The document summarizes the development of PA Digital, a collaborative project to aggregate digital collections from institutions across Pennsylvania. It describes how a summit in 2014 led to the creation of a survey to assess current collections. Using the survey results, developers built a prototype aggregator to harvest metadata from contributors using OAI-PMH. The aggregator transformed and normalized the metadata to share with the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA). Through outreach and governance efforts, PA Digital aims to expand participation and improve features to better serve users.

1. Collaborating on
Collections as a
Community
Patricia
Hswe
|
Penn
State
University
Libraries
Keystone
Digital
Humanities
Conference
23
June
2016
A Project Showcase

2. LOTS of credit due to the people involved!

3. LOTS of credit due to the people involved!
. . . If you want to go far, go together.
https://padigital.org/about-partnership/

4. That
said
.
.
.
Images
used
in
this
presentation
are
credited
on
the
last
slide.

5. The Story of PA Digital

6. PA
Digital
Collections
Summit
in
summer
2014
/
Emily
Gore
The Story of PA Digital

7. Survey
in
fall
2014
about
digital
collections
PA
Digital
Collections
Summit
in
summer
2014
/
Emily
Gore
The Story of PA Digital

8. Survey
in
fall
2014
about
digital
collections
PA
Digital
Collections
Summit
in
summer
2014
/
Emily
Gore
Building
the
aggregator
The Story of PA Digital

9. Survey
in
fall
2014
about
digital
collections
PA
Digital
Collections
Summit
in
summer
2014
/
Emily
Gore
Building
the
aggregator
Speaks
for
itself
The Story of PA Digital

11. “Social
engineering”
side
of
the
effort

12. “Social
engineering”
side
of
the
effort
How
do
you
get
a
distributed
bunch
of
people
to
collaborate,
coordinate,
get
things
DONE?

13. PA Digital Collections Summit – Summer
2014
• Among
participants
were
.
.
.
– Temple
U.,
PA
State
Library,
Penn,
Penn
State,
Keystone
Library
Network,
Carnegie
Library,
POWER
Library,
PALCI,
Heinz
History
Center,
and
more!
• Emily
Gore,
DPLA
Director
of
Content
• Break-­‐out
sessions
• Next
steps

14. Surveying the PA digital collections
landscape
• Survey
released
in
August
2014
&
open
until
June
2015
– Example
questions:
How
do
you
handle
copyright
clearance?
Who
hosts
your
digital
collections?
What
DAMS
do
you
use?
Metadata
schema?
• 239
organizations
responded,
70%
public
and
academic
libraries
• Access
the
survey
results
at
https://is.gd/
pdcp_survey

15. Surveying the PA digital collections
landscape

16. Surveying the PA digital collections
landscape
We
know
we
need
more
participants
that
are
museums
and
archives.

17. Building the aggregator
• Proof-­‐of-­‐concept
purpose
/
show
&
tell
– Prototype
aggregator
by
March/April
2015
• Production
aggregator
in
2016
– OAI-­‐PMH
harvesting
and
serving
– Metadata
is
transformed,
based
on
OAI
and
DPLA
requirements
– Preview
layer
is
web-­‐based
– Intentionally
“verbose
logging”
• To
learn
more,
view
this
DPLAFest
2016
video
presentation
about
PA
Digital:
https://is.gd/
padigital_dplafest

19. Code
for
DPLA
Hydra
Head:
https://github.com/tulibraries/dplah
http://libcollab.temple.edu/aggregator

20. THE “SOCIAL ENGINEERING”
ASPECTS
Yes, the tool is important, but more so the people!

21. Milestones
• April
2015
–
proof-­‐of-­‐concept
aggregator
• July
2015
–
submitted
application
to
become
a
service
hub
• Late
August
2015
–
application
approved!
• January/February
2016
–
initial
ingest
of
PA
Digital
content
• April
2016
–
PA
Digital
content
live
in
the
DPLA!

22. Impact of the aggregator
• Proof-­‐of-­‐concept
state
=
unifying,
consolidating
application
not
only
in
terms
of
technology
– Tangibility
• Advantages
re:
metadata
remediation/
normalization,
distributed
workflows
• Outreach
tool
• Local
(institutional
context)
usage/potential

23. What’s next?
• Lots
of
outreach!
• Governance
work
• Addressing
feature
requests
about
/
from
– Metadata
– Aggregator
– DPLA

24. THANK
YOU!
Twitter:
@PADigitalNews
|
http://www.padigital.org/

25. Image credits
• take
a
photo
-­‐
https://www.flickr.com/photos/bruce_aldridge/8239964617/
via
Flickr
by
Bruce
Aldridge
CC
BY-­‐SA
2.0
• Free
Library
of
Philadelphia
-­‐
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/
File:The_Free_Library_of_Philadelphia.jpg
via
WikimediaCommons
by
nanoman657
CC
BY-­‐SA
3.0
• Surveying
-­‐
https://www.flickr.com/photos/carbonnyc/12270235054/
via
Flickr
by
David
Goehring
CC
BY
2.0
• Buzzword
Bingo:
Metadata
=
Data
about
data
-­‐
https://www.flickr.com/photos/
planeta/11427773216/
via
Flickr
by
Ron
Mader
CC
BY-­‐SA
2.0
• Construction
worker
at
Westlake
Center,
1988
-­‐
https://www.flickr.com/photos/
seattlemunicipalarchives/6648032895
via
Flickr
by
Seattle
Municipal
Archives
CC
BY
2.0
• IMG_6531
-­‐
https://www.flickr.com/photos/h3nr0/5012587802/
via
Flickr
by
Henry
Tseng
CC
BY
2.0