Thresholds for Discovery: EAD Tag Analysis in ArchiveGrid, and Implications for Discovery Systems
The ArchiveGrid discovery system is made up in part of an aggregation of EAD (Encoded Archival Description) encoded finding aids from hundreds of contributing institutions. In creating the ArchiveGrid discovery interface, the OCLC Research project team has long wrestled with what we can reasonably d...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Code4Lib
2013-10-01
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| Series: | Code4Lib Journal |
| Online Access: | http://journal.code4lib.org/articles/8956 |
| _version_ | 1818116842279927808 |
|---|---|
| author | M. Proffitt B. Washburn M. Bron |
| author_facet | M. Proffitt B. Washburn M. Bron |
| author_sort | M. Proffitt |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | The ArchiveGrid discovery system is made up in part of an aggregation of EAD (Encoded Archival Description) encoded finding aids from hundreds of contributing institutions. In creating the ArchiveGrid discovery interface, the OCLC Research project team has long wrestled with what we can reasonably do with the large (120,000+) corpus of EAD documents. This paper presents an analysis of the EAD documents (the largest analysis of EAD documents to date). The analysis is paired with an evaluation of how well the documents support various aspects of online discovery. The paper also establishes a framework for thresholds of completeness and consistency to evaluate the results. We find that, while the EAD standard and encoding practices have not offered support for all aspects of online discovery, especially in a large and heterogeneous aggregation of EAD documents, current trends suggest that the evolution of the EAD standard and the shift from retrospective conversion to new shared tools for improved encoding hold real promise for the future. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-11T04:28:56Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-43a97c5c09ae49fa9b4b7dd5788016ee |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1940-5758 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-11T04:28:56Z |
| publishDate | 2013-10-01 |
| publisher | Code4Lib |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Code4Lib Journal |
| spelling | doaj.art-43a97c5c09ae49fa9b4b7dd5788016ee2022-12-22T01:20:55ZengCode4LibCode4Lib Journal1940-57582013-10-0122Thresholds for Discovery: EAD Tag Analysis in ArchiveGrid, and Implications for Discovery SystemsM. ProffittB. WashburnM. BronThe ArchiveGrid discovery system is made up in part of an aggregation of EAD (Encoded Archival Description) encoded finding aids from hundreds of contributing institutions. In creating the ArchiveGrid discovery interface, the OCLC Research project team has long wrestled with what we can reasonably do with the large (120,000+) corpus of EAD documents. This paper presents an analysis of the EAD documents (the largest analysis of EAD documents to date). The analysis is paired with an evaluation of how well the documents support various aspects of online discovery. The paper also establishes a framework for thresholds of completeness and consistency to evaluate the results. We find that, while the EAD standard and encoding practices have not offered support for all aspects of online discovery, especially in a large and heterogeneous aggregation of EAD documents, current trends suggest that the evolution of the EAD standard and the shift from retrospective conversion to new shared tools for improved encoding hold real promise for the future.http://journal.code4lib.org/articles/8956 |
| spellingShingle | M. Proffitt B. Washburn M. Bron Thresholds for Discovery: EAD Tag Analysis in ArchiveGrid, and Implications for Discovery Systems Code4Lib Journal |
| title | Thresholds for Discovery: EAD Tag Analysis in ArchiveGrid, and Implications for Discovery Systems |
| title_full | Thresholds for Discovery: EAD Tag Analysis in ArchiveGrid, and Implications for Discovery Systems |
| title_fullStr | Thresholds for Discovery: EAD Tag Analysis in ArchiveGrid, and Implications for Discovery Systems |
| title_full_unstemmed | Thresholds for Discovery: EAD Tag Analysis in ArchiveGrid, and Implications for Discovery Systems |
| title_short | Thresholds for Discovery: EAD Tag Analysis in ArchiveGrid, and Implications for Discovery Systems |
| title_sort | thresholds for discovery ead tag analysis in archivegrid and implications for discovery systems |
| url | http://journal.code4lib.org/articles/8956 |
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