PARSE.Insight and APARSEN Reaching a Common Vision for digital preservation research

1. PARSE.Insight and APARSEN Reaching a Common Vision for digital preservation research David Giaretta

2. PARSE.Insight • Important source of information about users and their views • Identified fundamental threats which infrastructure can address • APARSEN • Creating a common vision for digital preservation research • Create a Virtual centre of Excellence

3. Common Vision

7. Overview of APARSEN • FP7 Network of Excellence • 6.8 M€ from EU • 4 years • 32 partners

8. Rationale and scope • Funding for an NoE in Call 6 is targeted at reinforcing excellence in Europe by structuring the research capacity in those research disciplines which remain fragmented and would significantly benefit from consolidation. Regarding the research fields under this call (digital preservation, digital libraries, cultural heritage) previously funded work in form of Networks of Excellence (i.e. DELOS and EPOCH) should be taken into account. It is not excluded to present proposals for further integration of research capacity in digital libraries or cultural heritage. However, this should be well justified in terms of the need to overcome continuing and harmful fragmentation and not duplicate the essence of the work already done. The scale of the digital preservation challenge, both in quantity and complexity, goes beyond the capacity of single institutions or sectors. To tackle this challenge adequately requires concerted and orchestrated efforts, critical mass, as well as synergies of ideas, technology solutions and practices – and this across disciplines, organisations and across national borders. Stakeholders within and beyond the existing digital preservation community need to be mobilised. Consequently, there could be scope for a Network of Excellence in structuring digital preservation research for the future.

9. .... • Proposals should argue convincingly that the fragmentation of current research effort is hindering research and progress in the area, demonstrate clearly that they bring together existing European excellence in the different research fields involved, and be clear about the potential for sustainable commitments between the research organisations post-project, including the potential for influence on and leverage of national research activities and funding.

10. Aims of the project • The APARSEN NoE brings together an extremely diverse set of practitioner organisations and researchers in order to bring coherence, cohesion and continuity to research into barriers to the long-term accessibility and usability of digital information and data, exploiting our diversity by building a long-lived Virtual Centre of Digital Preservation Excellence.

11. Building on... • OAIS Reference Model • CASPAR • PLANETS • DPE • SHAMAN • PARSE.Insight • LOTAR • Alliance for Permanent Access • Audit & Certification standard • Industrial Vendors } WePreserve

12. Why is APARSEN as it is? • Need to deal with all types of digitally encoded information • Many complex things • Projects like CASPAR, SHAMAN have provided evidence that we know how to approach this with intellectual rigor • Research needed for specifics • Things are not cleanly split – RECURSION is key concept • PARSE.Insight has provided a great deal of evidence about what people are concerned about • Audit & certification will be in place in the next year or so • Vision for 2020 and 2030 developed

13. Approach • use cross-sectoral cooperation to overcome fragmentation of the research field and to avoid redundancy and duplication of effort; • support sustainable integration of research resources and capacities (researchers, services, teams institutions, organisations); • NoEs are expected to implement a Joint Programme of Activities that requires a formal commitment of the participating organisations. COMMON TERMINOLOGY IS VITAL

14. described by delimited by Archival Information Package Packaging Information Package Description derived from identifies Content Information Preservation Description Information further described by Interpreted using * Data Object Representation Information 1 Interpreted using Reference Information Provenance Information Context Information Fixity Information Physical Object Digital Object Structure Information Semantic Information Other Representation Information Access Rights Information adds meaning to 1 OAIS Archival Information Package 1...* Bit

15. Where is Digital Preservation research done? • Universities? • Libraries • Archives? • Scientific Research Laboratories? • Manufacturers? • Vendors?

16. 32 Partners from • Research laboratories • National libraries • Manufacturers • Software vendors

17. PARTNERS • LTU • MRL • ONB • SBA • STFC • STM • TESSELLA • UKDA • UNITN • UPAT • AIRBUS • APA • BL • CERN • CINES • CINI • CSC • KNAW-DANS • DNB • DPC • ESA • FORTH • FRD • FTK • GLOBIT • HA /AFPUM • ICT • IKI • INMARK • KB • LIBER

18. Project profile & origins Users E-Infrastructures GENESI-DR PARSE.Insight SCIDIP-ES Universities & Research Institutes APARSEN Network of Excellence HLEG Sci data e-Infr Vendors:IBM/MicrosoftTessella DPC, nestor, STM, LIBER National libraries and archives Virtual Centre of Excellence APA Big science: CERN/MPI/HA/ STFC/ CINES ESA LTDP Industrial:Airbus, SMEs Innovators Research (Digital Preservation) CASPAR SHAMAN PLANETS HLEG Digital Library 19

19. Vision is linked into all research WPs Research integration Research subset Research subset Research subset Research subset Research subset Research subset Formal qualifications Training & awareness Vision Staff exchanges Internal workshops Common tools & env Integration Integrated research, best practice, services, tools Spread Excellence Refine and integrate ideas European Organisations and researchers Embed research Research USA Asia Australisia etc Internal sharing ideas

22. Magic? • no-one has all the answers, and no-one can even see all the questions • despite that we all tend to defend our own area of work in which we have invested effort

24. Approaches • no-one has all the answers, and no-one can even see all the questions • despite that we all tend to defend our own area of work in which we have invested effort • It is much easier to work within our own silos but much more difficult to cut across the boundaries • It is easy to convince ourselves that our work has wide applicability (if only others would recognise the brilliance of our work and use it!) • There are many solutions in search of a problem

25. Testing • We are not mad • We do useful things • However we are forced to “over-sell” what we do • APARSEN must try to provide a more realistic view • Each tool/technique has strengths and weaknesses, applies to some digital objects and not others TESTING KEEPS US HONEST!