Good practice guides
From Digipedia
Contents |
Introduction
All digital content needs to be useful and relevant to its users and must be created so that everyone finds it accessible. It should also be possible to repackage and reuse any part of the content to suit any situation - for example to use individual images as part of a learning package, to integrate a sound clip into another service. Finally, digital content needs to be created so that it is future-proof. To do this means a consistent approach to content creation using internationally agreed good practice and standards.
There are a number of resources which can be consulted covering the whole digital life cycle to ensure that the right choice of standards and strategic decisions are made to suit individual circumstances.
UKOLN
Good Practice Guide for Developers of Cultural Heritage Web Services
The UKOLN Good Practice Guide was developed from the Technical Advisory Service provided by UKOLN and the AHDS to the NOF Digitisation of Learning Materials Programme which ran from 2000 - 2003. It is maintained and updated by staff at UKOLN. The guide provides advice on standards and best practice for all stages of the digital content life cycle and is divided into five main sections:
- Management processes
- Handling and delivering digital resources
- Web sites
- Digital curation
- Publicity and marketing
Each topic within the section contains extensive information and advice together with further references. A selection of the pages have been tagged in Delicious.com and it is also available as a single printed file.
MINERVA
Technical Guidelines for Digital Cultural Content Programmes. Version 2.0, 2008
The MINERVA Technical Guidelines were prepared for the MINERVA project in the context of a series of European and national initiatives to make digital content in Europe more accessible, usable and exploitable. The broader context is the European Commission’s i2010 Digital Libraries initiative, which has as one of its objectives the creation of a European Digital Library aiming to make millions of digital objects easily accessible to all European citizens.
The document is intended as a resource for policy-makers, for those implementing funding programmes for the creation of digital cultural content and for those managing digitisation projects. Based on a life-cycle approach to the digitisation process, it seeks to provide guidelines for the use of technical standards and identifies areas where there is already a commonality of approach. Its advice is divided into 8 broad areas as follows:
- Projects and planning
- Preparing for the digitisation process
- Storage and management of the digital master material
- Metadata, standards and resource discovery
- Publishing on the web
- Delivery formats
- Re-use and repurposing
- Intellectual property rights, copyright, licencing and sustainability
It also includes an introductory section on the role of technical standards and the benefit of deploying open standards at all stages in the digital life cycle.
NISO
Framework of Guidance for Building Good Digital Collections, 3rd edition, 2007
The 3rd edition of A Framework of Guidance for Building Good Digital Collections was produced by the National Information Standards Organization (NISO) Framework Working Group, with the generous support of the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS).
The Framework has three purposes:
- To provide an overview of some of the major components and activities involved in creating good digital collections.
- To identify existing resources that support the development of sound local practices for creating and managing good digital collections.
- To encourage community participation in the ongoing development of best practices for digital collection building.
It is intended for two audiences: • cultural heritage organizations planning and implementing initiatives to create digital collections; and • funding organizations that want to encourage the development of good digital collections.
Advice and guidance is focused around four key areas: collections, objects, metadata and programmes. For each of these, general principles related to quality are defined and discussed, and supporting resources providing further information are identified. These resources may be standards, guidelines, best practices, explanations, discussions, clearinghouses, or examples.