The Digital Archaeological Workflow: A Case Study from Sweden
Marcus Smith [email protected]
CAA 2014 – Paris
The Problem • No central fieldwork
register
’Charles Babb parts storage’ – SDASM (flickr)
The Problem • No central fieldwork
register • No central digital
archive for archaeological data
The Problem • No central fieldwork
register • No central digital
archive for archaeological data
• Digital availability of fieldwork reports is patchy
The Problem • No central fieldwork
register • No central digital
archive for archaeological data
• Digital availability of fieldwork reports is patchy
• Existing resources not linked
’silos’ – Doc Searls (flickr)
The Problem • No central fieldwork
register • No central digital
archive for archaeological data
• Digital availability of fieldwork reports is patchy
• Existing resources not linked
• Inefficient information transfer (digital → paper → digital)
How It Works – The Computer. The Output Unit. (Ladybird books)
Goals for DAP • Fully digitised seamless
information transfer
’CERN storage servers’ – skimaniac (flickr)
Goals for DAP • Fully digitised seamless
information transfer • Digital archive for
archaeological data
Goals for DAP • Fully digitised seamless
information transfer • Digital archive for
archaeological data • Access to source data
Goals for DAP • Fully digitised seamless
information transfer • Digital archive for
archaeological data • Access to source data • Semantically linked
data
’Anchor Men of the Mauretania’ Tyne and Wear Archives and Museums (flickr)
’Come in We’re Open’ – jilleatsapples (flickr)
Goals for DAP • Fully digitised seamless
information transfer • Digital archive for
archaeological data • Access to source data • Semantically linked
data • Openly licensed, re-
useable data • National ‘events’
register
DAP so far… • Government directive, with extra funding for five years • LOD as a core idea; openness and transparency as core
values • Collaborative effort with the archaeological community • DAP requires a new data infrastructure for us at RAÄ • DAP requires a new way of working for archaeologists in
Sweden: – Technical challenges – Licensing challenges – Mindset challenges
DAP so far… • Already in place:
– SAMLA reports/PDF repository: http://samla.raa.se/
– Processes mapped – Conceptual modeling
ongoing
DAP so far… • Already in place:
– SAMLA reports/PDF repository: http://samla.raa.se/
– Processes mapped – Conceptual modeling
ongoing
DAP so far… • Already in place:
– SAMLA reports/PDF repository: http://samla.raa.se/
– Processes mapped – Conceptual modeling
ongoing
Actor / R
ole
Organisation
Organisation
Legal framework
Legal fram
ework
Legal framew
ork
Archaeological event
Method Analysis
Fieldwork Documentation
Resolution
Documentation
Development
Research event
Actor /
Role
Assessment event
Legal status
Monument type Period
Information management event
Land m
anagement
event
Legal event
Natural event
Tangible Heritage
Temporal Context
Geographical Context
Event Context
Operative Context
DAP so far… • Already in place:
– SAMLA reports/PDF repository: http://samla.raa.se/
– Processes mapped – Conceptual modeling
ongoing • Still to plan:
– protocols & formats – data mapping – digital archive…
• To do straight away: – rescue fieldwork data – start a skeleton of an
events register – …and ‘master data’
such as ontologies, thesauri/controlled vocabularies!
SOCH Swedish Open Cultural Heritage
• K-samsök – ‘Cultural Cross-Search’ http://www.ksamsok.se/
SOCH Swedish Open Cultural Heritage
• K-samsök – ‘Cultural Cross-Search’ http://www.ksamsok.se/
• Metadata aggregator & web service for cultural heritage institutions
• Monuments, buildings, museum collections…
SOCH Swedish Open Cultural Heritage
• K-samsök – ‘Cultural Cross-Search’ http://www.ksamsok.se/
• Metadata aggregator & web service for cultural heritage institutions
• Monuments, buildings, museum collections…
• 40 institutions
(≈25–30 million triples)
(≈25–30 million triples)
• 2.1 million artefacts • 880 thousand photographs • 830 thousand monuments • 440 thousand documents • 110 thousand historic buildings • 40 thousand personages • 2000 historical events • 1500 historic maps
SOCH Swedish Open Cultural Heritage
• K-samsök – ‘Cultural Cross-Search’ http://www.ksamsok.se/
• Metadata aggregator & web service for cultural heritage institutions
• Monuments, buildings, museum collections…
• 40 institutions • 4.7 million database
objects
Structured Vocabularies • SOCH publishes LOD… • …but the majority of the
classification metadata is still text strings, rather than URIs pointing to terms in authoritative controlled vocabularies
• We’re going to need a number of such thesauri in for the data a future DAP infrastructure is going to handle
• Perhaps even a full-blown ontology for Swedish archaeology…?
• Monuments types • Legal status • Events • Periods • Materials • Built heritage • Evidence types • Techniques • Artefact types • …etc
• Extant/non-existent • Internal/external
Structured Vocabularies • SKOS: Simple Knowledge Organisation System – an RDF
application for structured vocabularies (also RDFS, OWL…)
• Initial idea: create SKOS versions of our vocabularies and put them out on the web. (Like SENESCHAL http://www.heritagedata.org/)
• But now: Need a proper system for managing these terms and publishing them in different ways: one central system for storing and managing the data, which can be consumed by a variety of systems (both internal and external) in a variety of formats. Of which SKOS would be one.
• Investigate user-needs: not many use SKOS today… but may do later.
Who manages what data? • Local authorities: resolutions • Fieldwork units: field
documentation; produce reports • National Heritage Board:
national monuments register, buildings register, monuments types thesaurus, etc; archive reports
• Forest Agency: forest sites • Museums: finds • Universities, SND: research
data, analyses • National Land Survey:
geospatial data • Law: legal terms/concepts, legal
events
• We need to be able to manage the data we're responsible for
• We need to be able to connect to (fetch) data that external bodies are responsible for, and react when they change
Challenges • Ongoing DAP project to deliver a set of recommendations on how
we should manage the structure and mapping of our master data taxonomies: practical protocols/praxis, and tools.
• Versioning and preservation • We welcome suggestions and feedback - we're very much finding
our way as we go! • DAP is a massive undertaking, and we don’t want to reinvent the
wheel if we can help it.
DAP SOCH
http://www.raa.se/dap http://www.ksamsok.se/ http://www.kringla.nu/
[email protected] @carwash
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