The Office of Digital Collections and Research (DCR) of the University of Maryland Libraries supports the teaching and research mission of the university by facilitating access to digital collections, information, and knowledge. This is accomplished through enhancing access to selected library resources through the development, maintenance, and preservation of digital collections; by serving as a knowledge resource within the university for digital library issues and development; by participating in national and international initiatives which further the development of new forms of scholarly communication, tools, standards, and applications; and by providing training and support in digital library standards and formats.
On July 9, DCR co-managers Dave Kennedy and Jennie Levine hosted a presentation at the 2008 Mid-Atlantic Digital Library Conference (MADLC) entitled Implementing a Digital Repository with Fedora. The talk focused on the development and implementation of the University of Maryland’s Digital Collections repository, based on the Fedora digital asset management platform.
The presentation explored the technical and organizational issues faced in mounting a relatively complex architecture with limited resources, as well as the various metadata schemes used in the system and the development of an API, object and content classifications, and web services. Issues of migration, authentication and archival storage featured prominently in the discussion. The presentation concluded by addressing future enhancements and plans for development, as well as stumbling blocks and lessons learned from the process of building a digital collections repository.
The PowerPoint slides of the presentation are available for viewing here.
The decision was unanimous. A Treasury of World’s Fair Art and Architecture has won the Worldwide Books Award for Electronic Publications given by the Art Libraries Society of North America. Patricia Kosco Cossard, Architecture, Planning, and Preservation Librarian, is the collection’s creator. The digital library provides access to artifacts, virtual tours and contextual essays covering a broad number of world’s fairs. The awarding committee said Cossard’s work was a grand undertaking and a significant contribution to the arts area disciplines.
Date: May 16, 2008
Kate Murray presents “Sticky-shed, Dropouts and Warping: Issues in Preserving Your Audiovisual Collections.” This talk, sponsored by the MLA’s Academic Research Libraries division, addresses the broad issues in preserving audiovisual media, including the exploring the unique challenges inherent in audiovisual collections, examining survey and assessment tools, and discussing a variety of migration strategies to continue access to content. The presentation focuses on digital reformatting policies at UM Libraries.
