Tansley China

The China Digital Museum Project: 

The China Digital Museum Project Dr. Robert TANSLEY, HP Labs Prof. Xukun SHEN, Beihang University Prof. Yue QI , Beihang University

HP Labs and China MoEDigital Museum Project: 

HP Labs and China MoE Digital Museum Project Many universities in China have a museum Many objects of historic, cultural, educational and research value Due to space requirements, and size (geographic and population) of the country, museum contents are not optimally utilised Additionally, some physical objects are deteriorating Therefore objects are being digitised Improve access Preserve

China Digital Museum Introduction: 

Phase I Status 18 campus museums each with 20k-50k objects. 4 categories: geoscience, biological, anthropological, science and technology Plan for Phase II 50+ campus museums. Standardisation of platform and metadata. DSpace-based distributed system. China Digital Museum Introduction

Challenges: 

Challenges Many objects of various kinds E.g. Calligraphy, pottery, biological specimens, aircraft Large amount of digital data will be produced 100 universities, ~2Tb per university museum Must be easy to find and access content Currently distributed over many sites Content must be preserved

Approach: 

Approach Use and enhance DSpace to build a large, distributed digital asset management system Capture, preserve, enable access HP Labs, China MoE & universities collaboration Beihang University main technical collaborator

Approach overview: 

Approach overview Each museum loads content and metadata into local DSpace Content and metadata are replicated at two large-scale ‘data centres’ For preservation: multiple copies Enable access: more bandwidth for end-users Ease discovery: aggregate ‘virtual museums’

‘Virtual Museums’: 

‘Virtual Museums’

Standardised Metadata: 

Standardised Metadata All objects are categorised according to standard taxonomy All objects have core metadata (Dublin Core) Extended metadata for each category of object

University Museums: 

University Museums Each University Museum runs a DSpace instance Digitised objects, and associated metadata descriptions, are ingested into local DSpace instance Including category Each object given a Handle at this stage Handle generated by local DSpace; registered with central DM project Handle Server

University Museums: 

University Museums University museums allow METS to be harvested via OAI-PMH This METS includes: Category Core metadata Extended metadata per category URL references to Bitstreams User access level information Intended to be compatible with standard DSpace METS profile

University Museums: 

University Museums

Data Centres: 

Data Centres Data Centres hold replicas of digitised objects and metadata from University Museums Good for robust, long-term preservation More than one place where digitised objects can be downloaded; enables serving more users Data Centres use OAI-PMH protocol to obtain objects from University Museums Replicated items retain same Handle Data Centre copy added to Handle record

Data Centres using OAI-PMH: 

Data Centres using OAI-PMH

Overall system architecture: 

Overall system architecture

Enhancements to DSpace: 

Enhancements to DSpace Chinese language translation of user interface Search of Chinese metadata and text OAI-PMH harvester/client Build on existing client from Old Dominion University Supporting extended metadata “Pretend” its Dublin Core to start; build on metadata support extension proposed by HP Labs, under development at Eduworks METS Importer tool Various specific needs, but common core to contribute to OSS DSpace Create Handles using remote Handle Server

Challenges and research questions: 

Challenges and research questions Managing a federated DSpace: Handle resolution: One Handle, multiple objects Updating objects: Lifecycle of university museums: Registration, when there are problems Metadata standardisation Ensuring metadata is valid: XML Schema validation on METS and metadata within it Distributed authorisation Role-based approach: User access levels Many deployments Version control, release processes

Challenges and research questions: 

Challenges and research questions Mapping Digital Museum model to DSpace model University Museums free to organise as desired, but must specify category in metadata At Data Centres, capitalise on community scope browse/search tools

Project plan: 

Project plan Three-phase approach Phase 1: One data centre, 1-2 university museums Phase 2: One data centre, 10-18 university museums Phase 3: Full deployment, two data centres, 100 university museums

Project status: 

Project status Phase 1 nearly complete Single university museum, data centre replicating content Chinese metadata searchable Currently testing and consolidating Metadata standardisation in progress

Summary: 

Summary Many Chinese university museums are digitising contents These digital objects and metadata are loaded into DSpace instances Content and metadata from university museum DSpace instances replicated in two data centres Building large-scale distributed DSpace system

China Digital Museum Project Technical Team: 

China Digital Museum Project Technical Team