A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk Addressing The Limitations Of Open Standards Brian Kelly UKOLN University of Bath Bath, UK UKOLN is supported by: Co-Authors Marieke Guy, UKOLN Alastair Dunning, AHDS Co-Authors Marieke Guy, UKOLN Alastair Dunning, AHDS This work is licensed under a Attribution- NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 licence (but note caveat) Resources bookmarked using mw-standards-2007 ' tag

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 2 Contents This talk will cover the following topics: Introduction Standards are great Standards don't always work Layered approach developed by QA Focus Application to JISC development programmes Application elsewhere Sustainability Conclusions

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 3 About Me, About UKOLN Brian Kelly: UK Web Focus – national Web advisory post Advises higher & further education & cultural heritage sectors on Web innovations, standards & best practices Involved in Web since January 1993 Involved in Web standards for JISC development programmes since 1995 UKOLN National centre of expertise in digital information management Location at the University of Bath, UK Funded by MLA (Museums, Libraries and Archives Council) and JISC (Joint Information Systems Committee) Introduction

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 4 Open Standards Are Great … JISC's development programmes (like others): Traditionally based on use of open standards to: Support interoperability Maximise accessibility Avoid vendor lock-in Provide architectural integrity Help ensure long-term preservation History in UK HE development work: eLib Standards document (v1 – 1996, v2 – 1998) DNER (JISC IE) Standards document (2001) which influenced: NOF-digi Technical Standards (digitisation of cultural resources) Open Standards

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 5 … But Don't Always Work There's a need for flexibility: Learning the lesson from OSI networking protocols Today: Is the Web (for example) becoming over-complex "Web service considered harmful" The lowercase semantic web / Microformats Lighter-weight alternatives being developed Responses from the commercial world Open Standards Other key issues What is an open standard? What are the resource implications of using them? Sometimes proprietary solutions work (and users like them). Is it politically incorrect to mention this!? Other key issues What is an open standard? What are the resource implications of using them? Sometimes proprietary solutions work (and users like them). Is it politically incorrect to mention this!?

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 6 What Is An Open Standard? Which of the following are open standards? PDF Flash Java MS Word UKOLN's "What Are Open Standards?" briefing paper refers to characteristics of open standards: Neutral organisation which 'owns' standard & responsible for roadmap Open involvement in standards-making process Access to standard freely available … Note these characteristics do not apply equally to all standards bodies e.g. costs of BSI standards; W3C membership requirements; … Open Standards

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 7 Compliance Issues What does must mean? You must comply with HTML standards What if I don't? What if nobody does? What if I use PDF? You must clear rights on all resources you digitise You must provide properly audited accounts What if I don't? There is a need to clarify the meaning of must and for an understandable, realistic and reasonable compliance regime Compliance JISC 5/99 programme ~80% of project home pages were not HTML compliant

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 8 The Context There will be a context to use of standards: The intended use: Mainstream Innovative / research Key middleware component Small-scale deliverable Organisational culture: National vs small museum Teaching vs Research Service vs development … Available Funding & Resources: Significant funding & training to use new standards Minimal funding - current skills should be used … Contextual Issues An open standards culture is being developed, which is supportive of use of open standards, but which recognises the complexities and can avoid mistakes made in the past

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 9 Quality Assurance External factors: institutional, cultural, legal, … The Layered Standards Model JISC JISC / project 3 rd Parties Owner Annotated Standards Catalogue PurposeGovernance MaturityRisks … Prog. nFundingResearchSector… Context: Policies ExternalSelf assessment Penalties Learning Context: Compliance JISC's layered standards model, developed by UKOLN. Note that one size doesn't always fit all

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 10 Implementation How might this approach be used in practice? Programme XX Call / Contract Committees Advisers Programme Team Proposals must comply with XYZ standard Proposals should seek to comply with XYZ Proposals should describe approach to XYZ Projects audited to ensure compliance with … Projects should develop self-assessment QA procedures and submit findings to JISC Projects should submit proposed approach for approval/information Development Programme JISC Manager Report Contract Report must be in MS Word / … and use JISC template … Contextual Model

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 11 Note recent feedback has identified the need for heading on usage in other programmes (i.e. political acceptance) The Standards Catalogue The information provided aims to be simple and succinct (but document will still be large when printed!) Standard: Dublin Core About the Standard: Dublin Core is a metadata standard made up … Version: New terms are regularly added to … Maturity: Dublin Core has its origins in workshops held … Risk Assessment: Dublin Core plays a key role …. It is an important standard within the context of JISC development programmes. Further Information: DCMI, … Author: Pete Johnston, UKOLN Contributor: Date Created: 04 Oct 2005 Update History: Initial version. Example Note that as the standards catalogue is intended for wide use the contents will need to be fairly general

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 12 Standards Catalogue Process There's a need for developing and enhancing the standards catalogue in order to: Update with new standards Learn from feedback and experiences Review Policies Context Compliance Support Infrastructure QA Framework User Experiences Funder's Experiences Standards … E-Framework Feedback

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 13 Sustainability How do we Sustain, maintain & grow the standards catalogue? Develop a sustainable support infrastructure? Suggestions: More resources for support infrastructure Extend model to related areas to gain buy-in, etc Exploit learning gained by projects, reuse experiences, encourage sharing, etc.: Build on QA Focus approach (briefing docs and case studies) Contractual requirement for projects to produce end-user deliverables and deliverables related to development process Sustainability

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 14 Lessons From NOF-digi TAS What have we learnt from supporting the NOF-digi programme: Use of Standards Best practices not necessarily embedded if imposed externally Formal compliance monitoring can be expensive (& unproductive) Establishing Community of Practice Limitations of top-down & centralised support Sustainability problems of large, monolithic and centrally owned support resources Sustainability

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 15 Support Infrastructure Opportunity to exploit deliverables from JISC-funded QA Focus project: 100+ briefing documents & 30+ case studies Licensed (where possible) under Creative Commons UKOLN are continuing to publish new documents (documents on Folksonomies, AJAX, Podcasting, Wikis, etc. published recently) Case Study Template About the Project Area covered Approach taken Lessons Learnt / Things We'd Do Differently … Case studies: Opportunity to describe experiences in specific areas Standard template to ensure consistency & provide focus Allows UKOLN to promote projects' work Project get better Google rating Support

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 16 Support Infrastructure (2) How do we integrate the standards catalogue with implementation experiences, etc. Linking to related information in Wikipedia (the world can help the updating) Uploading information to Wikipedia – the wider community can help to update and maintain it Making information available with CC licences – so others can use it, update it – and hopefully give feedback on enhancements Use of syndication technologies (RSS & OPML) Support Note this is a Web 2.0 approach: Uses Web 2.0 syndication technologies Trusts users and benefits from a wide user base Contributes to Web 2.0 services Note this is a Web 2.0 approach: Uses Web 2.0 syndication technologies Trusts users and benefits from a wide user base Contributes to Web 2.0 services

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 17 Support Model Different stakeholders have different interests Developers Selection of standards & architectures Users Is it usable? Will it do what I want? Will I use it? Can I use it in various contexts? Funders, etc Addressing differing interests

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 18 Similar Approaches Elsewhere AHRC (Arts & Humanities Research Council) programmes: Requirement for bids to include technical appendix Covers open standards, metadata, documentation, rights, preservation, … Bids marked by technical experts Flawed technical proposals are informed of deficiencies Training and Advice provided to community to help raise awareness of best practices and improve quality of development proposals Support

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 19 Parallels With Web 2.0 This approach has many parallels with Web 2.0 Web 2.0 Culture Openness: Encourage of sharing by developers (problems as well as successes); use of CC; … Always beta: There is not a single correct solution, but a process of continual development User-focussed: Importance of satisfying user communities, rather than a set of rules Web 2.0 technologies Alerts & Syndication: Speedy alerts for fellow developers and reuse of content for developers Blogs & Wikis: Tools for developers to facilitate sharing and collaborative working Web 2.0

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 20 Example: Syndicating Content Note importance of: (a) RSS and OPML (b) modular approach and (c) Creative Commons licence to maximise use & reuse of 100+ briefing documents QA Focus resources are embedded in University of Waterloo Web site. Resources are also being ported to a Wiki to support ongoing maintenance by Web Standards community.

A centre of expertise in digital information managementwww.ukoln.ac.uk 21 Conclusions To conclude: Open standards are important for large-scale development work It is therefore important to have a pragmatic approach and not hide behind dogma The contextual approach: Allows scope to address complexities of technologies; deployment environments; etc. Best deployed within a supportive open standards culture Can be extended to other relevant areas We can use Creative Commons licences for standards information; support materials; etc. We can (and should) take a Web 2.0 approach to support materials (and not just end user services) Conclusions