1. Dublin Core for Museums Day 1
CIMI
John Perkins
Paul Miller UK Office for Library & Information Networking
Thomas Hofmann Australian Museums On-Line

2. Overview for Thursday March 25
Introduction to Metadata
Introducing the Dublin Core
CIMI DC Guidelines - Dublin Core for Museums
Break
DC for museums continued...
Lunch
Practicalities of Implementing DC
Introduction to MICI

3. What’s the Problem ? Need to serve a Web audience
Demand for content
Uncertain quality
Expectations for rapid easy access
Need to be visible on the Web
Two million web sites
Half a billion addressable pages
Many communities with the same problem

4. What’s the Problem ? Manage and organise interconnected data
Different types
Different repositories
Packages
Interoperate with other communities
Interoperate with other applications
Need a way to:
Express meanings in rich and complex data
Express the structure of our data
Encode the transfer of data

5. What’s the Solution ? Communities address their own needs
Do so in a way that works across communities
Standards based
Collaborative

6. What is a Community? Libraries Museums
A resource description community is characterised by agreed semantic, structural and syntactic conventions for exchange of descriptive information
Libraries
MARC
AACR2
Museums
SPECTRUM
MICI
Based on a slide by Stu Weibel

7. Communities working together
Home
Pages
Museums
Geo
Libraries
‘Internet
Commons’
Commerce
Whatever...
Scientific
Databases
Based on a slide by Stu Weibel

8. Communities working together
Metadata
Museums
Metadata
Metadata
Metadata
Based on a slide by Stu Weibel

9. What is Metadata? Meaningless jargon
or a fashionable term for what we’ve always done
or “a means of turning data into information”
and “data about data”
and the name of a film director (‘Luc Besson’)
and the title of a book (‘The Lord of the Flies’).

10. What is Metadata? Metadata exists for almost anything People Places
Objects
Concepts
Databases
Web pages

11. What is Metadata? Metadata fulfils three main functions:
description of resource content
“What is it?”
description of resource form
“How is it constructed?”
description of issues behind resource use
“Can I afford it?”.

12. What is Metadata?
Many structures have evolved at different levels, and to meet different requirements...
MICI

13. For human communication we need...
Semantic Interoperability
Standardisation of content
“cat milk sat drank mat ”
“Let’s talk English”
Structural Interoperability
Standardisation of form
“Here’s how to make a sentence”
“Cat sat on mat. Drank milk.”
Syntactic Interoperability
Standardisation of expression
“These are the rules of grammar”
“The cat sat on the mat. It drank some milk.”

14. Many flavours of metadata Managing change
Challenges
Opportunities
Many flavours of metadata
which one do I use?
Managing change
new varieties, and evolution of existing forms
Tension between functionality and simplicity, extensibility and interoperability
Functions, features, and cool stuff
Simplicity and interoperability

15. Introducing the Dublin Core
An attempt to improve resource discovery on the Web
now adopted more broadly
Building an interdisciplinary consensus about a core element set for resource discovery
simple and intuitive
cross–disciplinary
international
flexible.

16. Introducing the Dublin Core
15 elements of descriptive metadata
All elements optional
All elements repeatable
The whole is extensible
offering a starting point for semantically richer descriptions
Interdisciplinary
libraries, museums, government, education...
International
available in 20 languages, with more on the way.

17. Introducing the Dublin Core
Title
Creator
Subject
Description
Publisher
Contributor
Date
Type
Format
Identifier
Source
Language
Relation
Coverage
Rights

18. Extending DC (semantic refinement)
Improve descriptive precision by adding
sub–structure (subelements and schemes)
Element qualifier
Value qualifier
Greater precision = lesser interoperability
Should ‘dumb down’ gracefully
Creator
First Name
Surname
Affiliation
Contact Info
Based on a slide by Stu Weibel

19. Extending DC (a modular approach)
Modular extensibility...
additional elements to support local needs
complementary packages of metadata
…but only if we get the building blocks right
Terms & Conditions
Description
Archival Management
Based on a slide by Stu Weibel

20. Extending DC? DC offers a semantic framework
through use of further substructure, meaning can often be clarified
John Inc. ?
John xyz ?
xyz John ?
<Creator>
“John”
John Inc.
John xyz
xyz John.
<Creator>
<fore name>
“John”

21. Extending DC? DC offers a semantic framework
Use of domain–specific schemes greatly increases precision
Washington State ?
Washington DC ?
Washington monument ?
<Coverage>
“Washington”
Washington State
Washington DC
Washington monument
<Coverage>
<TGN>
“Washington”
“North and Central America, United States, Washington”

22. Dublin Core in the physical world
Dublin Core originally designed with electronic resources in mind
Physical resources are fundamentally different
Issues of surrogacy become more important
Genre, Type, and Format models vary greatly
Difficult to remember what is being described, and which characteristics of the resource and its surrogates are ‘correct’.

23. Introducing Physical Objects
Aspects of the real world are key to much of what museums do
Physical objects have dimensions
23 x 46 cm
12 x 52 x 18 in
18.6 cm3
823 pages
Physical objects have a form
oil on canvas
Tadcaster limestone
stainless steel.

24. Introducing Physical Objects
Physical objects change over time
constructed between AD524 and 873
repaired in AD1270
incorporated into ornamental arch in AD1320
Physical objects move
cast in Beijing
used in Shanghai
taken to Hong Kong
on display in Macau.

25. Introducing Physical Objects
Physical objects are associated with people
written by William Shakespeare
acquired by Lord Elgin
decreed by the Emperor Hadrian
associated with Prince Charles Edward Stuart
Physical objects are contextualised
fired at the Battle of Trafalgar
carried on Apollo 11 from the moon
printed on the first printing press
salvaged from the Titanic.

26. Introducing Collections
Museum objects, whether original or surrogate, are normally part of a collection
Collections may be ‘real’...
the Sutton Hoo hoard
the Terracotta Warriors
...an aspect of the process by which objects enter the museum...
the Burrell Collection
Solomon Guggenheim’s art collection
…or simply practical
coins at the British Museum
the Tate Gallery’s collection of works by Da Vinci.

27. Introducing Surrogacy
Many of the resources we describe are, in reality, surrogates for something else
a photograph of King Tutankhamen’s death mask
a photograph of a statue of George Washington
a film of President Kennedy’s assassination
a sound recording of Neil Armstrong’s “One small step for man…” speech on the moon
a copy of the Mona Lisa
a model of the Great Wall of China
a reproduction of the Terracotta warriors.

28. Issues of Surrogacy
Many of the resources we describe are, in reality, surrogates for something else
we need to be clear whether we are describing the resource or its surrogate
the sculptor of a statue is often not the person who made its photographic surrogate
the model of the Forbidden City is unlikely to have been created at the same date as the Forbidden City itself
the format of a computer image of the Mona Lisa (image/jpeg ?)is not the same as the format of the original painting (oil on canvas ?).

29. Other Museum Issues
Museums need to describe real objects and surrogates in a similar manner
guidelines/standards therefore need to encompass both, despite their differences
Resource descriptions will often be drawn from existing collection management systems in the first instance, rather than created afresh
guidelines therefore need to respect existing practices within established systems
There is often no ‘right’ answer
so practices need to allow for approximate dates, multiple possible creators, etc.

30. Introducing the 1:1 Principle
1 : 1
The broader Dublin Core community is tackling some of the problems relevant to museums
Their work on the ‘1:1 Principle’ is especially useful in resolving museum issues over original versus surrogate and item versus collection:
each Dublin Core ‘record’ should describe only one resource, whether surrogate or original. Associated resources should be linked together by means of the Relation element in Dublin Core.

31. Introducing the 1:1 Principle
1 : 1
In a record describing a photo of the Mona Lisa on a web page, for example…
Leonardo da Vinci is not the creator of the image
The image was not created during the Renaissance
…but you might include these as Subject terms, and you could usefully provided a link to the record describing the real painting via Dublin Core’s Relation element
Equally, in describing the painting itself…
is not the Identifier of the painting
but you might link to this image via Relation, just to show people what the painting looks like.

32. The primacy of ‘Type’
In describing museum objects, it is often most useful to first decide what you are describing and why, rather than beginning with ‘who made it’ and ‘what is it called’, as is often the case with books
if you know you’re describing a surrogate of the Mona Lisa, then you know Leonardo da Vinci is not the Creator; whoever made the surrogate is
if you know you’re describing a collection of 20th century paintings, then you know that Picasso, Hockney et al are not the Creators; the collector is.

33. The primacy of ‘Type’
if you know you’re describing the Sutton Hoo helmet, then the fact that it was added to a particular museum collection in 1939 perhaps doesn’t matter; that information is better placed in the collection record
if you know you’re describing a natural specimen, then perhaps it has no Creator; there may be a ‘creator’ associated with its identification or collection, though.

34. Dublin Core for Museums: Assumptions
In applying Dublin Core to museums, we are making certain basic assumptions, many of which were tested by CIMI
DC is appropriate for use in describing both physical and digital resources
DC is easy to learn and simple to use
Information can be meaningfully and efficiently extracted from existing museum systems in order to populate DC records
the creation of a DC record to describe a museum object is cost–effective, and aids the discovery of resources more than simply allowing access to the underlying Collection Management system might.

35. Practicalities of Implementing Dublin Core
Paul Miller Uk Office for Library & Information Networking
Thomas Hofmann Australian Museums On-Line

36. Overview Creation and Maintenance Harvesting and Distribution
Retrieval
Implementation Models
Case Study

37. Dublin Core - Refresher
15 simple elements
Focus on Resource Discovery not Resource Description
One Dublin Core record per resource
Interoperable across communities
Can be easy populated from existing databases
Can be formatted in XML/ RDF or HTML

38. When should I use Dublin Core?
You have a rich standard, need simpler one
You want to disclose your data to other communities using commonly understood semantics
You want to provide unified access to databases with different underlying schemas
You need core description semantics and don’t feel compelled to invent them anew

39.   Considerations  Creation and Maintenance tools educate
Harvesting/ Distribution tools

Retrieval tools consensus interface design 

40. Creating and Maintaining Dublin Core Metadata

41. Encoding Dublin Core HTML RDF Unqualified Qualified Based on XML Easy
Overloaded Content (HTML 3.2)
Additional Attribute (HTML 4)
RDF
Based on XML
Sophisticated
More complex

42. Encoding Dublin Core - Unqualified
<HEAD>
<META NAME="DC.TITLE"
CONTENT="My Web Page">
<META NAME="DC.Subject"
CONTENT="Computers,Metadata">
</HEAD>

43. Encoding Dublin Core - Qualified (HTML 3.2)
<HEAD>
<META NAME="DC.Subject"
CONTENT="(SCHEME=AAT)(LANG=EN) Statue, Granite">
</HEAD>

44. Encoding Dublin Core - Qualified (HTML 4)
<HEAD>
<META NAME="DC.Subject"
SCHEME="AAT"
LANG="EN"
CONTENT="Statue, Granite">
</HEAD>

45. Encoding Dublin Core - Sub-Elements
<HEAD>
<META NAME="DC.Date.Created"
CONTENT=" (SCHEME=ISO8601)
">
<META NAME="DC.Date.Modified"
SCHEME="ISO8601"
CONTENT="1999–03–25">
</HEAD>

46. Encoding Dublin Core - RDF
...
<?xml:namespace href=" as="ISO"?>
<RDF:RDF>
<RDF:Description …>
<DC:Date>
<RDF:Description>
<ISO:date>1999–03–25</ISO:date>
</RDF:Description>
</DC:Date>
</RDF:RDF>

47. Example Tool: DC Dot http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/metadata/dcdot/
Semi-automated generation of Dublin Core
Cut and past into document
Conversions to HTML, SOIF, XML, WHOIS++, USMARC, GILS

48. Example Tool: DC Dot
Screenshot of

49. Example Tool: DC Dot
Screenshots of DC Dot output

50. Example Tool: Reggie http://metadata.net
Generic creation tool for any metadata schema published to metadata.net
Currently supports: Dublin Core in 5 languages
Syntax: HTML META tags (V3.2 and 4.0), RDF

51. Example Tool: Reggie
Screenshot of Reggie

52. Example Tool: Site Generator
Tool which parses local web site and automatically creates Dublin Core metadata
Syntax: HTML
JAVA based tool which requires JDK 1.1

53. Further Information - Creation and Maint.
Metadata Creation Tools General METADATA PAGE AT UKOLN METAWEB TagGen SE
User Guides
Official User Guide for Simple Dublin Core
CIMI Guide to Best Practice: Dublin Core

54. Harvesting and Distributing Dublin Core Metadata


55. Harvesting / Distribution
Tools
Z39.50 Gateway
Metadata Harvester
Full-text Search Engine
Resources
Indexing, harvesting tools Z

56. Searching and Retrieving Dublin Core Metadata

57. Retrieval Tools Interface design HTML - search forms
HTML - predefined queries
Z39.50 clients/ Java applets
Standalone applications
Interface design
Assist users: -help them to understand what they are looking for -give them an idea what terminologies you are using -use commonly understood design language

58. Bringing it all together: Implementation Models
 

59. Implementation Models
Harvesting DC into a repository (database)
Distributed Database Search
Full-text indexing with metadata extraction

60. Implementation Models
Harvesting DC into a repository (database) 
HTML 
Query
Harvester
Repository
XML 
Other types
Dynamic document creation from database
retrieve resource

61. Implementation Models
Distributed Database Search
Z39.50 Server
Z39.50 Gateway
Query
retrieve resource

62. Implementation Models
Full-text indexing with metadata extraction 
HTML 
Query
Indexer
Index DB
XML 
Other types
Dynamic document creation from database
retrieve resource

63. Questions before implementation
Do I really need Dublin Core?
What is my budget?
What type of resources do I want to describe?
Which encoding format for which resource?
Do I have community support?
Can I provide creation tools?

64. Challenges of implementing Dublin Core
Intellectual
Education of information creators
Community consensus
Resistance against sharing information
Technical
Efficient tools
Infrastructure
Economical
Automatic generation vs. manual creation
Cost of training
Cost of tools

65. Dublin Core for Masses?

66. Dublin Core for the masses
Why Dublin Core hasn’t hit the consumer market yet
No killer application
Lack of standardisation
No support in public search engines
No support in mass market applications
Non transparent applications
Inefficient handling in HTML

67. Further Information
Projects Official Dublin Core web site
Mailing lists Dublin Core Implementors workgroup Mailing list

68. Case Study: AMOL

69. Case Study AMOL (1) Gateway to Australian Museums and Galleries
Initial idea: One central access point for all Australian collections
Creation of AMOL standard record for object data due to lack of common standards
8 basic field with focus on resource discovery and easy deployment from within existing databases
Fields: Object Title, Object Name, Creator, Description, Item ID, KeySearchTerms, Date/DateRange, Associated Places

70. Case Study AMOL (2)
AMOL search/ system architecture - current system
Mapped
metadata
exported
User
queries search
engine and gets records
delivered to web browser
HTML
documents
Legacy DB
Remote web server
storing HMTL documents
AMOL index server

71. Case Study AMOL (3) Lessons Learned Data and technology related
Lack of consistent use of controlled vocabularies, quality of data recorded
Performance of indexing software, lack of metadata support in public search engines
high administration efforts
Intellectual
Users have problems with “empty text box” approach
Limited information in record to see context with larger picture
General
Large institutions: bureaucratic machinery, complex collection systems designed without interoperability in mind
Small institutions: concerned about security issues, fear of larger institutions

72. Case Study AMOL (4) New perspectives
New resource types: Information about institutions, Images, Video, Audio, general HTML pages - goes beyond capabilities of standard AMOL record
Need to provide easier access for users
New cross community projects require interoperable metadata standards for cross domain searching
Strong move in Australia towards Dublin Core based metadata schemas driven by government
Strong move towards interpretation of objects through stories
Search Architecture and extended AMOL metadata standard

73.  Case Study AMOL (5)   NEW AMOL search/ system architecture
User
queries search
engine and gets records
delivered to web browser
Remote web server
Providing dynamic access to ODBC databases
Legacy databases 
AV resources 
Textual resources 
Information mapped to DC based metadata plus index text, images
AMOL index server

74. Case Study AMOL (6) Future Directions
Implementation of RDF for dynamically served databases and text style resources
Consensus of community: Metadata Forum
Further education of users: Metadata Workshops
Creation of multi-type metadata schema based on Dublin Core
Creation of mapping tools for easier database implementation

75. Case Study AMOL (7) Recommendations Biggest Problem still remaining:
Prepare good user guides
Run workshops and educate museum professionals
Get consensus from community
Plan with interoperability in mind
Evaluate tools and plan for future additions
Biggest Problem still remaining:
what is the benefit to the individual institution other than being interoperable for networked resources

76. Dublin Core for Masses?

77. Dublin Core for the masses
Why Dublin Core hasn’t hit the consumer market yet
No killer application
Lack of standardisation
No support in public search engines
No support in mass market applications
Non transparent applications
Inefficient handling in HTML

78. Further Information
Projects Official Dublin Core web site
Mailing lists Dublin Core Implementors workgroup Mailing list

80. For Machine Communication we need..
Semantic Interoperability
Standardisation of content
“Let’s talk Resource Description”
“Creator, Publisher..,”
Structural Interoperability
Standardisation of form
“Lets use MICI”
“Field # 1 Element Name
Syntactic Interoperability
Standardisation of expression
“Here’s how to say it in HTML”
“<Meta name= Element Name= “….”>”