Interoperability: recombinant potential

1. Interoperability:recombinant potential Lorcan Dempsey ‘opportunities for applied research on the creation, management, preservation, and use of digital content’ IMLS workshop 17/18 March 2003

2. Overview • MARC • MARC-XML, MODS, Dublin Core, Onix, LOM • EAD, TEI, DC, MARC • METS, SCORM • DDI, FGDC, .. • MARC AMC, EAD, DC, RSLP • OAIS, METS, OCLC/RLG, … • Z39.50, SRU/W, Xquery, … • SOAP, WSDL, UDDI, … • GIF, TIFF, PNG, JPEG, … • XML, RDF, .. • DDC, LCSH, LCC, TGN, AAT, … • PURL, DOI, ISTC, URN, … • XRML,ODRL,..

3. Remarks on interoperability Institutional perspective Interoperability frameworks Concluding remarks Inconclusive!!! Different mental models The words of things entangle and confuse document, repository, archive, digital library, registry, … Overview

6. “Creative knowledge you can put in your pocket”

8. Interoperability as recombinant potential • Can I … • … add a document to a repository? • … add a repository to a distributed query? • … fuse metadata from one repository with another? • … assemble these resources into a learning package? • … embed an interactive service in my exhibition, my reading list, my campus portal? • … ingest a content package into an archive? • … take a content package out of an archive in 10 years time? • … navigate several databases by subject, by name, by place, by resource type, by educational level? • … cite a document in a repository? • … bring resources into my own workspace? • With … • … as little custom work as possible • … as little precoordinated agreement as possible

9. lab books PDAs campus portal learning management systems exhibitions course materialtext book new scholarly resources readinglists Institutional repository Virtual reference Digital collections Catalog Aggregations E-reserve Licensed collections Library serviceenvironment user environments resource environment

10. Disaggregating scholarly publishing Linking, Identifiers Libraries, archives and museums digitizing unique collections Content and metadata models Research and learning materials Eprints Research data Learning materials E-portfolios Service model: multiple environments of use Exhibition, workbench/lab book, learning management system, portal, interpretive essay, … Metadata models Syntax Semantics Values Content packaging models METS, SCORM Collection model Heirarchical, multiple items Provenance, context Interpretive, organized knowledge, evidential Use model Tools required, … Different perspectives

11. Resources (Objects and collections) “content” “metadata” Rights People Institutions Concepts Places Resource levels Educational standards … Services Query Disclose Get/put Validate Ingest Annotate Request Register Migrate … Interoperability Infrastructure Registry Publish structures/schema Directory Services, collections Resolution Relate other resources

12. A changed world • A pervasive network environment requires a more light-weight, fine-grained approach to combining and recombining resources and services. • “Web services” • See pre-workshop comments. • We have done most work at metadata level (and access to metadata), but even there …

13. Equivalence? Network digital library of theses and dissertations Management of identity and difference E-prints UK Consistency Schema transformation Harvesting LOM Knowledge organization Articulate resources and users by subject, place, Major issues Different communities of practice (case law) Leverage accumulated investment in knowledge organization technologies or see them wither Harvesting nascent – need agreements What can be automated Precoordinated vs dynamic recombination Some metadata examples

14. An institutional perspective • High acronymic density a source of bewilderment • Makers and takers • State of the art keeps receding over the horizon • Balkanization leads to sub-optimal approaches

15. Dublin Core OAI set record MARC8 ONIX VRA Core TEI RSLP CSDGM Collections Item Simple Description Rich Description

16. Organizational domains Library Archive Press Learning management Departments Computing Interest domains Grid/Internet2 Digital library Learning management Disciplinary focuses Shared services A variety of repositories Identity management Institutional investment What confidence? Vertical silo within institution -- wheels within wheels How do you manage investment across silos Current metadata creation and content management practices unsustainable. Institutional issues

17. Interoperability frameworks • Reference model • Functional architecture

18. AUDIT RESOLVE Creator Infoseeker Agent Learner Resource Utilizers NEGOTIATE TRADE DISCOVER ACCESS USE MANAGE RIGHTS OBLIGATIONS Presentation (Query, Browse, Follow Path) SEARCH GATHER REQUEST Access Management Procurement Mediation PUBLISH ALERT Repositories Provision MANAGE MANAGE STORE STORE EXPOSE EXPOSE CONTROL ACCESS STORE MANAGE EXPOSE DELIVER Metadata Assets MAKE PAYMENT AUTHENTICATE AUTHORISE Directories Registries People Repositories Metadata Vocabulary Organizations Traders Competency IMS digital repository interoperability specification

19. JISC Information Environment architecture

20. Positive Hedging our bets Common frame of reference Articulate business, technical and service discussion Orient and motivate development Suggest roles and responsibilities Examples OAIS OKI IMS JISC IE Portal envy Questions At what level of granularity Cross-domain? Unhelpful circumscription? Stifles thought Interoperability frameworks – the big IF

21. Some concluding thoughts • Institutions and incentives !!!!! • Our apparatus for managing standards is dysfunctional. • What incentives and support for creating recombinant schema, resources (metadata and content), and services would be useful? • Interoperability plus time = preservation. • Service architecture • We need a greater focus on exposing and combining services in user or system environments. • What level of explicit “interoperability framework” is useful? • What interoperability infrastructure is useful and how is it sustained (registry and directory)? • Make data work • We need better approaches for managing resource identity and difference. • Mining – needs data • Can we make knowledge organization technologies more effective in a network environment? • Why has digital library research had so little impact in operational environments?

22. Thank you! Lorcan Dempsey