NDSA:November 18, 2013 Standards and Practices Working Group Notes

From DLF Wiki

Participants on the Call

  • Kate Murray
  • Winston Atkins
  • Carolyn Campbell
  • Emily Shaw
  • Dina Sokolova
  • Kate Zwaard
  • Andrea Goethals
  • Leah Prescott
  • Amy Kirchhoff
  • Butch Lazorchak
  • Vika Zafrin
  • Carol Kussmann
  • John Spencer
  • Mary Mardigan
  • Meg Philips
  • Michelle Paolillo

New Members

  • Michelle Paolillo -- Cornell University Library
  • Vika Zafrin -- Boston University, Mugar Library
  • Carolyn Campbell -- Georgetown Law Library
  • Carol Kussman -- first meeting representing University of Minnesota

Project Status

  • The TRAC review tool is now available at: https://www.archivematica.org/wiki/Internal_audit_tool - the download file contains all of the files needed in a standalone instance of Drupal. Now that that's done, we can focus on building up the wiki pages for the activities of the Self-assessment and Audit project.
  • PDF/A paper draft sent out on the listserv -- please send comments to Butch Lazorchak (wlaz@loc.gov) by December 2nd.

"What are you working on" -- Roundtable Discussion

  • Kate Zwaard, Library of Congress: I’m working on a few software development projects right now. The one that’s probably the most relevant here is a project I manage to help LC staff accession, preserve, and manage digital collections. We also develop Bagger and the BagIt Library. Aside from the standards and best practices of the software development world (development methodologies, code conventions, etc), the best practices we are interested in are related to preservation/administrative metadata, fixity, and provenance. One of our biggest challenges (and joys) comes from serving a diverse user base – our colleagues in the Law Library have different interests, requirements, and needs than our colleagues in the American Folklife Center or in the Manuscript division, for example. For sanity checks, we rely on our colleagues in the NDSA and in the software development community. More about our group here: http://blogs.loc.gov/digitalpreservation/2011/08/yes-the-library-of-congress-develops-lots-of-software-tools/


  • Andrea Goethals, Harvard Library: I'm working on:
    • Adding support for video to our preservation repository
      • Using various format sustainability criteria to decide on video formats, could use agreement on video formats and metadata schemas
    • Finishing up a large repository migration - now focused on the metadata migration & user adoption
      • In the software development portion of the project, used best practices on packaging metadata, technical metadata schemas, hooks into format registries
    • A road map for new Digital preservation services
      • Used repository assessment models including the levels of digital preservation
    • NDSR Boston project - testing the residency model piloted by LC & IMLS is Washington DC
      • Using existing curricula like DPOE

For sanity I turn to the digital preservation community writ large including the NDSA and the IIPC preservation working group.


  • Kate Murray, Library of Congress: I'm working on:
    • working on the MXF AS-07 application specification definition which is geared for archiving and preservation. This includes metadata standards and has led me to the SMPTE Core Metadata effort.
    • documenting case histories about working with born digital video (through the FADGI AV Working Group). We hope this eventually extends to recommended practices for file creation.
    • FADGI is also about to publish a matrix comparing codecs and wrappers for reformatted video
    • I'm also working on documenting email formats for the Sustainability of Digital Formats website
    • NDSA fixity project


  • Leah Prescott and Carolyn Campbell - Georgetown University Law Library is:
    • We are just at the beginning of implementing a production-level digitization program so our standards and practices are primarily centered around that activity - making sure that we are following best practices and primarily using the FADGI guidelines. Books, images, audio, video, etc.
    • We are also in the process of vetting Digital Asset Management systems (along with main campus) and have started discussing preservation requirements in conjunction with that (although the system itself may not be a preservation environment)
    • Will soon be implementing a BagIt process to create a basic preservation file structure on a server - and implementing BagIt validation on a periodic basis.
    • Working on strategies to implement METS for both display and preservation
    • Beginning to work with digital forensics for obsolete media
    • Continuing to lead the Chesapeake Digital Preservation Group to deal with legal link rot


  • Michelle Paolillo - Cornell University; preservation related projects
    • We are in a fledgling state with our preservation repository, the Cornell University Library Archival Repository (CULAR). I am the service manager and business owner with regards to repository development. CULAR is governed by a steering committee which I also chair. Standards and Best practices I currently appeal to:
      • NDSA Levels of preservation - My steering committee and I are especially grateful to have a framework to use when discussing possible development, and way to keep the various facets of development in synch.
      • My metadata specialist, Jason Kovari - helps evaluate which schema(s) may be especially helpful in specific situations, and helps evaluate how much description we should minimally require. (In general, I emphasize the role of metadata frequently, since even a decade or two down the road, none of us will be here to remember or explain anything.)
      • I search the web for many terms related to preservation, to get a better idea of what has been tried, and (hopefully) to what success. It is great to learn that this group has been leveraging Wikipedia for basic knowledge.
      • Specific challenge: often curators have little idea as to how to get their collections ready for deposit (this includes appropriate description, metadata creation, structuring, weeding, etc.) I always attempt to lower barriers, but frequently encounter reluctance to create or alter workflows in ways that would integrate preservation into the lifecycle of the object. I suspect preservation is seen as an add-on. I would love ideas and best practices for developing the partnerships that would increase engagement.
    • Cornell has also recently created an executive level group called the Repository Executive Committee. Cornell has many repositories for digital assets, all built from various architectures. The charge before the committee includes a survey of our current repository landscape, with an eye towards simplifying the architectural diversity. I hope to be a vigorous voice on that committee for preservation. Some challenges:
      • The architectures of the various repositories tend to be optimized for whatever content type they specialize in.
      • Several architectures in use are aging out, or have already aged out. There will be migrations in our future.
      • Not all repositories have preservation in mind; many are delivery centered.
      • I am open to any sanity checks or standards/best practices that are available that would help with this effort.


  • Amy Kirchhoff - ITHAKA
    • BagIt specification
    • Dublin Core and event metadata informed by PREMIS
    • Audits
    • Update workflow
    • DOI, ISBN
    • Exchanging serial packages
    • For sanity: Depends on what we're working on, lately British Library, KB, CRL


  • Butch Lazorchak - Library of Congress
    • PDF/A standards working group
    • Was recently at Best Practices Exchange. Organizations are looking for guidance on identifying standards initiatives and bodies that they should be participating on or monitoring or that are already sufficiently covered by other institutions


  • Carol Kussmann - University of Minnesota
    • Focusing on things related to University of Minnesota's preservation repository - file formats, workflows, policies
    • Also working on Electronic Records training tool/Portal with the Council of State Archivists that will include best practices, policies, case studies
    • Portal (not live yet - should be public in June)
    • For sanity: NDSA, DPOE trainers, preservation contacts


  • Dina Sokolova - Columbia University
    • Born-digital formats
    • Developing workflows
    • Relying on Archivematica's policies on video and email formats
    • Database preservation tools
    • For sanity: digital preservation community


  • Mary Vardigan - Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR)
    • Data Seal of Approval, Certifications, Levels of Digital Preservation
    • Video standards
    • For sanity: groups participating in certification initiatives


  • Meg Phillips - NARA
    • (Changed roles at NARA a couple months ago, was coordinating electronic resources, now external affairs liaison)
    • Monitors landscape for projects to refer to people
    • NARA has new format guidance for transferring born-digital electronic records in categories of preferred, acceptable, etc. It's out for public comment now and we want to finish it this winter
    • New SIP standard - standard but flexible


  • Vika Zafrin - Boston University Mugar Library
    • The Institutional repository Librarian for Boston University's open access and preservation repository
    • Arts and digital collections - don't know how they will present it
    • Resource problems
    • For sanity: Search using Google


  • Winston Atkins - Duke University Libraries
    • Fedora/Hydra repository - working on getting it up and going and related policies
    • TRAC/ISO
    • Video preservation/formats
    • Storage
    • Participate on the CRL Certification Advisory Panel
    • Follow FADGI, international standards
    • For sanity: NDSA, listservs, etc.


  • John Spencer - BMS/Chace
    • 2 major labels are doing assessments similar to the FADGI video format assessment
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