ASU\'s KNET Overview

ASU Knowledge Network: an Digital Repository Development, Overview, Digital Collections [http://knet.asu.edu/]

Who Are We?

Informatics and Cyberinfrastructure Services (ICS) Department at ASU Libraries (in Hayden Library).

We’re developing a digital repository that will help faculty organize and store digital materials that result from their research projects.

The repository will help provide greater accessibility to digital objects and digital research.

Researchers, students, and the public can access digital research results via a Web browser .

What is a Digital Object?

Research materials are stored in the repository as digital objects.

Digital objects can include materials that are as diverse as videos, audio recordings, GIS maps, data sets (excel spreadsheets, database tables), texts, or images.

The stored digital objects may have been created digitally (e.g., a Word document or Excel sheet) or it could be a digital representation of a physical object (e.g., a book that has been scanned and saved as a PDF file, or a digital photograph of a museum specimen).

What is a Digital Repository?

Museums, libraries, and archives have long been in the business of acquiring, cataloguing, storing and preserving physical items.

Trained staff at these institutions typically help patrons find and retrieve items of interest.

A digital repository provides those same services – storage, preservation, cataloguing, indexing, search engine, retrieval – for digital objects.

Although digital repositories require a staff for management, users can access the materials via the web browser on their computers.

ASU Libraries uses FEDORA for the digital repository

FEDORA : not to be confused with Fedora Lynx operating system.

ASU Knowledge Net uses an open source repository framework technology called FEDORA.

(Flexible Extensible Digital Object Repository Architecture)

[http://www.fedora.info].

Originally funded by DARPA & adopted by Cornell University and the University of Virginia Library.

ASU Knowledge Net

ASU Knowledge Net is the library application that provides a gateway to the digital repository database, indexes, and digital object collections

ASU Knowledge Net is currently in alpha phase of development and is available at: [http://knet.asu.edu]

It is designed to look similar to popular search engines like Google and Yahoo for simplicity and ease-of-use

Mimmo: Digital Projects Librarian

Meet with faculty to help develop workflows for organizing and storing digital collections like: texts, images, data sets, audio, or video related to a research project.

Help implement descriptive metadata for collection or projects.

Assist with the development of digital object content models which describe how digital objects should be “ingested” into the repository, like the geospatial, image, audiovisual, oral history and other content models as needed.

Mimmo: Digital Projects Librarian

Communicate and build relationships with other university digital repositories & staff

E.g., current liaison with Northern Indiana University for the Palgen photograph of Cambodian village and rural scenes during the period from 1946 to 1962. Present-day photos are available at NIU and historical photos will be available at ASU.

Manage and supervise ICS Staff members for digital production support.

Develop digital “best practices”

What are the benefits of having a Digital Repository?

Powerful digital object model

Collections are easier to use and find.

Access to digital resources that have been traditionally inaccessible like digital images archived on a professor’s workstation.

Increase the discovery of digital resources

New search technologies like context keyword narrow terms

Archive digital objects in perpetuity & provide access to archived objects

Knowledge Net Start Page: GUI Application of the Fedora Framework

Browse or Narrow Searches in ASU Knowledge Net by…

Digital object or media type

Image, Audio, Video, Maps/GIS, Data

ASU research

ASU Faculty publications, ASU college or school; ASU Centers & Institutes; Thesis & Dissertations; ASU music performance; Interviews & Events

Archive & Special Material Collections

Finding Aids; Grey Literature; Oral Histories

Example of Browsing or Limiting Search to Maps/GIS Object

Example of ASU Faculty Member Summary & Publication List

Example of Oral History Audio from Arizona Jewish Historical Society

Key In-house Digital Collections

Library Channel

Place to find ASU Library news & announcements and tips for the latest trends in research libraries

Professional, original podcast recordings

Interviews, lectures, roundtable discussions with library staff and members of the ASU community (faculty & guests)

Audio tours of ASU Libraries

Subscribe to the latest library news

Original video productions concerning libraries and ASU research community

Very accessible - available through ASU Knowledge Net, Internet Archive, Library Channel Blog, Cox Digital Cable, and iTunes University

Library Channel currently includes 56 audio podcasts, 19 video productions and 2 library audio tours

Facilities used to record oral histories by prominent academics

Listen & watch ASU libraries news & events via iTunes University or ASU Library Channel blog

Colorado River Central Arizona Project Collection

Records of the Central Arizona and Boulder Canyon Project

Selections from the Carl T. Hayden Papers, an Arizona Congressman from 1911-1970

132 objects made up from over 3000 images and transcribed text

Materials include maps, legal transcripts, water project records, personal papers, photographs, and ephemera

Topics include: natural resource development, water reclamation, land-use management, and the Central Arizona Project (CAP)

The Colorado River Central Arizona Project Collection is part of The Western Waters Digital Library (WWDL)

collaborative regional project about the Columbia, Colorado, Platte, and Rio Grande river basins created by twelve university libraries in eight western states

Entry Page of Colorado River Central Arizona Project Collection

Current ASU Knowledge Net Digital Developments & Partnerships

Embryo project

ASU School of Music Performances

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Mimbres

ArchiVision Image Library

Morrison Institute Publications Archive

Digital Antiquity

Embryo Project

Embryo Project examines the changing scientific understanding of embryos, and embryo research

ASU Knowledge Net staff have worked in conjunction with the ASU Center for Biology and Society staff to develop the online Embryo Project Encyclopedia

FEDORA framework technology used by ASU Knowledge Net was also implemented to keep track and index embryo digital resources (People, Places, Practices, Images, Concepts, Context, Literature)

“ Behind the scenes” FEDORA framework captures relationships amongst objects via metadata that may not normally be readily apparent

ASU School of Music Performances

The ASU School of Music Performances collection consists of audio recordings of graduate recitals, faculty performances, and ensemble performances recorded at Arizona State University from 1985 to present day

MP3 Audio recordings may be streamed and listened to with flash technologies imbedded in ASU Knowledge Net

Breakdown Tango! Example of original ASU School of Music Performance

ASU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Currently in first phase of a project between the Graduate College and the ASU Digital Repository

Goal is to transition the receipt and management of printed copies of theses & dissertations to a process that accepts and archives electronic documents

In the future, Graduate students at ASU will have the option of submitting their thesis or dissertation electronically only, and the electronic copy will be archived in ASU Knowledge Net (instead of paper copy)

Example of Electronic Dissertation with PDF-A Link (Archival Format)

Mimbres Pottery Images Database Project (MimPID)

Joint project with the ASU School of Human Evolution and Social Change (Anthropology - SHESC) and Harvard.

Will include Mimbres Pottery images & descriptive information created and currently maintained by Dr. Steven LeBlanc (Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University).

ICS will supply descriptive metadata & house the images in KNET: 30,000 images, 9,500 color thumbnails, 9,500 color full size images of pots, 5,000 full size B/W and the same 5,000 b/w in thumbnail.

Archaeologists use the word "Mimbres" to refer to a prehistoric culture that thrived in present-day New Mexico.

Audience: professional archaeologists who are subject matter experts; other scholars and researchers (not domain experts); general users (public and K-12).

Image Results of MIMBRES Pottery

Focused search result on MIMBRES pottery

Archivision Image Collection

Currently in first phase of implementation

Goal is to ingest a teaching collection of 16,000 images into the digital repository

The collection will be a transdisciplinary teaching tool for the history of:

Architecture

Urbanism

Landscape architecture

And Art in general

The "base collection" of 16,000 images is a teaching core collection representing major Greek, Roman, Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque, 18th and 19th Century and Modern sites pulled from our more than 100,000 slide archive.

Sample Image Collection of the Arch of Titus, Rome, Italy

Morrison Institute for Public Policy Publications Archive

Morrison Institute is a resource for objective policy analysis and expertise at ASU:

Researches public policy issues

Informs policy makers and residents

Advises leaders on choices and actions

Digital repository is currently working with Morrison Institute to make publications of the institute available through the repository.

Initial phase is to provide access to more recent publications of the institute

Sample of Morrison Institute Publication in the Digital Repository

The Digital Antiquity Project

Based on two National Science Foundation grants, a team of ASU archaeologists, computer scientists, and ASU Library are working to design and build a digital information infrastructure (cyberinfrastructure) for systematically collected archaeological data.

Archaeologists will be able to upload datasets (archaeological sites reports), and researchers across scientific disciplines will be able to retrieve the datasets and conduct comparative archaeological research.