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Re: Request for sources on creating & organizing archives of electronic materials



John Hunter wrote:
> I need advice about the best available references for
> defining models for organizing, accessing, and archiving electronic documents.

You raise many difficult questions, and I don't think there's any quick answer that could address all
of them.  As with any other issue related to information technology, the appropriate approach will
vary greatly, depending on things like:

- how much involvement you have in the design of systems for the creation and maintenance of active
records,
- resources available,
- how much descriptive and administrative metadata, documentation, data modeling, requirements
definition, etc. already exists and can thus be "borrowed" from the creating entity,
- whether the materials comply with open industry standards or are locked into more proprietary
systems, and if proprietary, how cooperative the vendors are (assuming they're still in business),
- whether you have access to the source code of relevant systems,
- how much the behavioral aspects of digital objects matter to you,
- intellectual property right contstraints associated with the materials in question,
- how much retention scheduling and appraisal has already been done for you,
- what sort of custody arrangement you have,
- the sorts of regulations or other organizational requirements that must be met in preserving the
materials.

If you're looking for a relatively high-level conceptual model for preservation, you might want to
took at:

- Reference Model for an Open Archival Information System (OAIS)
http://www.ccsds.org/red_books.html

Two sources of more specific functional requirements for recordkeeping systems are:

- Functional Requirements for Evidence in Recordkeeping
http://www.sis.pitt.edu/~nhprc/

- Design Criteria Standard for Electronic Records Management Software Applications (DoD 5015.2-STD)
http://jitc.fhu.disa.mil/recmgt/

These are just a few pointers that raise some of the important issues.  There are many other very
helpful sources out there.  I've tried to provide access to at least a few of them at:
http://www-personal.si.umich.edu/~calz/ermlinks/

No single source provides a definitive solution to the questions you raise.  There are many tools
(principles, methods, applications, etc.) available to address all of them.  But the proper
combination of these tools will vary from one situation to another.

The approach to take with a workflow system or data warehouse in a major, highly regulated corporation
will obviously differ in many ways from the approach to take with some Wordperfect files sitting on a
floppy disk that were donated along with a box full of papers.  Many issues will be the same, but
others will be quite different.

=========================================================
 Cal Lee
 University of Michigan
 School of Information
 Phone: 734-647-0505
 http://www-personal.si.umich.edu/~calz/
 "How can I know what I think because I forgot what I said?"
                                         - Karl Weick, 1979

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