Planets Introduction

1. Planets Introduction Adam FarquharLondon, 13-June-2006

2. Digital Information at Risk • European National Libraries and Archives • Have the legal responsibility and the legislative framework to safeguard digital information and provide sustained access to digital cultural and scientific knowledge • Have limited ability to ensure that today’s digital information will be accessible for future generations • Our society risks a gaping hole in the cultural and scientific record unless we act now • Meeting the challenge of preserving access goes beyond the capabilities of any single institution

3. Stakeholders Working Together • The Planets Project brings together stakeholders across Europe • National Archives of Great Britain, The Netherlands, Switzerland • National Libraries of Austria, Denmark, Great Britain, The Netherlands • These stakeholders have advanced practices and strong motivation to find practical deployable solutions • ... leading research universities • University of Cologne, University of Freiberg, University of Glasgow, Technical University of Vienna • … leading technology suppliers • Austrian Research Center, Tessella • IBM • Microsoft

4. Key Outcomes • Increase Europe’s ability to ensure long-term access to its cultural and scientific heritage • improve decision-making about long term preservation • ensure long-term access to valued digital content • control the costs of preservation actions through increased automation, scaleable infrastructure • ensure wide adoption across the user community and establish market place for preservation services and tools

5. Decompose the Problem • PLANETS will develop: • Planning services that empower organisations to define, evaluate, and execute preservation plans • Methodologies, tools and services for Characterisation of digital objects • Innovative solutions for Preservation Actions • An Interoperability Framework to seamlessly integrate tools and services in a distributed service network • A Testbed to provide a consistent and coherent evidence-base for the objective evaluation of different protocols, tools, services and complete preservation plans.

6. PreservationPlanning Services Project Architecture Reflects Problem Structure UserCommunity Preservation Action Services Test Bed:evaluation and validation services Dissemination Take-up & Training SupplierCommunity Characterisation Services Interoperability Framework

7. Sample Plan Plan Policy Planner Evaluator Profile Plan Content Executor Repository Delivery Preservation Planning • Planets will build on Rauber’s preservation planning work • Input: • Preservation policy • Collection and community profile • Feedback • Plans can be executed on sample content and evaluated • Execution • Plans can impact a repository, ingest workflow, delivery workflow • Validation • Services will be evaluated in real organisational contexts

8. Content Characterisation • Planets focuses on characterising content in order to support preservation planning and preservation actions • Move away from high up-front costs to establish metadata • HULs migration project provides an illustrative example • Images were segmented into 20+ groups based on parameters of the transformation tools • Work will build on TNAs PRONOM service for file-format identification • Define a characterisation language • Define an extraction language • Define an pluggable interpreter • Leverage understanding to recommend improvements in file format design • Establish methods for evaluating loss due to preservation actions

9. Transform content Provide pluggable infrastructure to wrap third-party transformation tools Fill gaps with purpose-build transformation tools Address need to preserve relational databases Build on Swiss Archive work Address need to preserve Microsoft Office content Build on MS Office12 migration tools Transform environments Modular emulation of the full hardware/software environment Provides full look-and feel Superb for highly dynamic content Layered durable approach to emulation Builds on IBM Universal Virtual Computer (UVC) Provides robust migration-on-demand using today’s knowledge Establish abstract device drivers Preservation Actions

10. Planets provides an interoperability framework including Interoperable distributed services Service registries and shared data-stores Encapsulate tools as services Orchestration capability to combine services Planets testbed Provides a foundation for objective evaluation of preservation actions, characterisation services, and preservation plans Provides a controlled research infrastructure Enable partners to conduct experiments, load content objects, execute tests, evaluate the results, and compare the outcome to similar tests Supports use of the Interoperability Framework Provides a shared infrastructure for the preservation community Enables external organisations to validate their preservation plans Establishes content collections and preservation scenarios for benchmarking Establishes certification criteria and procedures to evaluate third party tools and services Interoperability Framework and Testbed

11. Conclusion • Planets • Brings together National Archives, and Libraries with University researchers and technology vendors to meet the challenges of ensuring long-term access to digital material • Builds on strong digital archiving and preservation programmes • Addresses core digital preservation challenges with a focus on the needs of Libraries and Archives • Potential to address wider communities • Will provide an interoperable framework that will • Enable third-parties to provide tools and services • Enable vendors to integrate preservation services • Enable content owners to ensure long-term access to their digital content • Will use an empirical approach to gather evidence on what works and why • And use the evidence to guide project activities