Application of Standards for Visual Representation of ALM Objects

Adolf Knoll

National Library of the Czech Republic

What do we wish to achieve?

Access to various types of information, preferably over networks Publications incl. fulltext Visual documentation of museum objects,

sites, monuments of architecture, … Besides the so-called catalogue

information we need direct access through various technologies

Types of objects: libraries and archives

Classical documents: books, periodicals, manuscripts, letters, maps, postcards, …

Other analogue documents: microforms, video and audio recordins, slides,…

Digital documents

All on various carriers: paper, parchment, silk, glass, palm leaves, tape, disks, various plastic carriers, …

Types of objects: museums

Paintings Various 3D objects incl. those

documenting development of techniques and technology

Archeological sites Architectural monuments Geological and paleontological Events and performances

SiteEmpúries

Identificationdescription of the site

imageJPEG,

24-bit, 355x251 pxl, 75 dpi, …

Representationof the concrete object

Archeologicalsite

PostcardDigital

photograph

Identificationdescription

of the postcardpostcard

Physical description is part of the identification

Identification record

It describes general and concrete attributes of the object

Catalogue record It has a recommended structure, which:

Reflects the needs of the concrete area Enables communication; … therefore, it gets standardized step by

step

Document - identification

Description or cataloguing rules:

AACR2 (modern documents) MASTER (manuscripts) Dublin Core (on-line documents) DIEPER (periodicals) …

Formal expression of the standardized description

MARC UNIMARC, INTERMARC, MARC21 (USMARC),

MAB2 MASTER DTD for description of MSS DIEPER DTD (unfortunately uncompleted) Dublin Core as cataloguing in published

electronic documents

Syntactical expression of the formalized description

Labelled format with names of fields MARC or any other structured labelled

lines ASCII file SGML file (which type, which DTD?)

DOBM (Memoriae Mundi, Kramerius) TEI (MASTER) XML (Memoriae Mundi from 2002)

Cataloguing rulese.g. AACR2

Formalized inMARC

Labelled format

Formalized inDublinCore

Formalized inMASTER

DOBM XML

HTML/metatags

SGML TEI

Three levels of understanding

Museum object – identification

AMICO Data Specification – Catalogue CDWA – Categories for the Description of Works of

Art Object ID Systèmes descriptifs (architecture, movable objects

incl. technological ones,…) CIDOC Information Categories Van Eyck, VRA, AFRICOM, MIDAS (architecture,

archeology), RLG Cultural Materials Alliance Description Guidelines

Great variety of rules

Museum object – formal structuring and syntax

Some standards do not speak about this

Several known standards have a labelled format (CDWA, AMICO, …)

There are attempts to apply XML (British SPECTRUM DTD in development)

Compatibility of identification terms

Documents Standardized

recording of the same entity (authority files, thesauri) Personal names Subject Titles (partly) Corporate bodies Iconography

(ICONCLASS)

Museum objects Recommended

dictionaries, thesauri Personal names (e.g.

ULAN) Places (e.g. TGN) Subject (e.g. AAT,

MET)

Thesaurus of Geographic Names

Union List of Artists Names

The Art and Architecture Theasaurus

Multilingual Egyptological Thesaurus

DATE

CDWA

subject

Oil painting

Adoration of theMagi

Various approaches: generic identification vs. subject identification

Document Nieuport 17

Military aircraft Propeller aircraft Historical aircraft Transport vehicles

Author, publisher, date of publication, ….

Technical object Description of the

aircraft Description of the

engine Description of the

photograph

What have I on-line now?

All these various pieces of information should be interconnected and made deliverable

Identification and location Choice of approriate

standards and their formal expressions

Cataloguing of objects and creation of databases

Formal bridging of databases, e.g. SFX technology (Metalib)

Semantic bridging !!!

Digitization of objects and their analogue representations Choice of standard data

formats Choice of complex e-

doc formats (XML) Creation of digital

libraries

What do we do now?

Identification record based MASTER DTD

Technical record based on the NISO draft and ICC profiles

Description of

component parts

Technical

description of the images of component parts

JPEG preview image

JPEG archival image

JPEG user image

MrSID (maps) image

TIFF/G4 image

DjVu image Fulltext tagged in SGML TEI

For representation of museum objects this can be done in an analogue manner.

Samples

Celtic sites in Bohemia Books and articles Photograps of the arechological site – I, II Museum objects

History of a town Books and articles Video and movies Digital representations – e.g. postcards

                              

Memory stone

Place

Old cemetery

Grand-father’s mill in Hronov