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Success story
Union Historical Archives invests in digital preservation
deda tech was able to understand the client’s needs, specifically analyzing the technical requirements and combining them with open source solutions on the market, but following international standards.
Recognized as the only historical and official archives of all the institutions of the European Union, the Historical Archives of the European Union (HAEU) is where all the information researchers and citizens want to know about the Union and beyond reside, also housing more than 160 private collections of European personalities, politicians, movements and associations. Accessibility and preservation are the key words that characterize their mission; in fact, their goal is to ensure the long-term preservation of all deposited knowledge and to be a focal point for the collection of highly heterogeneous documentation across agencies and institutions.
Service centers
54 countries
R&D Divisions
12
Industrial patents
35
Evolutions
European tender award and start of the Digital Preservation project.
Digital Preservation System Project nomination for Digital Innovation in Cultural Heritage and Activities Observatory Award.
Joint deda tech & EUI presentation of the Digital Preservation project at CAMP 2019 of the Archivematica Community, at CERN, in Geneva.
Publication paper: “The service model for Long Term Data Preservation, accessibility and interoperability at HAEU” at GARR 2019, Turin.
SCENARIO
Develop a strategic repositioning project. The Historical Archives of the European Union play a very important role; since 1983 they have been collecting all documents of historical interest produced by the EU institutions, preserving sources of great value to the entire community.
In fact, the European Regulation indicates that the institutions of the Union are obliged to send all official paper documents they produce to the Archives, however, this does not exist for digital documents, where each individual institution is responsible for archiving.
With the digital evolution, the large amount of paper records, we are talking about a heritage of 400 thousand documents, has been enriched by 20 thousand files including videos, sound recordings, floppy disks, which later became CDs, usb, photos, pdfs and websites.
This raised two important questions:
In fact, the European Regulation indicates that the institutions of the Union are obliged to send all official paper documents they produce to the Archives, however, this does not exist for digital documents, where each individual institution is responsible for archiving.
With the digital evolution, the large amount of paper records, we are talking about a heritage of 400 thousand documents, has been enriched by 20 thousand files including videos, sound recordings, floppy disks, which later became CDs, usb, photos, pdfs and websites.
This raised two important questions:
- Do we have enough space for all the documents that need to be stored?
- If technology evolves, will they still be readable in a few years?
Questions that have turned into challenges for the Archives namely those of making the records accessible and intact even thirty years from now by creating conditions to safeguard everything that has been digitized, as digital media exhibit greater obsolescence than physical media.
The Archives therefore needed to develop a strategic repositioning project that would have them recognized as a central point of observation and study of everything related to the European integration process.
deda tech was able to understand the client’s needs, specifically analyzing the technical requirements and combining them with open source solutions on the market, but following the international standards shared by the community(ISO:16363, ISO:14721) and the Reference Model OAIS – Open Archival Information System.
At the same time, the project takes into account the co-presence of two different ways of knowledge sharing: B2C towards the public and B2B towards the customers of digital repository services who must be able to have access to their data according to their needs.
The proposed result succeeded in meeting the structural and economic needs of the Archive, allowing deda tech to win the tender and stand out for its expertise on the subject.
At the same time, the project takes into account the co-presence of two different ways of knowledge sharing: B2C towards the public and B2B towards the customers of digital repository services who must be able to have access to their data according to their needs.
The proposed result succeeded in meeting the structural and economic needs of the Archive, allowing deda tech to win the tender and stand out for its expertise on the subject.
Proposal and solution
Among the best digital preservation solutions was identified Archivematica, which is completely open source.
Archivematica, fully open source, micro-services workflow and architecture, aligned with the OAIS reference model and all relevant standards for the historical archives context. The Tender Team mapped the requirements with available documentation for the community of such a solution and estimated the project, finding full fit with the client’s economic and project needs. The choice of an open source solution made it possible to minimize customizations by reducing the risk of the durability of the solutions over time and better ensuring data integrity. This also influenced the choice of methodology used in the 4-year project, where much emphasis was placed on project management: PMBOK methodology.
In the first phase of the project, we focused on the development of the Digital Preservation System with the on premise mode, resulting in the output of two strategic documents for Historical Archives activities: the Digital Preservation Strategy Plan and theICT Plan. These also constitute the first results of the project by redefining the organization’s operations in light of the new context in which it operates. In the second phase, on the other hand, we moved on to the design phase, defining the functions desired by the user communities and described in usage models (Use case) and to the implementation phase of the Digital Preservation System and the related service model. deda tech still deals with the maintenance and possible developments of the system, defined in this phase, always in the on premise mode and through technical support services.
Particular attention was paid to the procedural aspect. As agencies and institutions began to take an interest in organizing Archives to deposit their digital records, it became clear that the reliability of the system offered lay not so much and not only in the quality of the technical solution and compliance with standards, but in identifying the right processes residing around the system. Therefore, it was decided to take great care in regulating the deposit, defining the process steps: how the data should be sent, who is responsible for receiving it, and so on. Two were the winning elements:
- Preparation on the topic and the required standards, by the deda tech project team;
- The identification of a quality open source digital preservation solution with ad hoc functionality for archives.
The listening-oriented approach was key in the initial workshop phase, where the exchange of views brought some inspirational ideas.
We were impressed by the vision on the topic and the project team’s deep knowledge of the standards, which lived up to expectations and with a special care, which was really appreciated, in the documentation drafted.
Director - Historical Archives of the EU
Achievements
Define new processes for managing digital archival services and new digital skills. Archives’ strategic investment has enabled it to define new processes for managing digital archival services and new digital skills for monitoring and managing long-term preservation.
Crucial was the decision to involve people from the initial stages, pushing for training and development of new skills in line with international reference standards.
The Archives can rely on several tools: preservation strategic plan, IT strategy, migration plan, guidelines and submission agreement, which ensure long-term preservation and accessibility of records.
At the same time, security strategies have been reinforced by following the SWOT methodology and performing a risk assessment phase.
Now the Historical Archives of the European Union has achieved its goals:
Crucial was the decision to involve people from the initial stages, pushing for training and development of new skills in line with international reference standards.
The Archives can rely on several tools: preservation strategic plan, IT strategy, migration plan, guidelines and submission agreement, which ensure long-term preservation and accessibility of records.
At the same time, security strategies have been reinforced by following the SWOT methodology and performing a risk assessment phase.
Now the Historical Archives of the European Union has achieved its goals:
- Ensure long-term preservation despite continuous upgrading of technologies;
- Repositioning the EU Historical Archives as a service provider in certified digital repository;
- To assert expertise and reliability of collection and filing procedures by attracting interest from agencies and institutions.
deda tech with the successful implementation of the project and subsequent maintenance service has managed over the years to enhance the stability and security of the digital preservation system through the use of persistent identifiers in the information packages.
In addition, the integration of reporting and log management functions have made it possible to meet the needs of the internal digital preservation service and facilitate the monitoring and administration of the service.
In addition, the integration of reporting and log management functions have made it possible to meet the needs of the internal digital preservation service and facilitate the monitoring and administration of the service.
For the future, the Archive aims to achieve an increasing participation of the international community and to realize a service that is interoperable with those of other European institutions, particularly that of the European Commission, activating connections and insights unthinkable in the traditional paper archive world. Together with the support of deda tech and the expertise demonstrated by the project teams, it can ensure the continuous updating of technologies to preserve information and make it easily accessible and usable, also pushing towards new evolutions such as the implementation of semantic networks (through artificial intelligence) that connect other archives to the system.
