Waypoints A Digital Archive of U.S. Coast Guard History IS257 Project Presentation Christine Jones, Jennifer Hastings, Ken Langford

U.S. Coast Guard Historical Archive  Maintained by U.S. Coast Guard historians office in Washington, D.C.  Donated materials from donors/donor groups; materials collected by USCG historians  Size of collection ~200K artifacts (depends on who you ask)

Diverse collection of artifacts  Physical artifacts (e.g., lighthouse lenses, artistic works)  Historical files (e.g., case documents of the Titanic sinking)  Photographic images

Current storage solution

Current access method (paper)

Current access method (digital)

Our solution: Waypoints  Administrative interface Capture information on artifacts in a structured, consistent way Add U.S. Coast Guard-specific metadata to enrich collection  Public interface Access entire collection online Promote exploration of underutilized historic materials

Conceptual Design: Usage Info  Administrative interface Users:historians, record keepers Needs: uncomplicated, fast input Tasks: record input, metadata creation  Public interface Users: USCG retirees, historians, public Needs:support content retrieval Tasks:subject browse, keyword search

Conceptual Design: Data  Entities Artifact  Photograph, historic document, physical artifact, video, oral history, artwork Creator Donor Collection Historian Historian Review

Conceptual Design: Metadata  Entities (continued) Year Person Thing Event Mission Unit Organization Location

ArtifactID Artifact User UserID Donor Creator Collection Historian Review Historian OralHistory Physical Artifact Video Historic Document Artwork CreatorID DonorID CollectionID HistorianReveiwID HistorianID ArtworkID HistoricDocumentID PhysicalArtifactID OralHistoryID VideoID CreatorID DonorID CollectionID Photograph PhotographID ArtifactID HistorianReviewID ArtifactID Logical Design: Waypoints ER Diagram ArtifactID HistorianID DonorID

ArtifactID Artifact CreatorID DonorID CollectionID HistorianReviewID Year OrganizationAssociation MissionAssociation UnitAssociation ThingAssociation LocationAssociation PersonAssociation EventAssociation associationID artifactID personFacetID thingFacetID eventFacetID missionFacetID unitFacetID organizationFacetID locationFacetID associationID artifactID associationID artifactID associationID artifactID associationID artifactID associationID artifactID associationID artifactID Person Thing Event Mission Unit Organization Location Logical Design: Waypoints ER Diagram (continued)

Logical Design Design Challenges Artifact sub-classing  Deciding which types of artifacts to represent  Handling photos Metadata structure and associations  Conveying many to many relationship  Creating the flexibility to show the full hierarchy of each piece of metadata

Physical Design  PHP and MySQL Implemented logical design in MySQL 4.1 and MySQL 3.23 Access Waypoints DB using PHP via Web interface  Web interface Photo input Photo detail Browse via metadata

Next Steps  Enrich the Administrative Interface Allow administrators to add artifacts Add capability to add metadata and assign it to artifacts  Continue adding data to the library  Evolve the Public UI based on user feedback

Feedback Questions/suggestions?