The Connecticut Digital Archive: A Repository for Digital Culture

Greg Colati, University of Connecticut

October 22, 2012

Why the CTDA? Connecticut’s digital cultural heritage is:

Ephemeral Fragmented Not easily discoverable or reusable

What is the CTDA? An idea and a plan for a service that will

provide: digital preservation and curation for permanently

valuable digital assets for cultural heritage institutions in Connecticut

a general point of access for resources about Connecticut that is open and available to all

Instructions for building services using its resources

Tools to manage digital assets

Who is the CTDA?Currently a loose association of interested institutions with seed funding from:

NEH Foundations Grant Application pending, notification in March 2013 Engage interested organizations across the state Develop the organizational framework for a state-

wide digital repository Four workgroups:

Governance Access/Use Content/Scope Technical Platform

Produce an organizational handbook Plan for implementation Prototype infrastructure

Example Content Owners/Relationships•Archives and Manuscripts

•Institutional Repository

•Research Data

•State Publications

•Archival Records

MAGIC/

CSDS

•Map Resources•Geographic Data Sets

•Curated CT Resources:

•Historical Societies

•Libraries•Museums, etc.

Other Partne

rs

•Colleges•Museums•Libraries•Any content provider

Central:• Program

Administration• Technical

Infrastructure• Governance• Working groups

Local:• Management• Presentation

Example Presentation Layers

CTDA

CTDA general portal

CHO

Connecticut history.org

State Library

Custom portals

Data supplied to consumerData/presentation supplied for consumer

Partner Framework

Management Layer

Presentation (Access) Layer

Information UniverseRe-use and exchange

Management: CTDA

CTDA

Repository (Preservation) Layer

Dig

ital

Obje

cts

Meta

data

Policies, Controls, Preservation Activities CTDA Repository

CHO Others…

External aggregators and direct links

Management: OthersManagement: Partner

Others…

Current NEH Foundations Grant participants: Connecticut State Library University of Connecticut Mystic Seaport Museum Connecticut Historical Society Trinity College Hartford History Center Capital Community College Barnum Museum Western Connecticut State University American Antiquarian Society

Goals Short Term: (1 – 2 years)

Build the organizational and technical infrastructure Identify participants Pilot test system and collections

Near Term (2 - 4 years) Secure permanent funding for digital cultural heritage

preservation Load data from participating organizations Open to the public Connect the CTDA to national and international data

aggregators like the Digital Public Library of America Long Term (now until ????)

Preserve Connecticut culture for future generations

Join Us!

Greg ColatiSr. Director, Archives, Special Collections and Digital Curation

University of Connecticut

gregory.colati@uconn.edu