Presentation of Getaneh Alemu (UPHEC) at the seminar "The Digital Media Collection +100 Years" in Bristol (16/09/2009) organised by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC)

1. Preservation Metadata Initiatives and Standards
JISC Seminar on "Digital Media +100 years“
16th September 2009, University of Bristol
David Anderson
Janet Delve
Dan Pinchbeck
Getaneh Agegn Alemu
Antonio Ciuffreda

2. KEEP Team and Partner Institutions
http://www.keep-project.eu

3. KEEP
Vision: preserving & facilitating access to digital objects
Strategy: developing an Emulation Access Platform
Work packages

4. KEEP Rationale
Only emulation can preserve all characteristics of a digital
object
Content, structure, context, appearance and behaviour
(Rothenberg & Bikson, 1999)
Digital objects have become very complex
Certain types of objects can not be migrated
Lack of knowledge about obsolete data carriers

5. Digital Preservation
Why digital preservation?
to ensure protection of information of enduring value for access by
present and future generations (Conway, 1990, p. 206).
How long digital objects need to be preserved?
Several hundred years (Exon, 1995)
Digital Media +100 years (JISC, 2009)
A century (Janée, G., Mathena, J., &Frew, J., 2008 )
Five years and more! (Verheul, 2006)

6. The challenges of digital preservation
It was ‘possible’ to preserve written material over
millennia
But we struggle to preserve digital information
even for few decades
The speed of technological change
Exponential increase in digital data(born digital)
Obsolescence
Withdrawal of institutional support
Legal issues

7. Digital Preservation Strategies
Emulation
Migration
Refreshing
Software (File Format) migration
Bitstream Copying (Replication)
Digital archeology
Analogue backup

8. The Paradox of Migration
Migration compels us to stipulate on behalf of
future generations
Loosing look-and-feel
dynamic websites, games, databases, executable programs
Listing significant properties is complex
Reliance on standards and formats

9. Migration vs Emulation
Jeff Rothenberg
David Bearman
Michael Day
Bearman, D. (1999). Reality and Chimeras in the Preservation of Electronic Records. D-Lib Magazine, 5(4).
Rothenberg, J. (1999). Avoiding Technological Quicksand: Finding a Viable Technical Foundation for Digital
Preservation. Council on Library and Information Resources.

10. Metadata is crucial for any preservation strategy
Digital information is plagued by:
Short media life
Obsolete hardware & software
Defunct websites (Chen, 2001)
Technology mediated access with a vengeance
We can not control change but we can have good metadata
So we need metadata for digital preservation

11. Preservation metadata
Metadata is a “structured information that
describes, explains, locates, or otherwise makes
it easier to retrieve, use or manage an
information resource.”
(NISO, 2004)
Focus has been on descriptive/bibliographic
metadata
Information that supports and documents the long-
term preservation of digital objects
(Lavoie and Gartner, 2005, p.2; OCLC/RLG, 2005).

12. Benefits of Preservation Metadata
enables a digital object to become self-
documenting over time
(Lavoie and Gartner, 2005, p.6).
supports to maintain:
Viability
Renderability
Understandability
Authenticity
Identity
(Woodyard-Robinson, 2006)
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosetta_Stone

13. Types of Information for Preservation Metadata
provenance information/custodial history
authenticity information
preservation activity
technical environment
rights management
Source: (Lavoie and Gartner, 2005; Caplan, 2009)

14. Metadata for Authenticity
Authenticity refers to “the quality of being what it purports to be”
(OCLC/RLG, 2005, p.4-6)
Digital objects that lack fixity, integrity and authenticity “are of
little value to repositories” (OCLC/RLG, 2005, p.4-5)
Fixity can be ensured if only the object is unchanged
throughout its archival life cycle

15. Open Archival Information System (OAIS)
OAIS is an organization of people and systems
Preservation & access for a designated community
CCSDS Blue Book 650.0-B-1:2002; ISO 14721: 2003; Pink Book: 2009

16. OAIS Information Model

17. What does it take to be OAIS Compliant?
Use common concepts and terminologies
Fulfil six mandatory responsibilities
negotiating and accepting information from producers
having enough mandate on the information
determine designated community
ensure understandability and usability of the content
using appropriate policies and procedures
ensuring availability of the preserved information

18. The RLG WG on Preservation Metadata
An earlier effort (1997/98)
A set of 16 metadata elements
for digital images
Aimed at access and
preservation
Not widely adopted
But contributed to the
development of PREMIS

19. The NLA PANDORA Logical Data Model
The PANDORA project was
initiated by NLA in 1996
Ensuring long-term access to
significant Australian on-line
publications.
High level entities
Identification
Persistent identifier
Selection and negotiation
Capture
Preservation
Rights management and access
control

20. Preservation Metadata Standards Framework
(National Library of New Zealand)

21. Networked European Deposit Library (NEDLIB)
Funded by the European Commission's Telematics
Applications Programme (1998-2000)
Led by the National Library of the Netherlands
Developed the Deposit System for Electronic Publications
(DSEP)
DSEP adopted the OAIS functions
Defined NEDLIB Metadata Elements

22. NEDLIB Metadata Elements

23. Networked European Deposit Library (NEDLIB)
Metadata Elements

24. CURL Exemplars in Digital Archives(Cedars)
Cedars was a JISC funded project in the UK from 2001-2002
(Universities of Cambridge, Leeds & Oxford)
Cedars developed a metadata specification for long-term
preservation of digital objects
Cedars based its metadata schema on OAIS information model
Cedars was invited by OCLC/RLG PREMIS WG

25. Cedars Metadata Elements
CEDARS Metadata Elements (Based on: Stone & Day, 1999, p. 2)

26. PReservation Metadata Implementation Strategies
From theory to practice
OCLC/RLG working group (>30 international
experts) in 2003
PREMIS Data Dictionary(2005; 2008)
Core & implementable
Neutrality
2005 DPC award winner

27. Can’t Environment be an entity in its own right?
Environment

28. PREMIS Data Dictionary

29. PREMIS Data Dictionary

30. LMER (Long-term preservation Metadata for Electronic Resources)
LMER metadata elements (Based on: Steinke, 2005)

31. LMER (Long-term preservation Metadata for Electronic Resources)
LMER metadata elements (Based on: Steinke, 2005)

32. Metadata Encoding and Transmission Standard

33. MODS in METS
Source: http://www.loc.gov/standards/premis/louis.xml

34. PREMIS in METS
Source: http://www.loc.gov/standards/premis/louis.xml

35. PREMIS in METS
Source: http://www.loc.gov/standards/premis/louis.xml

36. Format Registries

37. Metadata for Emulation Framework
Analyse state-of-the-art
Avoid duplication
Interoperability
Metadata management

38. Thank you for listening!
For comments email: Getaneh.Alemu@port.ac.uk
University of Portsmouth, UK