M ETADATA S TANDARDS FOR D IGITAL R ECORDS : H ELPING THE P UBLIC F IND THE R ECORDS THEY N EED Cheryl Walters, Kayla Willey, and Sandra McIntyre Electronic Records Conference April 28, 2011

O NCE PEOPLE HAD TO COME IN TO R ECORDS C ENTERS TO USE MATERIALS People come into Records Centers Records center staff help them find information Person examines records with aid of inventory

N OW M ANY M ORE WAYS F OR P UBLIC TO DISCOVER AND ACCESS RECORDS Records Digital Collection Google & harvesters Users on site Online Finding aids Database or catalog records The Goal: Everything connects

M ETADATA STANDARDS : T HE IMPACT ON SEARCHING Sandra McIntyre Program Director Mountain West Digital Library Utah Academic Library Consortium

G OAL : A RECORD THAT IS PUBLICLY VIEWABLE ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD

O NLINE ACCESS AND PRINT ORDERS

M OUNTAIN W EST D IGITAL L IBRARY Search portal at Network of digitization projects in Utah, Nevada, and other places in the Mountain West Program for increasing digital library efforts of the member libraries of the Utah Academic Library Consortium

T YPES OF RECORDS IN MWDL Photographs Artworks Video clips Oral history audio clips Books Journals Historical newspapers Pioneer diaries Theses and dissertations Finding aids in EAD format

T YPES OF RECORDS IN MWDL Minutes Log books Maps, plans, and drawings Bills and ordinances Death certificates Plans and reports

F IND IN W ORLD C AT

M OUNTAIN W EST D IGITAL L IBRARY : G OALS FOR U SERS One-stop search portal for digital collections in the Mountain West Successful searching and browsing Interesting ways to discover items Interesting juxtapositions of items from different sources

S YSTEM : E X L IBRIS P RIMO An integrated discovery system Sits on top of other library systems, e.g., catalogs Powerful harvesting of digital collections Powerful searching Online delivery

H ARVESTING METADATA FROM REPOSITORIES

Open Archives Initiative (OAI) and Dublin Core

D UBLIN C ORE RECORD VIA OAI

R ESULTS IN MWDL

C ONSISTENCY OF M ETADATA Across 650,000 records Over 350 collections In a variety of media From 59 diverse partner organizations Hosted on 17 repositories With rich metadata

S OME M ETADATA C HALLENGES : L EADING USERS TO ITEMS THAT LACK WORDS For visual materials For audio materials For handwritten texts Computer-readable text

M AKING M ETADATA W ORK IN DIFFICULT CASES Making printed texts easy to find is obvious and easy – make the words searchable But what about digital objects that have no searchable texts? Photographs, Slides, Artwork Handwritten letters, ledgers, diaries Audio, video

H OW DO YOU SEARCH & FIND A P HOTOGRAPH ? Description: Man and woman standing in front of an agent’s car covered with … posters reading “A Silo is the Dairyman’s Savings Bank… good milk is clean milk … Description: Man and woman standing in front of an agent’s car covered with … posters reading “A Silo is the Dairyman’s Savings Bank… good milk is clean milk … Title: View of agent’s car covered with promotional dairying posters Title: View of agent’s car covered with promotional dairying posters Subject terms: Advertising Agricultural extension workers – Utah Automobiles Subject terms: Advertising Agricultural extension workers – Utah Automobiles

H OW ABOUT A HANDWRITTEN LETTER ? Where to find the letter : Ridgway family papers, …MSS 8 Box 1 Folder 13 Where to find the letter : Ridgway family papers, …MSS 8 Box 1 Folder 13 Subject terms: Teenagers -- Correspondence Ridgway, Robert, Ornithologists Baird, Spencer Fullerton, Subject terms: Teenagers -- Correspondence Ridgway, Robert, Ornithologists Baird, Spencer Fullerton, Description: Handwritten incoming correspondence to Robert Ridgway from Spencer Baird, June 22, 1869 … It discussed Utah specimens that Ridgway had sent to Baird … Description: Handwritten incoming correspondence to Robert Ridgway from Spencer Baird, June 22, 1869 … It discussed Utah specimens that Ridgway had sent to Baird …

H OW ABOUT A HANDWRITTEN LETTER ? i hope you will have a chance among the pines, and meet with nests of some of the jays … gather up a large number of these pipilos so that we may settle all questions concerning them.

For this interview, we provide the audio, plus a searchable transcript and full metadata description And what about Audio, Video?

Subjects: Haney, Darnel L. -- Interviews Race discrimination -- Utah -- History School integration -- Arizona – Phoenix African American athletes -- Interviews Subjects: Haney, Darnel L. -- Interviews Race discrimination -- Utah -- History School integration -- Arizona – Phoenix African American athletes -- Interviews Summary of interview: USU alumnus and former basketball player Darnel Haney... talked about …his childhood in Phoenix, Arizona where he was the first black athlete to play high school basketball.... Throughout he talks about racial attitudes he has encountered during his life. Summary of interview: USU alumnus and former basketball player Darnel Haney... talked about …his childhood in Phoenix, Arizona where he was the first black athlete to play high school basketball.... Throughout he talks about racial attitudes he has encountered during his life. How many people had ever been around black people before? They would ask “Well, what do you people want to be called?” I would say “I want to be called Darnel, number one.”

T HE O RIGINS OF M ETADATA -- A LL OF THESE THINGS ARE DISCOVERABLE VIA THE W EB -- H OW DID WE GET HERE ? Information wasn’t always so easy to share or find

A LONG AND WINDING ROAD … Handwritten entries in a single ledger Handwritten cards in single card catalog Printed catalog, many copies Evolution of rules so information could be shared Application profiles for groups sharing records & objects in a collaborative environment

Catalogue of Boston Medical Library Arranged in Numerical Order: Manuscript, E NTRIES HANDWRITTEN IN A SINGLE BOOK In 1800s, handwritten lists, one copy in one library

H ANDWRITTEN C ARDS, S TILL LIMITED, BUT NOW MOVABLE … Then handwritten catalog cards in local card catalogs The Card Catalog at the University of Pennsylvania Library

Supplementary Catalogue of Books added to the San Francisco Free Public Library, P RINTED ENTRIES IN BOOK FORMAT, S TILL LIMITED, BUT NOW MULTIPLE COPIES

T YPEWRITTEN CATALOG CARDS, MOVABLE AND SHAREABLE … In first half of 1900s, union catalogs, typed catalog cards, & local card catalogs Library of Congress sold catalog card sets to Libraries for their card catalogs. At least three cards needed for each title: one for author, title, and at least one subject.

A DVENT OF THE COMPUTER In 1960s, two important developments MARC (Machine Readable Cataloging) invented Catalog records could be shared electronically Catalog records could be shared electronically OCLC library network in Ohio Libraries could share cataloging records Libraries could share cataloging records Libraries could easily check who owned what Libraries could easily check who owned what Libraries could borrow books from each other using OCLC Libraries could borrow books from each other using OCLC By 1980s, most libraries switched from card catalogs to online catalogs

C ATALOGING RULES HAVE CHANGED ALSO

W HERE WE ARE TODAY Internet: worldwide access & communication Many standards and formats so that information can be exchanged electronically Digitization of resources Eliminates need to travel to archives Facilitates discovery of information Anyone with a computer can use materials WorldCat & Making it easy to find info

S HARING M ETADATA

A LPHABET SOUP OF FORMATS & STANDARDS  MARC: 1960s MARC  EAD: 1993 Encoded Archival Description EAD  Dublin Core: elements Dublin Core  Dublin Core Extended or Qualified Set: elements  XML eXtensible Markup Language (a more flexible html-type language) XML  MARCXML: MARC rendered into XML MARCXML  METS: Metadata Encoding and Transmission Standard METS  MODS: Metadata Object Description Schema MODS

H OW TO T AKE INFORMATION IN ONE FORMAT AND GET IT INTO ANOTHER FORMAT : C ROSSWALKS None of the standards are wrong Key is to find a common ground for discovery OAI (Open Archives Initiative) uses the Dublin Core as the common language for metadata sharing Unique local information can still co-exist with information shared for discovery Local information can be kept private if desired

OAI response (XML) OAI H ARVESTING OAI Provider OAI request (HTTP) OAI Harvester CONVERSATION and METADATA EXCHANGE COMPUTER to COMPUTER OAI understands Dublin Core

OAI response (XML) OAI H ARVESTING OAI provider (CONTENTdm) OAI request (HTTP) Identify “Who are you?” ListSets “ What sets do you have available?” ListMetadataFormats “What metadata formats are available?” metadataPrefix=oai_dc “Give me the metadata for all records in simplified Dublin Core” “ I’m the UVU CONTENTdm Repository.” “Here is a list of sets.” “ Here’s the list of metadata formats.” “Here are the records.”

OAI Harvesting “Here are the records.”

M AP TO D UBLIN C ORE FOR OAI H ARVESTING Simple DC:Expanded DC:

Q UALIFIED D UBLIN C ORE TERMS PARTICULARLY PERTINENT TO RECORDS MANAGERS accrualMethod The method by which items are added to a collection. accrualPeriodicity The frequency with which items are added to a collection. accrualPolicy The policy governing the addition of items to or disposition from a collection. accessRights Information about who can access the resource or an indication of its security status. rights Information about rights held in and over the resource. rightsHolder A person or organization owning or managing rights over the resource.

Added Lavender and Reddish fields later – LOCAL fields, although some are shared by mapping them to DC

BYU R ECORDS M ANAGEMENT E XAMPLE In Dublin Core: Outdoors Unlimited 191 Rental receipts Feb ’04 Paid Rentals; Feb ‘04 z Tape; March ‘04 Bikes Paid; March ‘04 Rentals Paid Records Center Vault C : Row 14 Bay 20 Shelf 4 Position 3 text Oracle Stellent Database Display:

D EVELOPMENT OF THE MWDL D UBLIN C ORE A PPLICATION P ROFILE CDP Dublin Core Metadata Best Practices ( )  Based on Dublin Core Basic or Simple Set of Elements (15)  Version MWDL Dublin Core Application Profile (2010+)   Version 1.1 released June 2010  Based on Dublin Core Extended Set of Elements (55)  Defines the Common Ground for Discovery Additional Guidelines in Development Second version of Profile will incorporate feedback

H OW THE P ROFILE IS O RGANIZED Six sections:  Best Practices for All Fields  Explanation of Table Components  Elements (in alphabetical order)  Preservation Elements (Optional)  Vocabulary Encoding Schemes  Syntax Encoding Schemes

E LEMENT FIELDS  8 required fields Date, Description, Format, Identifier, Subject, Title, Type, Rights  2 mandatory if applicable fields Creator, Conversion Specifications  13 optional fields Abstract, Alternative, Contributor, Extent, isPartof, Language, Publisher, Relation, Source, Spatial, TableofContents, Temporal, Transcription COMMON SET FOR DISCOVERY AND DATA EXCHANGE

E XAMPLE OF TWO ELEMENTS FROM THE MWDL P ROFILE Every Required, Mandatory, and Optional Field is described in the Profile

N EW S ECTION : P RESERVATION ELEMENT

FUTURE Feedback & refine and ready to come out with second version Power and flexibility of the metadata standard People appreciate guidance and structure Coordinating power of a written document

W RAP U P : O PENING E LECTRONIC R ECORDS TO THE P UBLIC Through collaborations like MWDL, records from many entities can be searched simultaneously Power and flexibility of the metadata standard Record creators appreciate guidance and structure Coordinating power of a written document

Q UESTIONS ? Cheryl Walters Utah State University, Merrill-Cazier Library Kayla Willey Brigham Young University, Harold B. Lee Library Sandra McIntyre Mountain West Digital Library