Digital Archive Policies and Trusted Digital Repositories

The MIT Libraries, the San Diego Supercomputer Center, and the University of California San Diego Libraries are conducting the PLEDGE Project to determine the set of policies that affect operational digital preservation archives and to develop standardized means of recording and enforcing them using rules engines. This has the potential to allow for automated assessment of "trustworthiness" of digital preservation archives. We are also evaluating the completeness of other efforts to define policies for digital preservation such as the RLG/NARA Trusted Digital Repository checklist and the PREMIS metadata schema. We present our results to date.National Archives and Records Administration (US) under NSF cooperative agreement 0523307 through a supplement to SCI 0438741 and the NSF grant ITR 0427196

The Ohio State University's Institutional Repository: How Policy Informs Practice

Presentation on the Knowledge Bank, The Ohio State University's Institutional Repository, given at the 2007 OhioDIG (Ohio Digitization Interest Group) 3rd quarter Meeting held at The Ohio State University's Ackerman Library

Interoperability for digital repositories: towards a policy and quality framework

Interoperability is a property referring to the ability of diverse systems and organisations to work together. Today interoperability is considered a key-step to move from isolated digital repositories towards a common information space that allow users to browse through different resources within a single integrated environment. In this conference we describe the multi-level challenges that digital repositories face towards policy and quality interoperability, presenting the approaches and the interim outcomes of the Policy and Quality Working Groups within the EU-funded project DL.org (http://www.dlorg.eu/)

Interoperability for digital repositories: towards a policy and quality framework

Interoperability is a property referring to the ability of diverse systems and organisations to work together. Today interoperability is considered a key-step to move from isolated digital repositories towards a common information space that allow users to browse through different resources within a single integrated environment. In this conference we describe the multi-level challenges that digital repositories face towards policy and quality interoperability, presenting the approaches and the interim outcomes of the Policy and Quality Working Groups within the EU-funded project DL.org (http://www.dlorg.eu/)

Towards a Holistic Approach to Policy Interoperabilityin Digital Libraries and Digital Repositories

Underpinning every digital library and digital repository there is a policy framework, which makes the digital library viable - without a policy framework a digital library is little more than a container for content. Policy governs how a digital library is instantiated and run. It is therefore a meta-domain which is situated both outside the digital library and any technologies used to deliver it, and within the digital library itself. Policy is also a key aspect of digital library and digital repository interoperability in a common and integrated information space. Policy interoperability - that is the exchange and reuse of policies - is a step beyond policy standardisation. Furthermore, effective and efficient policy frameworks are also one of the Digital Curation Center (DCC), DigitalPreservationEurope (DPE), nestor and Center for Research Libraries (CRL) core criteria for digital repositories. In this article, we share our research on policy interoperability levels and the experimental survey on policy interoperability conducted with real-life digital libraries, as a contribution towards the definition of a Policy Interoperability Framework

Digital Archiving and the Establishment of Open Access Digital Repositories in Selected Nigerian Universities

This paper focuses on digital archiving and the establishment of open Access digital repositories in three selected Nigerian Universities. Despite the abundance of vital information kept in the traditional archives of Nigerian universities, many researchers cannot easily access it due to the seeming absence of proper digitization and online visibility. It is also observed that the practice of archiving and the management of information in the repositories in Nigerian universities is limited to the central library, which makes access to information in the satellite archives across the departments and in the administrative units very difficult. This paper therefore, intends to; determine the nature, existence and the roles of digital repositories in the three selected Nigerian universities and to identify the types of information sources and resources available in their digital repositories, among others. Qualitative research methodology was adopted. Data was purposefully obtained from the websites of the three Selected Nigerian universities. The findings of this study indicate that the Digital Repositories existed in the three selected universities studied with different names, and were found to contain volumes of scholarly information sources and resources, which were organized in a systematic and chronological order, but it is not well structured to specifically link resources in the departments, faculties and other units of the universities with the central repositories. It was also found that Digital Repositories were not always accessible, possibly due to inadequate ICT infrastructure and necessary staff skills for their effective maintenance. It was concluded that the repositories existed for over a decade and were providing information services to its users. It was recommended that, the management of the universities studied should imbibe strong maintenance culture to effectively manage the Digital Repositories for sufficient access to scholarly information sources and resources and should consider the installations and deployment of necessary ICT infrastructure, as well as the right software configurations including the provision of regular staff training for proper digitisation and digitalisation of work processes and procedures in the repositories for efficient results and the promotion of Digital Data Literacy in Africa

Towards a Theory of Digital Preservation

A preservation environment manages communication from the past while communicating with the future. Information generated in the past is sent into the future by the current preservation environment. The proof that the preservation environment preserves authenticity and integrity while performing the communication constitutes a theory of digital preservation. We examine the representation information that is needed about the preservation environment for a theory of digital preservation. The representation information includes descriptions of the preservation management policies, the preservation processes, and the state information that is needed to verify the correct working behavior of the system. We demonstrate rule-based data grids that can verify that prior policies correctly enforced preservation properties, while sending into the future descriptions of the current preservation management policies

Digital Curation and Preservation Bibliography 2010

This selective bibliography includes over 500 articles, books, and technical reports that are useful in understanding digital curation and preservation. The Digital Curation and Preservation Bibliography includes published articles, books, and technical reports. All included works are in English. The bibliography does not cover conference papers, digital media works (such as MP3 files), editorials, e-mail messages, letters to the editor, presentation slides or transcripts, unpublished e-prints, or weblog postings. Most sources have been published between 2000 and the present; however, a limited number of key sources published prior to 2000 are also included

DRIVER Technology Watch Report

This report is part of the Discovery Workpackage (WP4) and is the third report out of four deliverables. The objective of this report is to give an overview of the latest technical developments in the world of digital repositories, digital libraries and beyond, in order to serve as theoretical and practical input for the technical DRIVER developments, especially those focused on enhanced publications. This report consists of two main parts, one part focuses on interoperability standards for enhanced publications, the other part consists of three subchapters, which give a landscape picture of current and surfacing technologies and communities crucial to DRIVER. These three subchapters contain the GRID, CRIS and LTP communities and technologies. Every chapter contains a theoretical explanation, followed by case studies and the outcomes and opportunities for DRIVER in this field