South African Digitisation Initiative (SADI)

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://wiredspace.wits.ac.za/handle/10539/12494

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Now showing 1 - 10 of 13
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    A Policy Framework for the Digital Library
    (2013-03-07) Ubogu, Felix
    The paper argues that it is essential that an institution has an appropriate policy framework in place in order to ensure the long-term success of its digital library programme and that institutions do not have to reinvent the wheel but can adapt policies already in use by other institutions. Information gathered on digital libraries and repositories shows that many repositories do not have appropriate policies with regard to Content, Preservation, Metadata Re-use and Data Re-use. A comparison of the policies also shows a wide degree of variation, particularly in terms of depth and breadth of coverage. In South Africa, most institutions confirmed that they either had no policy or were in the process of drafting one.
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    Simple Cultural Heritage Preservation
    (2013-03-07) Prof. Dr. Suleman, Hussein
    Software systems coupled with digitisation for the digital preservation of heritage have become the norm because of the opportunities for vastly better discovery and dissemination over traditional preservation techniques. However, these systems often are built on the premise that digitisation by itself will lead to preservation and little thought goes into the design of the software systems. It is proposed that the design of these software systems should be principle-based, where the core of such principles can be extracted from an analysis of successful preservation systems. Systems built on these principles will arguably provide the best platforms for digital preservation of heritage. Among these principles, the notion of simplicity is key. Recent and ongoing work provide many operational examples of how simplicity and related ideas can be incorporated into the design of systems to maintain or increase the level of functionality and, arguably, improve the ability to preserve both content and services in the long term.
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    Overview of the Carnegie / NRF Digitisation Project
    (2013-03-07) Spingies, Heinrich
    In 2008, the NRF was awarded a grant by the Carnegie Corporation of New York to implement a Digitisation and Preservation Centre. The presentation will provide the delegates with an overview of the project, the accomplishments and challenges experienced to date and the way forward.
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    Here today… here tomorrow: sustainable digital collections – the Stellenbosch experience.
    (2013-03-07) Seyffert, Mimi
    The aim of this paper is to share the experiences of Stellenbosch University Library and Information Service in developing a digital collections repository, with specific focus on heritage collections. The Library’s strategic intervention of supporting, developing and contributing to high-level scholarly publication output includes the strategic goal of digitising unique collections within the Library and Information Service. This goal has recently been given new impetus with Stellenbosch University joining the Research Libraries Consortium and benefiting from a Carnegie Corporation of New York grant for the digitisation of heritage collections. The paper will look at the various processes we undertook to realise the aims of the project: from selecting and preparing collections for digitisation, liaising with external service providers, choosing a platform to host the content, making the content accessible and ultimately adding value to the collections. I will also discuss the challenges in keeping the integrity of original heritage collections and not jeopardising their context when transforming hard copy to digital. Finally, the paper will examine the ways in which we as the Library and Information Service ourselves have made investments to make these projects sustainable and to ensure not only the maintenance, but also the growth and further development of our digital collections.
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    The Wits Digitisation Experience: Lessons Learned and Suggestions for National Collaboration
    (2013-03-07) Roberts, Charl
    The presentation will provide a brief background to the Wits Digitisation Centre, the services it delivers and strategies for the sustainability of the Centre. It will discuss our vision for an Integrated Resource Discovery platform for digital resources in the Library as well as digitisation policy development at Wits. Finally, it will allude to some of the technical and intellectual issues that need to be engaged with for collaboration across institutions and a possible way forward for a South African Digital Libraries and Archives Portal will be proposed.
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    The Wits Digitisation Experience: Lessons Learned and Suggestions for National Collaboration
    (2013-03-07) Pickover, Michele
    The presentation will provide a brief background to the Wits Digitisation Centre, the services it delivers and strategies for the sustainability of the Centre. It will discuss our vision for an Integrated Resource Discovery platform for digital resources in the Library as well as digitisation policy development at Wits. Finally, it will allude to some of the technical and intellectual issues that need to be engaged with for collaboration across institutions and a possible way forward for a South African Digital Libraries and Archives Portal will be proposed.
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    Towards the Digital Institution
    (2013-03-07) Layton, Roger
    We are living at a unique point in history in which all memory institutions are being transformed from purely physical institutions towards the digital institution. This transformation could not occur in previous generations, since the technologies were not in place to support this change. This transformation should also be largely completed by the next generation in 20 years or so, with all institutions will have a digital structure which reflects and complements their physical structure. It is thus our generation’s responsibility, and perhaps ours alone in the long history of memory recording, to ensure that this transformation occurs properly, so that it benefits all future generations. 9 This transformation is a one-off event and it encompasses the entire institutional operation and is not confined merely to the capturing digital images and the creation of repositories. Rather, this transformation requires a total re-engineering of the institution, and requires a rapid catch-up in knowledge, capacity and technology within a sector which is largely populated with older specialists within insufficient knowledge of the digital world. This paper presents some key elements of this transformation with which we are currently engaged to help various institutions through this sea change. Our experience has been that few institutions have started to make significant moves into this digital transformation, although everyone has accepted its necessity, and we are now at the start of the real work which is needed throughout the entire sector. This has led me to identify three major areas of work to be done.
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    From Ions to Bits – Managing Data in a National Research Centre
    (2013-03-07) Dr. Klump, Jens
    Managing data in active research projects is a challenging task. The innovative nature of research requires a flexible data infrastructure that is able to adapt to ad-hoc changes. How can this be reconciled with the necessity to streamline infrastructure services in order to keep cost at a sustainable level? What must data management services look like to integrate well into the everyday work of a researcher? In the past the focus of attention has been on large volume research data. However, most research data is small and complex, already highly enriched with contextual information. Managing this “long tail” of research data is labour-intensive and requires new strategies and technological solutions to allow sustainable operation. Eventually, the results of a project are published in the literature and should be accompanied by data publications. The data, now being part of the record of science, has to be citeable and has to be curated for a long period of time. Data publication and long-term preservation call for new services and for cooperation between infrastructure providers (computing centre) and memory institutions (library). 8 This talk will investigate the challenges and solutions for managing research data, taking research at GFZ as an example.
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    Trusted Digital Archives. Experiences from the Landesarchiv Baden-Württemberg, nestor and DIN
    (2013-03-07) Dr. Keitel, Christian
    The presentation will address various solutions to users’ needs regarding authentic digital objects. It will describe the approach of a specific archive, the German standards on trustworthy digital archives and the procedure of the nestor certification. The most important factor for digital archives is their designated user. The user decides if he can trust the objects of the digital archive and with that he decides about the credibility of the entire archive. Hence, questions related to authenticity and trustworthiness are fundamental to the success or failure of the archive. We could distinguish two different user groups in this regard. Some users question the authenticity of individual archival objects (group 1), while most users look at the trustworthiness of the archive as a whole (group 2). The digital archive should serve both groups. The Landesarchiv Baden-Württemberg is a regional state archive in Germany. We have designed and implemented a digital magazine (DIMAG) in 2006 and the free software tool IngestList in 2008 (http://sourceforge.net/projects/ingestlist/). Both tools have some built-in functions to address the needs of group 1. nestor is the German competence network for digital preservation. It supports the cooperation between the main actors in the heritage sector (archives, libraries and museums). A nestor working group compiled a criteria catalogue on trustworthy digital archives between 2004 and 2008 (English version on http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0008-2010030806). On this basis, a 7 follow-up working group published the German standard DIN 31644 Trustworthy Digital Archives in 2012. Both this standard and the original criteria catalogue address the needs of both user groups. DIN 31644 stands between the Dutch Data Seal of Approval and the ISO 16363 Audit and Certification of Trustworthy Digital Repositories in terms of complexity and requirements. Each of these standardization initiatives has developed its own certification procedure. These three certification procedures compose the European Framework for Audit and Certification of Digitial Repositories (http://www.trusteddigitalrepository.eu). Finally, the presentation will outline the central elements of the nestor certification procedure versus DIN 31644.