Sharing Your Finding Sharing Your Finding Aids in CONTENTdmAids in CONTENTdm

Encoded Archival Description (EAD) Files in Mountain West Digital LibraryJune 3, 2009

Sandra McIntyre, Mountain West Digital LibraryCheryl Walters, Utah State University

Encoded Archival Description(EAD)

Used by archives and manuscripts libraries to encode data describing corporate records and personal papers

Variously called finding aids, guides, handlists, registers, or catalogues

Administered and maintained jointly by:Society of American Archivists U.S. Library of Congress

Encoded Archival Description(EAD)

Based on Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) and its subset, eXtensible Markup Language (XML)

Main sections:<eadheader> – contains the title and optional

subtitle of the collection and detailed information about the finding aid itself

<archdesc> – contains the description of the collection material itself

EAD file in XML Finding Aid text is encoded using EAD and XML markup so the finding aids can be shared, searched and viewed electronically.

EAD element titleproper in XML tagging: <titleproper encoding analog=“title”> Register of the Andrew Karl Larson Papers</titleproper>

XML is the markup language that allows EAD files to be read and exchanged electronically.

EAD 2002 Schema

See http://www.loc.gov/ead

Using CONTENTdm for EAD files

CONTENTdm 4.0: minimal EAD importExtracted and imported 7 metadata fieldsNo display, just “Access this item”

Extraction script and other modifications by Terry Reese at Oregon State UniversityExtracted and imported unlimited fieldsSome institutions modified the displays

CONTENTdm 5.1: improved EAD import functionalityExtracts and imports 47 metadata fieldsDisplays EAD file as pages in compound object

Collaborative EAD project

Utah Manuscripts Association (UMA)Funding: LSTA grant 2007-20086 pilot institutions:

Utah State University -- PI: Brad ColeUniversity of Utah Brigham Young UniversityWeber State UniversityUtah State HistoryUtah State Archives

Collaborative EAD project: Goals

Interoperable use of metadataEAD standardProject’s own Best Practices Guidelines

Infrastructure for sharing and searching finding aidsCreating EAD files easilyUploading files and metadataSharing in Mountain West Digital Library

Education and assistance for new partners

Coming from different directions: partners widely divergent

Stages of readiness:One library had no electronic EAD finding aids,

just printAnother had all finding aids in XML EADSome had a mixture of print, html, & EAD

finding aidsStaff size: from very small to very largeIT support: from very little to a lotInhouse EAD expertise: from none to

considerable

Result #1:EAD files in 6 local repositories

http://digital.lib.usu.edu/cdm4/browse.php?CISOROOT=/Ead

A local EAD collection

An individual EAD file

Result #2:Harvested centrally

http://mwdl.org/index.php/search/results?query=&field-10=ead

Mountain West Digital Library

Project Steps

1. Project-specific standards2. Encoding tool3. Metadata extraction4. Ingestion to CONTENTdm5. XSL stylesheet for display of EAD files6. Modification of the CONTENTdm item

viewer7. OAI harvest into Mountain West Digital

Library

Our Best PracticeGuidelines

See LSTA project wiki: http://lsta.lib.byu.eduBased on other existing

guidelines such as Northwest Digital Archive Best Practice Guidelines & Best Practices and Application Guidelines for Creating EAD Finding Aids at the University ofMinnesota Libraries

Encoding tools

Custom shareware: xEAD from University of Utah

Commercial tools:<oXygen/> XML Editor by SyncRO SoftNoteTab Pro by Fookes SoftwareXMetaL by Just Systems

Metadata extraction:Mapping EAD elements (i.e.,

fields)35 EAD elements are extracted and mapped

Metadata extraction:Mapping flow

Metadata extraction:Setting up CONTENTdm fields

Metadata extraction:Extraction script

JScript batch extraction script:Acts on all EAD files in the same folderParses XML: Takes EAD elements and maps

them to CONTENTdm fieldsSaves each record (=metadata extracted from

one EAD file) as a separate line in a tab-delimited text file

JScript maps EAD unitid into the Collection Number field

of tab-delimited spreadsheet

// unitid to Collection NumbereadFields[4] = "ead:ead/ead:archdesc/ead:did/ead:unitid";eadToCdm[4] = 3;

JScript instruction:

Spreadsheet with Dublin Core metadata

Ingestion into CONTENTdm

Standard CONTENTdm “Multiple Files” importMetadata from tab-delimited text file goes into

CONTENTdm fields.All files from selected folder are uploaded.

Workaround for date ranges in 4.3

What’s happening inside a folder of finding aid files

during extraction

Clicking on jscript file extracts Dublin Core fields and… a tab delimited spreadsheet of

DC metadata is created in same folder

XSL stylesheet

Modifying CONTENTdm for immediate display of EAD file (with no CONTENTdm metadata record)

XSLT transformation of original EAD – controls the display of EAD elements to the user

Appearance customizable in CSS by each partner

Includes a search box for regional search of all finding aids in MWDL

XSL stylesheet

http://content.lib.utah.edu/u?/UU_EAD,867

Modifying item viewer in CONTENTdm

For CONTENTdm 4 or higher, with PHP 5 or higher:

1.Copy into appropriate directories:XSL stylesheetCSS stylesheetSmall images (for regional search box)New include file basic_view_ead.php

2.Add about 25 lines in basic_view.php

OAI harvest into Mountain West Digital Library

Project description and tools

http://lsta.lib.byu.edu

Results

All 6 repositories up4,694 EAD files harvested so far in MWDLReports of more patron requestsStandards still difficult to maintain

U of U: some empty required fieldsUSU: changed call number conventionWeber State: dates not formatted correctly

Editing process for EAD changes is tedious

Future growth

Bringing in additional regional partners Refining toolsAdding more EAD search and browse

capability to MWDL For repositories, adding links to digitized

materials

CONTENTdm 5’s Improved EAD Import

Advantages:Can import much bigger finding aidsNo need for pre-mapping by another tool

Disadvantages:Limited to importing one finding aid at a time;

this is problematic if have large amounts of finding aids

Encoding problems need to be resolved:Schema namespace not accepted so x-links don’t work<controlaccess>

Jury still out: will all text for files be searchable?

Questions welcome!

Sandra McIntyreProgram DirectorMountain West Digital Library(801) 585-0969sandra.mcintyre@utah.edu

Cheryl WaltersHead, Digital InitiativesUtah State University Merrill-Cazier Library(435) 797-2623cheryl.walters@usu.edu