Tuesday, November 18, 2008

CONTENTdm Customization

Yesterday I attended training in Indianapolis on how to customize the CONTENTdm interface. It was very useful. Customization requires editing HTML files, and on occasion, editing some PHP. I wish my Design of Complex Web Sites had taught me PHP instead of Ruby, since I'm not in a position to program Ruby anyway, and even if I could, would not be using it here. Then again, learning Ruby actually did help me understand the PHP code.

We currently use CONTENTdm for digital images at Earlham. Prior to my arrival, the Plowshares Project was finished, and right now students are working on getting Earlham College and Friends United Meeting materials online. I will link to the site when they are done.

CONTENTdm has many uses, yet I worry about what we will use down the road. It is not a long term preservation solution; it is good for displaying images and increasing access and description of our collections, particularly photographs. While there are a large number of text documents in Plowshares, I'm not sure how I feel about uploading more manuscript collections in the software. I just hope if we get something new, or CONTENTdm dies, we can easily migrate to a new system.

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Archivists

I had an interesting online dialogue with Mark Pearson, who works as an Instructional Technologist at Earlham and also administers the course management system Moodle and Earlham Learning Spaces. We were talking about Institutional Repositories, and he read a paper I wrote a while back. One question he had was why an archivist does not consider herself to be a librarian. It's really good question, because in some ways (and officially here at Earlham, I think) I'm considered a librarian. But the work I do is very different from being a reference/instruction librarian or subject specialist, or other library positions. I don't mean different in being better or worse, just different. I wrote this in response and would be curious if any other archivists or librarians think I'm way off or got something right:


It's interesting that you are asking the question of why an archivist does not see herself as a librarian. That's a great question. There are many similarities between the professions as both attempt to provide access, arrange, and preserve information resources of many different types. However, archivists have always processed and arranged their materials very differently from librarians. Reference and access also have traditionally been done in a different manner as well. Currently, there is a great deal of convergence in the profession, but there are still some very important professional differences including:

--Archivists are trained differently. While I took a couple of library related courses, I took coursework directly related to archives and had internships working in archives (I also worked in a library, but generally it is unusual for librarians to work in archives for internships--no stats to back this up, so I could be wrong).

-- Archivists often participate in the professional organizations of librarians including ACRL and ALA, but archivists also have their own national organization, the Society of American Archivists, that serves as an advocacy group and helps set archival standards. There are also many regional and topical organizations; for example, I'm active in the Midwest Archives Conference.

--As archival material often is unique, archivists have a different take on issues of security and access. Providing access to patrons and researcher is of the utmost importance, but the nature of the material requires different policies than in a library, such as not allowing primary documents outside the reading room and vigilance about security.

--Archival arrangement currently follows a standard called Describing Archives: a Content Standard (DACS). Archivists also have traditionally created finding aids for their collections, in comparison to traditional library cataloging. Of course, all of these descriptive means are in an upheaval right now as information professionals navigate new technology and increasingly digitize items.

--Archivists also appraise original materials, make decisions about what to keep and what to weed, must take care to preserve the materials long term, and now are dealing with digital born material and how providing access and preserving these items presents new challenges (As are librarians).

--Many traditional archives practices are under review right now, especially the degree of processing a collection may receive. Archivists also are engaging usability studies, metrics, and focusing on how to better serve their researchers and patrons. Traditionally, archivists have viewed themselves as guardians, but while preserving history is still very important, being more open about access has fortunately become just as important.

Those were just thoughts I had this morning, in part sparked by a discussion at a staff meeting about the hours of Earlham's archives. I think we have very accessible hours compared to many archives: M-F 9-12, 1-4, 7-9, and Sat/Sun 1-4. And we rely on student workers to cover some of those hours. I've done my best to remind my students when they work, sending emails reminding them of their scheduled weekend hours and asking them to let me know about conflicts in advance--I have found this simple effort at communication makes a big difference. So far, they have been great--I'm very fortunate in my student workers. In the past, there have been students who have missed their shifts, and reference librarians have let people into the archives. Now, I certainly would be upset a student missed their shift, but I also am very conflicted about a reference librarian letting a student or researcher into our collections, even if the door is locked behind them. I think we reached the agreement this morning in the meeting that if someone wants in and we are closed per our scheduled hours, the researcher will not be let in.

The dilemma is that we have circulating books in our Special Collections, as we have all books related to Quakerism in the archives open shelves, a decision that makes a lot of sense in that it creates a unified collection and helps maintain Earlham's Quaker history and identity (manuscripts, original Quaker records, rare books, and the college archives are locked and researchers not allowed in). But it does cause problems with students who expect to have access to a circulating book. I think our hours are posted prominently, though I'm going to work on making them even more transparent. Many special libraries within a larger library have fewer open hours and students adjust. Then again, perhaps the circulating books should someday be moved to a different part of the library so students can access them at all times the library is open. I have my doubts about whether that would work. But what is more important, providing instant access or keeping items important to the heritage of the school together? These are all issues we likely should consider for the future.

Thursday, November 6, 2008

Mothman Prophecies

I am breaking some rule of blogging by having no focus for my blog (travel? work? random stuff? movie reviews?) but I have a need to report on the movie I watched last night. It was called The Mothman Prophecies and Richard Gere and Laura Linney starred.

Perhaps I chose this movie from Netflix to raise my geek profile; internet quizzes point to me being a pure nerd rather than geek. I remember reading a story about the Mothman legend in sixth grade language arts, and it always haunted me. Thus, I rented this movie hoping to learn more about the legend's origins. I have a genuine interest in unexplained phenomena and the cultural explanations for these. However, this movie was an X Files wannabe. If Mulder and Scully were in it, it would have been fine. Gere and Linney had no chemistry and failed miserably (not that they were trying to emulate the X Files, just an obvious comparison in my opinion). It had great atmospheric music and cinematography and production values. But you never had any sort of idea of what the Mothman was or why anything was happening. It needed more shots of a man in a giant moth costume, in my opinion. I will give it credit for the last 25 minutes were genuinely gripping but the rest of this movie just had a bunch of confused people walking around.

The real Mothman legend came from Point Pleasant West Virginia, where reports of a mothman preceded a bridge collapse in which 46 people died. They have a statue of the Mothman in their downtown, so I may go visit it someday. They also have the world's only Mothman Museum. Road trip.