The GNM-DMS a Document Management System for the Germanische Nationalmuseum Martin Doerr, ICS-Forth Siegfried Krause, GNM April 2004

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 2 GNM-DMS, the Idea Breaking up Rigid Structures: (The GNM is a heterogeneous research organization, not an object administrator, with 15 departments, 1.5 million objects) –Maintain object documentation as XML documents –Reduce rigid database structures to minimum –Increase flexibility for dedicated structures –Apply a flexible approach to vocabulary control –Consistency enforcement, without imposing workflow, requires very careful analysis and algorithms Integrating the Past and the Future: –Retrospective documentation –System migration –Digital preservation are integral part of the concept Deliberately slow development for extensive field tests

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 3 GNM-DMS, current stage: Object documentation integrated with object entry, in use at client site –revised version in daily use since one year. –Registrar’s office, research departments (collections) with multiple XML- DTDs –Vocabulary control: mandatory, open list of terms and scope notes. Retrospective documentation Object move, loan in/out, accession,de-accession, photographic documentation –System migration, digital preservation are integral part of the concept –Monitoring, rather than imposing work-flow –Prototype tested at user site

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 4 Museum DMS Purpose Capture all facets of the knowledge about the museum objects, providing consistency and integrity control of objects, documents and referred concepts Administrational tasks (functions) –Accession, Document Initialization –Loan-In, Loan-Out, Movement (Location tracking) Scientific tasks (functions) –Inventory document management (collective objects, merge, split, change of inventory number, retrospective documentation) –Documentation phase Relations between objects Semantic linking of objects and other documents Search - retrieve Use of Thesaurus (person, place, period, object type) –Electronic publishing

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 5 iFS: Document Repository Master Catalogue: Document Index Oracle FTP Protocol Document Initialization Accession Document Search Object Relations Thesaurus Administration User Interface Scientific Upload Download Client side Server side WEB Browser XML Document Editor

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 6 Thesaurus Master Catalogue Identificationpart Scientificpart Administrationpart XML Documents Semantic relations Consistency relations Dept.1 Dept.2 Dept.3 <Accession> …. ….</Accession><Loan> </Loan>

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 7 Documentation facets Scientific part –Object type, object title, object history, subject depicted, material and technique, mark and inscription etc. Administration part –Accession, location, de-accession, loan in, loan out Identification part –Object related: Inventory number, accession number, department –Document related: document identifier, version, author –Registrar’s information: core documentation for administration purposes

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 8 Consistency and Integrity control Thesaurus: museum knowledge –Person –Place –Period –Object type Master catalogue: consistency and integrity control mechanism –Museum object –XML documents –Correlations

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 9 GNM-DMS, functional modules Document administration module –Creation and maintenance of documents stored in the Internet File System (iFS) –Interaction with document repository –Generation of inventory numbers –File access: document retrieval, store update, lock, unlock. Correlation and consistency management module –Ensures coherent correlation between identification identifiers of museum objects (accession number, inventory number) –Maintains the amendment history of information (old inventory numbers) –Ensures consistent update of master-catalogue and the identification information stored in inventory documents Search module –Retrieval of inventory documents –Access to both administrational and scientific information –Support of full text search and text retrieval on specified tags of the XML inventory documents

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 10 GNM-DMS, User Interface User Interface design: two level approach –Administrational information handling: Web browser user interface guides the document management Registrar’s office interface (provides access to all the necessary administrational information, exclusively managed by the registrar’s office) Department curator interface (provides access to all the necessary scientific information, managed by the dept. curator) –Object documentation: Customized XML editor guides and simplifies the documentation process  System Administrator Interface

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 11 GNM-DMS, Web browser UI Banner List of Work areas Toolbar List of documents

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 12 GNM-DMS, XML Editor Customized menu Edit the selected information unit Automatic insertion of inventory document information units

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 13 GNM-DMS, Critical Algorithms Inventory number changes for Retro inventory documents Inventory splitting – merging issues

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 14 Inventory number changes for Retro inventory documents During the transcription of paper-based information: two different objects may refer to the same identification number (conflict cases) GNM-DMS: can recognize all conflict cases and provides means to solve them Describing the problem: two states, two museum objects paper GNM-DMS object A object B

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 15 True conflict case paper GNM-DMS object A object B X1 Conflict System response: Save X1 to other- numbers and assign system generated inv# to identify object B paper GNM-DMS object A object B X1 Sys-Inv# X1 Querying the object with old identification information is retained

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 16 Typing mistake in database paper GNM-DMS object A object B X1 X2 conflict paper GNM-DMS object A object B X1 X2 paper GNM-DMS object A object B X1 X2 Sys-Inv# X2 paper GNM-DMS object A object B X1 X2 X1 correction correct situation Sys-Inv# X2 mistake

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 17 Merge – Split Issues A lot of time after an object’s acquisition, causes of considering the object as two (or more) different ones, may be raised. One the other, research can prove that two (or more objects) should have been considered as one. System keeps track of the objects merge – split history: –providing a rollback channel in case of new research results, –considering that an extracted object may belong to a new collection, –considering that a lot of the info of the extracted/merged document, already exists in the system, –strictly storing all the numbers under which material may have been referred in GNM-DMS.

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 18 Split Algorithm Glf20001 Split of inventory document with Number Glf20001 “Parent” inventory document retains its number XML Ref: “has extracted” XML Ref: “extracted from” Old Number (due to Split)Glf20001 New inventory document Glf20045 produced with number Glf20045

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 19 Merge Algorithm Glf20001 … to inventory document with Number Glf20001 … Invalid and Read-Only document Glf20076 with number Glf20076 Invalid and Read-Only document Glf20076 with number Glf20076 Glf20001 Old Number (due to Merge) Glf20001 Merge inventory document Glf20076 with Number Glf20076 …

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 20 Split – Merge Example Inv. Number Glf20005 Inv. Number Glf20032 Pool of Invalid Documents Inv. Number Glf20032 Old Numbers Glf20005 (Merge) Inv. Number Glf20006 Inv. Number Glf20032 Old Numbers Glf20005 (Merge) Glf20006 (Merge) Inv. Number Glf20007 Inv. Number Glf20032 Old Numbers Glf20005 (Merge) Glf20006 (Merge) Glf20007 (Merge) Inv. Number Glf20005 Old Numbers Glf20006 (Merge) Glf20007 (Merge) Glf20032 (Split) ? ? Inv. Number Glf20032 Old Numbers Glf20005 (Merge) Glf20006 (Merge) Glf20007 (Merge) ?? Pool of Invalid Documents

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 21 From:10/10/2000To:08/11/2000 To:02/02/2001 From:08/11/2000 Split – Merge Example Validation Date: 10/10/2000 Merge Date: 08/11/2000 Split Date: 02/02/2001 Inv. Number Glf20032 Old Numbers Glf20005 (Merge) Glf20006 (Merge) Glf20007 (Merge) … … … Inv. Number Glf20005 Old Numbers Glf20006 (Merge) Glf20007 (Merge) Glf20032 (Split) Inv. Number Glf20032 Old Numbers Glf20005 (Merge) Glf20006 (Merge) Glf20007 (Merge) ? ? ? ? Inv. Number Glf20032 Old Numbers Glf20005 (Merge) Inv. Number Glf20005 Inv. Number Glf20032

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 22 Critical Algorithms …Complete analysis implemented and documented …

Centre for Cultural Informatics, ICS - FORTH - Germanisches Nationalmuseum Nuremberg 23Conclusions The object documentation as documents satisfies the curators, helps digital preservation and reduces the development cost Report writing and precise queries become more complex, whereas information retrieval becomes very simple The use of leading edge technology, particularly XML WYSIWYG editors, requires flexibility from developers and clients – though technology stabilizes rapidly Respect of the local organization culture is a key to success