Challenges of Digital Preservation MA / CS 109 April 22, 2011 Andrea Goethals Manager of Digital Preservation & Repository Services Harvard Library

Challenges of Digital PreservationMA / CS 109April 22, 2011

Andrea GoethalsManager of Digital Preservation & Repository ServicesHarvard Library

“Digital Content”?Digitized (born-

analog)

Born-digital◦ Tweets◦ Web sites◦ Email◦ Documents

PDF Word, OpenOffice … Spreadsheets

◦ Data sets

Digital content is not new1957: 1st digital

image1969: ARPAnet1971: 1st email

sent1972: 1st

consumer-level video game

1975: 1st digital camera

Russell Kirsch’s son (source: NIST)

But has only recently exploded

1998: 1st Google index◦ 26 million pages

2000: Google index◦ 1 billion pages

2008: Google link processors◦ 1 trillion unique URIs◦ “… and the number of

individual Web pages out there is growing by several billion pages per day” – from the official Google blog

The coming tsunami2010: estimated

at 1.2 ZB (1 ZB is 1 million TBs)◦ DVDs stacked from

Earth to the Moon and back

2020: expected to grow by a factor of 44 to 35 ZB◦ DVDs stacked

halfway to Mars

Source: 2010 IDC Digital Universe Study sponsored by EMC

Outpacing storage

Source: 2009 IDC Digital Universe Study sponsored by EMC

Why do we care?

May be historically significant

Captured March 19, 2011 for a Japan Earthquake collection created by Virginia Tech, Internet Archive (http://www.archive-it.org/public/collection.html?id=2438)

http://www.archive-it.org/public/collection.html?id=2438

May be a work of art

YouTube Play. A Biennial of Creative Video (Oct. 2010 -)

http://bit.ly/a1phac

May be an important reference

Only availabl

e in digital

form

May only be possible digitally

http://ids.lib.harvard.edu/ids/view/15385910?buttons=y

Who cares?Cultural heritage institutions

◦Libraries, archives◦Museums, historical societies◦Academic institutions

GovernmentsEntertainment, news and media

industryScientific communityFunding bodies (NSF, NIH)You?


Preservation historicallyArchives and libraries have been

preserving all kinds of analog material for centuries using:◦Environmental control◦Conservation treatments

Can store away until resources allow processing◦Benign neglect approach works well


Analog content is fairly durableEven damaged, may still be

identifiable, readable, usable

Anatolian Cuneiform Tablet, circa 1850 BCE


In contrast digital content isEasily destroyedTransientHiddenRequires more active attention –

benign neglect approach doesn’t work


Digital content is easily destroyedBad peopleHardware or

software failuresHuman mistakes

◦ The slip of a finger can lead to catastrophic results

◦ “Help! Accidental deletion. I accidentally deleted 62 images… can you please recover them from backups?”

Digital content is transientAverage lifespan of a Web site is

between 44 and 100 days

Captured April 8, 2009 Visited October 13, 2010


Digital content is hiddenWhich is corrupt?


Digital content is hiddenBoth. Use helps but its not

enough to detect corruption.


But is it usable???It’s not enough to preserve the

digital bits◦AppleWorks?◦WordStar?◦Excel 1.0?

To use digital content we need software that can read the format


Reading formats

ffd8ffe000104a46494600010201008300830000ffed0fb050686f746f73686f7020332e30003842494d03e90a5072696e7420496e666f000000007800000000004800480000000002f40240ffeeffee030602520347052803fc00020000004800480000000002d80228000100000064000000010003030300000001270f0001000100000000000000000000000060080019019000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000003842494d03ed0a5265736f6c7574696f6e0000000010008313a3000200 ...

Reading formats


SOIAPP0 JFIF 1.2APP13 IPTCAPP2 ICCDQTSOF0 183x512DRIDHTSOSECS0RST0ECS1RST1ECS2...

Reading formats


SOIAPP0 JFIF 1.2APP13 IPTCAPP2 ICCDQTSOF0 183x512DRIDHTSOSECS0RST0ECS1RST1ECS2...

Access to information

informationcontent

bitsformats

SWHW

HW (paper)informationcontent

HW (paper)

symbols

language

Analog

bookUnmediated access

Digital bookTechnology-mediated

access

Formats are key to digital preservation

informationcontent

bitsformats

SWHW

supp

orting

tech

nolo

gies

digi

tal

cont

ent

If the format of our content is unsupported by technology, we can’t access the content’s information!

Dependent on fleeting technologyWe are dependent on technology

to interpret (render, play, etc.) digital content

No technology sticks around – it all ages and disappears

Eventually all digital content in its original format becomes unusable!


Format obsolescenceKodak PhotoCD

◦Used by libraries in the 1990’s and into 2000’s as a preservation format

◦Best decoders were from Kodak and are no longer supported

◦Very few software decoders remaining – soon images in this format will be unusable

◦Harvard’s Digital Repository Service has 7,243 of these


Two sub-problemsKeep the bits

safeKeep the

information usable as technology changes

Safe bitsInfrastructure, polices, practices and

professional staff to counter risks◦High quality storage◦Redundancy (multiple copies, multiple

locations)◦Media refreshing (replacing)◦Security and access restrictions◦Content recovery◦Integrity monitoring (check for

corruption)…


Integrity monitoringMessage digests – unique

signatures for digital content◦Fixed-size bit strings

6326ec82b3200df4a87fc54356d2cb73

◦Calculated by cryptographic hash functions, e.g. MD5, SHA1, …

Any changes to a file result in a changed message digest

Useful for detecting corruption


Usable informationPeople have to be able to find itPeople must be able to manage itDocument what’s important

(description, context, ownership, processing history)

Know what you are preserving (formats)…


A TIFF is a TIFF?Tiff 4.0Tiff 5.0Tiff 6.0Tiff 6.0 extension

YCbCr (Class Y)TIFF/IT (ISO

12639:2003)TIFF/EP (ISO 12234-

2:2001)RichTIFFEXIF 2.0

EXIF 2.1 (JEIDA-49-1998)

EXIF 2.2 (JEITA CP-3451)GeoTIFF 1.0TIFF-FX (RFC 2301)Class F (RFC 2306)RFC 1314Canon RAW

(.crw, .cr2, .tif)Nikon RAW (.nef)DNG (Adobe Digital

Negative)

Identifying formatsTechniques: “magic numbers”,

full parseFew tools

◦Support limited number of formats◦Accuracy varies

Some improvements◦File Information Tool Set (FITS)

fits.google.code

◦NARA-sponsored research


Usable informationMake sure there’s technology to

support the formats! (technology watch)

Preservation strategies◦Technology preservation◦Creation of viewing software◦Emulation & variations:

Universal Virtual Machine Universal Virtual Computer

◦Format normalization◦Format migrations…


Key format migration considerationsWhat can’t be lost in the

transformation? “Significant properties”◦E.g. color, embedded metadata,

resolution, ICC profiles, interaction, attachments, fonts, links

◦How important are each of these properties? – weighted criteria

To what format? “Preservable” formatsWhat else must be changed? Ex: LinksHow many versions to keep?


Preservation lifecycle – a series of hand-offsCreate or acquire digital contentIngest into a preservation repository

◦Continuous cycle of: Monitoring Planning Intervention

◦Subject to collection management decisions

Transfer to next generation of the repository or to a different repository


Ongoing commitmentRequires continual proactive

program◦You can’t just start and stop◦Time frames are MUCH shorter than

for preservation of analog materialRequires ongoing investment in

infrastructure and staff


Can’t do it aloneDigital preservation activities

must be shared across institutions

Even collectively we don’t have adequate resources or understanding


Preservation communityCollaborative organizations

(NDSA, IIPC, OPF)Collaborative projectsStandards and best practicesShared infrastructure and tools

◦Formats registry◦Repository software◦Preservation planning tools◦Format tools
