Olaf Janssen on the principles of large-scale digital libraries and their application to Europeana,...

Europeana – case study of a large-scale digital library

Olaf D. Janssen,

Europeana Office, The Netherlands

19th February 2009, for Leiden University

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Lay-out of talk

• Part 1 : Basic concepts of digital libraries (DLs)

• Part 2 : Case-study of large-scale DL : Europeana

• (Part 3 : On building Europeana)

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1- Basic concepts of digital libraries

Basic concepts

1. Digital library disciplines

2. Digital content & metadata

3. Multi-lingual, multi-cultural, cross-domain digital content

4. Interoperability & standardisation

5. Federated vs. centralized content, metadata transfer, aggregation & repositories

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Onl

ine

acce

ss Digitisation

Digital preservation

1.1 – Digital library disciplines

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Basic concepts





5. Federated vs. centralized content

6. Metadata transfer, aggregation & repositories

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1.2 - Digital content & metadata

Digital library digital objects / content

1) Digital object itself : image, sound, movie, text…

2) Metadata : structured data about the object

Digital object and its metadata are generally stored in different systems / institutions / countries!

Metadata provides URL to access digital object.

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1.2 - Digital content & metadataTypes of metadata

• Descriptive : describes object for discovery and identification e.g <title>, <publisher>, <author> etc.

• Structural : describes structure of compound objects, e.g. how pages are ordered to form chapters.

• Administrative : information to help manage a resource, e.g. how it was created, file type, who can access it …

• Preservation : information needed to archive and preserve an objecte.g. <Provenance> , <Authenticity>

• “Relational” : which other objects is the object related?

(NISO - 2004) Understanding Metadata - Bethesda, MD: NISO Press, p.1)

http://www.niso.org/standards/resources/UnderstandingMetadata.pdf

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Basic concepts






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1.3 - Multilingual, multicultural, cross-domain

Multi-lingual

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Multi-cultural

~ [ ]…. racial, cultural and ethnic diversity within the demographics of a specified place, usually at the scale of an organization such as a school, business, neighborhood, city, nation or continent

(Free after Wikipedia)


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MuseumsLibraries AV-institutions Archives

Cross-domain = representing 2 or more CH domains

Four main Cultural Heritage domains

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Museums

CIDOC- CRM

Libraries

DublinCore

MODS

MARC

AV-Institutions

MPEG7

MPEG21

Archives

EAD

Most commonly used metadata formats per domain

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Basic concepts






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1.4 - Interoperability & standardisation

Interoperability

~ the ability of two or more

systems, computers, humans, institutions etc.. to exchange information

and to use the information that has been exchanged

without special effort on either system

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Various types of interoperability in DLs (1/2)

1) Metadata interoperability

Problems appear when metadata from different domains, thus with different formats (DC, EAD, CIDOC-CRM, MPEG7..) are brought together in 1 digital library

The metadata is not interoperable

Need for standardisation to make metadata interoperable


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Libraries - DublinCore

Libraries - MARC

Libraries - MODS

Museums - CIDOC-CRM

Archives - EAD

AV-inst - MPEG7,21

1 single standardised cross-domain

metadata format


Mapping or cross-walk

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Various types of interoperability in DLs (2/2)

2) Political / human / cross-domain interoperability

• Building (human!) collaboration & network & consensus between institutions & domains is vital in a large DL

• Agree on organisational models for a DL

• Governance structure of the DL

• Roadmap for the future development & sustainability of a DL

• Agree budget and business plan for a DL


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FROM

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TO

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Basic concepts






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1.6 - Metadata transfer, aggregation & repositories

• Federated metadata : metadata are stored in multiple databases (CH-institutions)

• Centralized metadata : metadata is stored in one single database (central repository)

• OAI-PMH : protocol / mechanism for shipping (standardised) metadata from A B

Especially: from multiple federated databases 1 central database = aggregation

OAI-PMH : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Archives_Initiative

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OAI-server – in museum

LibraryCollection1

OAI-server - in library

Aggregation of federated metadata via OAI-PMH

CentralRepository

Standardised library

metadata (in XML format)

Standardised library


Aggregated, centralised, standardised, multilingual, multicultural, interoperable, cross-domain CH-metadata as basis for Digital LibraryOAI-harvester (client)

MuseumCollection1

Standardised museum


Standardised museum


MuseumCollection2


OAI-PMH

OAI-PMHOAI-PMH

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Various types/levels of aggregation (1/2)

1. Domain specific – The European Library (libraries), VideoActive (AV-archives)

2. Material specific – DIGMAP (maps)

3. Language specific – German, Russian… materials

4. Culture specific – Roma, Jews

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Various types/levels of aggregation (2/2)

5. Local – Municipal Archive of Lisbon, Leeds City museum

6. National regional (provincial) – Province Limburg, Belgium

7. National – Memory of The Netherlands (NL)

8. Trans-national regional – Vestnord (IS), Scandinavian, Meditern

Combinations of the above!

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Examples of aggregators

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Part 2 - Basic Concepts The European Library

www.theeuropeanlibrary.org

Domain-specific aggregation of library content

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Video Active

www.videoactive.eu

Domain-specific aggregation of AV content

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Part 2 - Basic Conceptshttp://portal.digmap.eu/DIGMAP

portal.digmap.eu

Material-specific aggregation of digitised maps

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Part 2 - Basic Concepts Memory of the Netherlands

www.geheugenvannederland.nl

Cross-domain aggregation of Dutch CH-materials

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Part 2 - Basic ConceptsVESTNORD

www.tamarit.is

Trans-national regional aggregation of newspapers & periodicals

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Lay-out of talk


• Part 2 : Case-study of large-scale DL: Europeana

• (Part 3 : Building Europeana)

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2 – Case study : Europeana

What is Europeana? (1/3)

Metadata & technical interoperability P.O.V.

Europeana = Website

giving1) online access to (currently) 4.2 million European2) multicultural, multilingual, cross-domain3) interoperable & standardised4) centrally aggregated 5) metadata6) (leading to the digital objects)

Digital objects themselves are NOT aggregated & stored centrally!

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Europeana

www.europeana.eu

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Insert extra screenshot

DutchFrench

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Metadata(stored in Holland)

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Digital object - movie(stored in France)

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From human / political / cross-domain interoperability P.O.V.

Europeana = Collaborative cross-domain network

for European CH-institutions to build consensus & cooperation between stakeholders to build & expand the Europeana website

• Agree on organisational models for Europeana

• Governance structure for Europeana

• Roadmap for the future development & sustainability of Europeana

• Agree on budget to build Europeana

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Some of the 1,000+ partners in Europeana

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National aggregator (Dutch) Geheugen van Nederland

Film archive aggregatorVideoActive

AV Collection X

Archivesaggregator

Libraries aggregatorThe European Library

National Library 1

Museum X

Archive X

National Archive 2….n

Film Archive 1

Film Archive 2

Film Archive 3

National Archive 1

Library X

Museum A Archive A Library A

Museums Aggregator

M1 M2 M3

National Library 2

National Library 3…n


Network structure for Europeana

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One big

aggregation & interoperability

exercise!

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Questions ?

[email protected]

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Lay-out of talk


• Part 2 : Case-study of large-scale DL: Europeana

• (Part 3 : Building Europeana)

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• December 2004 : Google announces its Google Print initiative (digitse 4 major US libraries + Oxford UK)

• January 2005: comments by Jean-Noël Jeanneney (president BnF) : Anglo-American dominance

• Large press coverage: “Europe’s cultural war with Google”

• French call for safeguarding the European cultural heritage support from European Union

• European Union 2005 : “Creation of a European Digital Library is a strategic priority“

• 2006-2007: Increased political momentum & support across Europe

Short historical context

3 – Building Europeana

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‘A digital library that is a single, direct and multilingual access point to the European cultural heritage.’European Parliament, 27 September 2007

‘A unique resource for Europe's distributed cultural heritage… ensuring a common access to Europe's libraries, archives and museums.’Horst Forster, Director, Digital Content & Cognitive Systems Information Society Directorate, European Commission

’ For the users it is not important whether the objects are kept by archives, libraries or museums, but to get access to the sources they want, and to be able use & re-use the resources across types of sources and sectors of institutions.’


Vision of the EU for a pan-European DL

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EU is major driver for building & expanding

Europeana

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• To create a multilingual public domain access point to Europe’s cultural and scientific heritage (= Europeana website)

• To use digitised cultural and scientific heritage resources as input for a wide range of information products and services

• To play a key role in the future growth of sectors such as learning and tourism

• To inspire new creative enterprise and innovation

• To promote understanding of our common European background and the sense of a European identity


Objectives of the EU for Europeana

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1. 2007: EU is “in the mood” to build Europeana Easy to secure funding from EU for some years

2. 2007: Set up a high-level legal entity to build, develop & sustain Europeana EDL Foundation

3. 2007: Set up coordination centre : Europeana Office (@ National Library of the Netherlands)

4. 2007-2008: Start & expand a cross-domain network of CH-institutions Consensus building, concertation, collaboration (human & political interoperability)

3 – Building EuropeanaKey steps in building Europeana (1/3)

- can employ staff- can bid for EU-funded projects

2007: Set up coordination centre : Europeana Office (@ National Library of the Netherlands)

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5. 2008 : Build Europeana prototype - proof of concept - website- online access to 4.2 million pan-European- multicultural, multilingual, cross-domain- interoperable & standardised- centrally aggregated - metadata- (leading to the digital objects)

All EU countries represented 1,000+ contributing organisations Multilingual interface in 25 languages

6. Nov 2008: Launch prototype


Key steps in building Europeana (2/3)

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PRESENT – Feb 09

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To be done :

7. Secure funding for future


Key steps in building Europeana (3/3)Member States can directly support the development of Europeana. This support ranges from urging museums, archives and libraries to become participants… to setting up national portals whose content can be harvested by Europeana. Government departments… can also directly sponsor the activities of the EDL Foundation as ‘Associated Participants’

The EU is committed to continuing its support for projects that will improve the availability of content from all the different institutions and the quality of services in Europeana

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To be done :

7. Secure funding for future

8. 2009-2010: Improve prototype to full website • Add more content expand network to include more CH

aggregators & institutions • 10 million digital items in 2010• 25 m items by 2014


Key steps in building Europeana (3/3)

Olaf Janssen on the principles of large-scale digital libraries and their application to Europeana,...

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