The Human Face of Digital Preservation: Organizational and Staff Challenges, and Initiatives at the Bibliothèque nationale de France

The process of setting up a digital preservation repository in compliance with the OAIS model is not only a technical challenge: libraries also need to develop and maintain appropriate skills and organizations. Digital activities, including digital preservation, are nowadays moving into the mainstream activity of the Library and are integrated in its workflows.The Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF) has been working on the definition of digital preservation activities since 2003. This paper aims at presenting the organizational and human resources challenges that have been faced by the library in this context, and those that are still awaiting us.The library has been facing these challenges through a variety of actions at different levels: organizational changes, training sessions, dedicated working group and task forces, analysis of skills and processes, etc. The results of these actions provide insights on how a national library is going digital, and what is needed to reach this longstanding goal

Analysis of Gallica and Data BnF logs and Modelling of Behaviour Patterns: Presentation of the Main Results

Gallica (http://gallica.bnf.fr) is one of the major digital libraries available for free via the Internet. It provides access to million of documents of any type and receive around 1.5 million visits per month. In the context of a research partnership between the BnF and Télécom ParisTech, an analysis of Gallica servers’ connection logs was carried out, applying machine-learning methods to them. The aim was not to collect information on users or their profiles but rather to use logs, which act as records of usage, as a basis for identifying typical clickstreams. For 15 months, a data clusterisation algorithm was developed, enabling grouping of Gallica sessions with similarities in sequencing and duration of actions . Logs analysed covered a range of durations, from a week to a month, with systematic checking of the stability of models obtained. Such learning methods take advantage of the very factor that undermines traditional methods for gathering information on usage: the extremely high numbers of connections. Despite the power of the algorithms involved, machine learning also requires numerous decisions to be taken, necessitating availability of other sources of knowledge on usages and users. For this reason, the preferred methodological choice was to have statistical models dialogue with results obtained from other approaches (ethnographic observations, interviews, etc.). The interest of the work carried out on the Gallica logs persuaded the BnF and Télécom ParisTech to add a further stage to the research devoted to Data BnF logs as well as clickstreams between Gallica, Data BnF and BnF General Catalogue

Following the user's flow in the Digital Pompidou

Since 2007, the Centre Pompidou, major modern art museum in Paris, developed a new digital strategy aiming at providing a global platform for online digital content: the Centre Pompidou Virtuel, which could literally translate as “Virtual Pompidou Center” or more accurately “Digital Centre Pompidou” . This platform provides access through a unique entry point to the whole digital production of the organization and associated institutions (Bpi, Ircam): digitized works of art, documents about art and art history, videos and podcasts, archival material, library books records, etc. The goal of the project was to make the online presence of the Centre Pompidou focus on the content rather than being just an institutional showcase mainly targeting physical visitors of the building in Paris. On the contrary, the Pompidou website is now a reference online tool for anyone interested in modern and contemporary arts, or in the humanities in general

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