A Chicken or An Egg? Planning Your Digital Project Presentation to the Saskatchewan Libraries Conference Digitization 101 Pre-Conference Workshop May 3, 2007 By Carol Hixson University Librarian University of Regina

Why, What, Who, How, When Why do you want to build a digital collection? Why do you want to build a digital collection? What do you have to digitize and how do you select what to digitize? What do you have to digitize and how do you select what to digitize? What are the challenges? What are the challenges? Who will be involved? Who will be involved? How do you plan? How do you plan? How will you implement and manage? How will you implement and manage? How will you evaluate? How will you evaluate? When will you be done? When will you be done?

Why Build Digital Collections? Because everyone else is? No!

To provide access to and awareness of materials To provide access to and awareness of materials To broaden access to physically fragile materials To broaden access to physically fragile materials To preserve some at risk materials To preserve some at risk materials To strengthen and build partnerships To strengthen and build partnerships To expand support for instructional programs To expand support for instructional programs To explore new delivery mechanisms for content To explore new delivery mechanisms for content To help shape the digital landscape To help shape the digital landscape To respond to user demand To respond to user demand

What to Select Digitization projects based on federally held collections and information holdings and supported by dedicated funding should:  support lifelong education and learning  reinforce a shared national consciousness and informed citizenship  be linked to economic growth and job creation

What to Select Decisions to select materials for digitization should also be based on a business-like approach that:  identifies target user populations  understands the needs and expectations of the users  identifies measurable deliverables that will demonstrate benefits  includes a promotion/marketing plan  provides itemized costing  takes into account the work necessary for obtaining copyright clearance for the material to be digitized

What to Select Meet your institution’s broad collection development criteria Meet your institution’s broad collection development criteria Visual impact Visual impact Historical significance Historical significance Illustration of a particular theme Illustration of a particular theme Meet needs of special user group Meet needs of special user group

What to Select Copyright: The Place to Begin Copyright: The Place to Begin Intellectual Nature of the Source Materials Intellectual Nature of the Source Materials Current and Potential Users Current and Potential Users Actual and Anticipated Nature of Use Actual and Anticipated Nature of Use Format and Nature of the Digital Product Format and Nature of the Digital Product Describing, Delivering, and Retaining the Digital Product Describing, Delivering, and Retaining the Digital Product Relationships to Other Digital Efforts Relationships to Other Digital Efforts Costs and Benefits Costs and Benefits

handbook/DecTree.pdf

What Are the Challenges?  Public interface – Web design  Context for collections  Building multiple collections simultaneously  Technical issues  Costs  Copyright  Training staff

Technical issues  Technical expertise  Hardware and software  Metadata support  Interoperability  User interface  Digital preservation

Technical expertise  Knowledge of operating systems and servers  Knowledge of database structure  Ability to troubleshoot  Knowledge of standards

Hardware and software  Open source  Purchased or licensed  Locally mounted or hosted externally  Adequate space and infrastructure  Robust backup mechanisms

Software requirements  Accept variety of digital formats  Allow for submission of digital objects, item-by-item or batch loading  Customizable user interface  Modular  Flexible system administration  Granular authorizations

Software requirements  Underlying mapping to standards- based metadata  Support controlled vocabularies  Flexible metadata capture, edit, and display  Global change capabilities  Statistics and reports

Digital preservation Digital preservation is essentially about preserving access over time. This makes it virtually impossible neatly to segregate costs which are only for digital preservation from costs which are only about access Digital preservation is essentially about preserving access over time. This makes it virtually impossible neatly to segregate costs which are only for digital preservation from costs which are only about accesswww.dpconline.org/graphics/digpresstratoverview.html

Digital preservation  Ensuring the long-term maintenance of a bitstream (the zeros and ones):  backing up files and keeping a copy at an offsite location  running checks to track the deterioration of storage media, files or bitstreams

Digital preservation  Providing continued accessibility of the contents:  viability  renderability  understandability

Digital preservation strategies  Bitstream copying  Refreshing  Durable/persistent media  Analog backups  Digital archaeology  Migration  Emulation

Digital preservation components  Metadata registry  Format registry  Checksum verification  Backup procedures  Persistent identifiers

Who Will Be Involved?  Library staff?  Computing center staff?  Faculty? Students? Target audience?  Campus or community partners?  Sister institutions?  Professional marketers?  Commercial vendors?

Staffing roles  Coordinator with overall responsibility  Web site designers  Group to make policy decisions  Staff to handle or review submissions  Staff to set up and maintain the system and resolve technical issues  Group or individuals to make contacts and market the collections  Staff for subsidiary services

How to Plan?  Develop a business plan  Develop a project plan  Document decisions  Make your decisions reversible

Business plan elements Mission, Vision, Values, Goals Mission, Vision, Values, Goals Executive summary Executive summary Product or service description Product or service description Needs assessment or market research Needs assessment or market research Environment and competition Environment and competition Markets and services Markets and services Organizational structure Organizational structure

Business plan elements Financial plans Financial plans Product evaluation and usability assessment Product evaluation and usability assessment Drawn from: Business Planning for Cultural Heritage Institutions Liz Bishoff and Nancy Allen Council on Library and Information Resources, 2004

Project plan issues Why are you doing it? Why are you doing it? Who is your target audience? Who is your target audience? Who will do the work? Who will do the work? What do you have to digitize and how will you select? What do you have to digitize and how will you select? What standards will you follow? What standards will you follow? What software and hardware will you use? What software and hardware will you use? How will you preserve the collection? How will you preserve the collection? How will you pay for it? How will you pay for it? How will you manage the project? How will you manage the project? How will you evaluate the project? How will you evaluate the project?

Project Management Web pages Web pages Archived discussion lists Archived discussion lists Project management software Project management software Folders, spreadsheets, etc. Folders, spreadsheets, etc. Overlapping responsibilities Overlapping responsibilities

Project Evaluation Focus groups Focus groups Web forms Web forms Formal surveys Formal surveys Use statistics Use statistics Outside consultants Outside consultants

When Will You Be Done? When you run out of money When you run out of money When you run out of materials to digitize When you run out of materials to digitize When your users lose interest When your users lose interest When you run out of time When you run out of time Never Never

Contact Information Carol Hixson University Librarian Dr. John Archer Library University of Regina 3737 Wascana Parkway Regina, SK S4S 0A2 Phone: (306) Fax: (306)