners of the 2012 DCP Digital Preservation Awards.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

The Award for Teaching and Communications was presented by Oliver Morley, Chief Executive of the National Archives to a small team from the University of London Computer Centre who run the Digital Preservation Training Programme (DPTP)—an entry-level, introductory course that develops critical thinking about digital preservation. . . .

The Award for Research and Innovation was presented by Martyn Harrow, Chief Executive of JISC to the PLANETS project. PLANETS brought together memory institutions, small businesses, major technology providers, and research institutions from across Europe to build practical services and tools to help ensure long-term access to digital cultural and scientific assets. . . .

The DPC's most prestigious prize—the Decennial Prize—is awarded specially to mark the tenth anniversary of the founding of the DPC and it recognizes the most outstanding work over the decade that the DPC has existed. An intense international competition followed and finalists from New York, Washington and London were selected after a painstaking assessment by an expert panel. But when Dame Lynne Brindley announced the winner this evening, it was the Archaeology Data Service at the University of York that came out on top. The Archaeology Data Service is an innovative group based in the Archaeology Department of the University of York.

Digital Curation Bibliography: Preservation and Stewardship of Scholarly Works Cover

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National Archives Announces Grant Awards for Historical Records Digitization Projects

The National Archives has announced its grant awards for historical records projects, including those for digitization and electronic records management and preservation.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

Digitizing historical records grants, totaling $420,000, went to four projects: the University of Florida will digitize and make available more than 36,000 pages of diaries and manuscripts from the end of the Colonial period to the beginnings of the modern state; Princeton University will digitize more than 400,000 pages of six Cold War-related manuscript collections; Harvard University will digitize 189,074 pages, covering four generations of the Blackwell Family from 1784 to 1981, that cover abolition, temperance, women's suffrage, and education; and the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library Foundation in Springfield, Illinois, will digitize the records of Richard Yates, Sr., governor of Illinois 1861-1865.

Three Electronic Records grants, totaling $235,000, went to: the Council of State Archivists for a two-year project to strengthen the capacity of states and territories to manage and preserve electronic records; an electronic records start-up project at the Guggenheim Museum in New York; and a planning grant for the Missouri Office of the Secretary of State to establish an electronic records archives.

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"’The Way We Do It Here’: Mapping Digital Forensics Workflows in Collecting Institutions"

Martin J. Gengenbach A has self-archived his Master's theses "'The Way We Do It Here': Mapping Digital Forensics Workflows in Collecting Institutions."

Here's an excerpt:

The study presented in this paper used semi-structured interviews with archivists and curators to investigate the implementation of digital forensics practices for managing born-digital content in collecting institutions. . . . High-level workflow models based on the information gathered through those interviews provide additional documentation and context for archives and special collections seeking to develop their own processes

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