1. The NOF Technical Advisory Service: Advice for the nof-digitise Programme
Richard Waller
NOF Technical Advisor
UKOLN is supported by:
A centre of expertise in digital information management

2. Introduction This presentation will:
introduce the programme served by TAS
explain the service’s rationale
give information on partners in the service
describe the service’s users
describe the service’s activities
describe the Programme members
give examples of TAS inter-operation
examine the issues raised over the service duration

3. NOF-digitise Programme
Programme Life: August 1999 to December 2004
£50 million funding to put information that supports lifelong learning into digitised form
It brings together a wide range of partnerships and organisations and is designed to support lifelong learning under one of three broad themes:
cultural enrichment
citizenship
re-skilling
Data resources comprised a considerable proportion of newly digitised material
Resources needed to be accessible, interoperable, durable and represent value for money

4. Rationale of NOF TAS
Need for informed support and advocacy of Technical Standards and Guidelines
Need for assistance in achieving standards compliance
Need for detailed and project-specific advice
Need for repository of standard and generic advice
Need for input into development of Technical Standards & Guidelines
Need for input into creation of Programme Manual
Need for examples of best practice
Need for means of communication to, from and between projects

5. The Partners Distributed team UKOLN, University of Bath
AHDS (Arts and Humanities Data Service), Kings College, London
Skills
UKOLN - Access (Web sites), Web site design and implementation, detailed technical support, support coordination, policy, documentation
AHDS – Digitisation, policy, Web site design

6. Nature of Users Nof-Digi projects:
come from higher education, local authority, museum, archive and other backgrounds
comprise a fairly heterogenous group
have a very wide range of technical competence
are involved in a variety of relationships with projects’ technical developers, ranging from in-house to commercial third-party with parent-child organisational relationships in between
NOF:
is composed of a project leader and case managers but with access to other forms of advice such as Resource
is a fairly homogenous group but which seeks advice on very varied matters from detailed project-specific issues to policy

7. Overview of Service Activities
Web sites:
FAQs
Information Papers
Workshop proceedings
Technical Standards & Guidelines
Programme Manual
Workshops
Project-specific advice
NOF-oriented advice

8. FAQs
FAQs are divided across different areas of the implementation cycle:
Web site design
Hardware and software
File formats
Legal issues
Digitisation
Metadata
Compliance

9. Information Papers
A series of papers intended to address key areas affecting the successful development of digitisation projects:
Topics:
Open Archives Initiative,Metadata Harvesting & the NOF Portal
Evaluation and Impact Assessment for NOF-digitise Projects
Website Perfomance Indicators
Writing for the Web
Web Site Performance Monitoring
Guidelines for Setting Up NOF-digitise Web Sites
An Introduction to Collection-Level Description
Metadata Sharing and XML
Content Management Systems
The Digitisation Process
Income generation and sustainability

10. Workshops Events: Example: Spring 2002 Virtual reality
Putting your project plan into practice: developing an information architecture
Creating Learning Resources
Website creation: good practice guidelines
Metadata: soup to nuts
Collection Level Description and NOF digitise projects
Preservation and NOF digitise projects
Evaluation and impact assessment for NOF digitise projects
From project to service: sustaining your work post-NOF digi
Image digitisation
Community Languages Workshops

11. Workshops
Events: Metadata: soup to nuts

12. Technical Standards & Guidelines
Current Version 5.0: Revised February 2003
Developed principally by UKOLN in association with Resource
Overview of Contents
Introduction
Creation
Management
Collection Development
Access
Re-use

13. Programme Manual The aims of the Programme Manual are
to provide NOF project managers and team/consortia members with a range of guidelines and information to assist and support in the practical implementation of the funded projects
to provide support in planning, managing and evaluating digitisation projects in future programmes funded in the UK and elsewhere

14. Project-specific Advice
NOF TAS query handling :
enquiries
Telephone enquiries
Site visits
Discussion list

15. Queries Handled

16. NOF-oriented Advice TAS also provides service to NOF in the form of:
Review meetings
Case manager-oriented ‘surgeries’
Policy review and advice
NOF-related discussion lists

17. Programme Members Project Leader TAS Becta Project Project Project n
Resource
Case Managers
TAS
Becta
Project
Project
Project n

18. Referral Process (1) Project Leader TAS Becta Project Project Project
Resource
Case Managers
TAS
Becta
Project
Project
Project n

19. Referral Process (2) Project Leader TAS Becta Project Project Project
Resource
Case Managers
TAS
Becta
Project
Project
Project n

20. TAS Position in Compliance Process
Project Leader
Resource 3
Case Managers 2
TAS
Becta 5 4 1
Project
Project
Project n

21. Service Issues
The earlier a support mechanism is introduced in a programme the greater the impact and service responsiveness
Ideally it should be involved in the creation of the standards on which it will advise
There is a conflict between advice and real world implementation that we must handle flexibly
If projects are to implement standards they need to understand them clearly and why they should use them
We fashion general advice from what we perceive as the current problems as well as about problems already known
We cannot prescribe nor anticipate everything … but we try

22. References NOF TAS http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/nof/support/
nof-digitise