Working Group on the Creation of a Digital Collections Database.
Justice, Andrew
The Working Group on the Creation of a Digital Collections Database
presented its first year of work in Montreal, which consisted of a beta
version of the database. This had been made over the course of the year
following the Dublin meeting in conjunction with Paul Buchanan, a
doctoral library student at the University of North Texas with
considerable professional experience in information technology and
software programming. Buchanan's main area of research is music
encoding, and he spent several months exploring various methods of
metadata harvesting from North American institutions (including MARC,
Dublin Core, and various XML permutations). The beta version was
presented to those in attendance, with the vast majority of the session
being a discussion from many different perspectives.
With the context of the database being to collect and reflect
digitized items which are already in existence and the understanding
that the scope will include IAML-affiliated institutions (to cut a wider
swath than other projects such as IMSLP, the Sheet Music and Music
Treasures consortia, and score-focused platforms such as Peachnote), the
primary concern of those in attendance was how to include the many
metadata standards represented by different institutions, consortia, and
countries, as well as linked data and the question of RDA. Consortia
databases were also a major concern, as many European digitized items
are part of a consortia and the owning institutions may not have a voice
in how the metadata is presented or made available.
It was agreed that the best way to proceed would be to identify
representatives from Germany, France, Italy, and the United Kingdom for
membership on the working group, so that the major European producers of
digital content could be consulted and the more pressing issues of
metadata harvesting can be explored more fully. Presentation of our work
in Vienna will include commentary on the aforementioned issues and an
updated plan for moving forward with this project.
Andrew Justice
Chair
