TextGrid – Virtual Research Environment for the Humanities

The TextGrid research group, a consortium of 10 research institutions in Germany, is developing a virtual research environment for researchers in the arts and humanities that provides services and tools for the analysis of text data and supports the curation of research data by means of grid technology. The TextGrid virtual research environment consists of two main components: the TextGrid Laboratory (TextGridLab), which serves as the entry point to the virtual research environment, and the TextGrid Repository (TextGridRep), which is a long-term humanities data archive ensuring sustainability, interoperability and long-term access to research data. To support all stages of the research lifecycle, preserve and maintain research data, and ensure its long-term usefulness, existing research practices must be supported. Therefore the TextGridLab provides common functionalities in a sustainable environment to intensify re-use of data, tools, and services, and the TextGridRep enables researchers to publish and share their data in a way that supports long-term availability and re-usability

Approaches to digital editing

This paper discusses approaches to digital editing, focusing on two projects, ReScript and Early English Laws (http://www.earlyenglishlaws.ac.uk). It also touches on some of the other tools available to editors, for example those offered as part of TextGrid. ReScript, a project of the Institute of Historical Research, aims to develop a prototype editing facility, which will support collaboration within established editorial teams as well as a crowdsourced approach to producing editions. It is currently being trialled with texts at a range of stages of production, from ‘completed’ 19th-century editions which will benefit from correction and annotation to completely new works. Early English Laws aims to publish online new editions and translations of all English legal codes, edicts and treatises produced up to and including Magna Carta in 1215. A bespoke editing facility has been developed by the Department of Digital Humanities at King’s College London which, like ReScript, will support collaborative editing, as well as export to print where appropriate. The latter project is particularly complex as it has to accommodate a variety of languages and editorial approaches (scholars working on early English texts, for example, have very different requirements from those working with Latin documents). The tools developed by both of these projects will be made available in due course for use and adaptation by and for other projects. The paper was given at the 'Envisioning REED in the digital age' workshop organised by the Records of Early English Drama project, University of Toronto, 4-5 April 2011

Applying Semantic Web Technologies to Medieval Manuscript Research

Medieval manuscript research is a complex, fragmented, multilingual field of knowledge, which is difficult to navigate, analyse and exploit. Though printed sources are still of great importance and value to researchers, there are now many services on the Web, some commercial and many in the public domain. At present, these services have to be consulted separately and individually. They employ a range of different descriptive standards and vocabularies, and use a variety of technologies to make their information available on the Web. This chapter proposes a new approach to organizing the international collaborative infrastructure for interlinking knowledge and research about medieval European manuscripts, based on technologies associated with the Semantic Web and the Linked Data movement. This collaborative infrastructure will be an open space on the Web where information about medieval manuscripts can be shared, stored, exchanged and updated for research purposes. It will be possible to ask large-scale research questions across the virtual global manuscript collection, in a quicker and more effective way than has ever been feasible in the past. The proposed infrastructure will focus on building links between data and will provide the basis for new kinds of services which exploit these data. It will not aim to impose a single metadata standard on existing manuscript services, but will build on existing databases and vocabularies. The article describes the architecture, services and data which will comprise this infrastructure, and discusses strategies for making th challenging and exciting goal a reality

E(nhanced)-research and the future role and tasks of research libraries

Ettekanne TÜ raamatukogus Saksa-Eesti akadeemilise nädala Academica raames 04.11.2008

Accelerating transition to virtual research organisation in social science (AVROSS) : final report

This report is the fourth deliverable of the AVROSS study (Accelerating Transition to Virtual Research Organisation in Social Science, AVROSS). The study aims were to identify the requirements and options for accelerating the transition from traditional research to virtual research organisations through e-Infrastructures. The reason for this focus is that it is clear that "soft" sciences have both much to gain and a key role to play in promoting e-Infrastructure uptake across the disciplines, but to date have not been the fastest adopters of advanced grid-based e-Infrastructure. Our recommendations to EU policy-makers can be expected to point the way to changing this situation, promoting e-Infrastructure in Europe in these disciplines, with clear requirements to developers and expected impact in several other disciplines with related requirements, such as e-Health

Virtual Research Environment for the ROSSIO infrastructure

Intuitive workspaces are crucial to the productivity of any researcher. In the field of Humanities, researchers usually need to deal with different formats of metadata, often coming from different sources. This is a serious drawback since it makes research a lot more demanding and time consuming. Therefore, shielding the user from this layer of complexity by presenting the data in a user-friendly and accessible interface is of great relevance. Moreover, the exchange of information and resources between researchers is an important aspect regarding the evolution of their work, making it ideal to provide them with a system where they can engage in collaborative activities. ROSSIO is an infrastructure that aims to be a meeting point where researchers have free and intuitive access to diverse digital contents in the areas of Social Sciences, Arts, and Humanities. For instance, this can be accomplished through the creation of a Virtual Research Environment (VRE). To that end, the goal of this dissertation is to develop a VRE that overcomes the mentioned challenges. Once the VRE is developed, researchers will have access to a number of functionalities that facilitate their workflow and research activities.Um ambiente de trabalho e intuitivo é crucial para a produtividade de qualquer investigador. Na área de Humanidades, os investigadores costumam lidar com diferentes formatos de metadados,muitas vezes provenientes de diferentes fontes. Isto é um grande inconveniente, uma vez que torna a investigação muito mais exigente e demorada. Por conseguinte, proteger o utilizador desta camada de complexidade, apresentando os dados numa interface intuitiva e acessível, é bastante vantajoso. Para além disso, a troca de informações e recursos entre investigadores é um aspeto importante no que diz respeito à evolução do seu trabalho, fazendo com que seja ideal fornecer-lhes um sistema onde se possam envolver em atividades de colaboração. O ROSSIO é uma infraestrutura que pretende ser um ponto de encontro onde os investigadores têm acesso aberto e intuitivo a diversos conteúdos digitais nas áreas das Ciências Sociais, Artes, e Humanidades, e uma das suas iniciativas é a criação de um Ambiente Virtual de Investigação (AVI). Para o efeito, o objetivo desta dissertação é desenvolver um AVI que supere os desafios mencionados. Uma vez desenvolvido o AVI, os investigadores terão acesso a uma variedade de funcionalidades que facilitam o seu fluxo de trabalho e as suas atividades de investigação

Digital Preservation Services : State of the Art Analysis

Research report funded by the DC-NET project.An overview of the state of the art in service provision for digital preservation and curation. Its focus is on the areas where bridging the gaps is needed between e-Infrastructures and efficient and forward-looking digital preservation services. Based on a desktop study and a rapid analysis of some 190 currently available tools and services for digital preservation, the deliverable provides a high-level view on the range of instruments currently on offer to support various functions within a preservation system.European Commission, FP7peer-reviewe