View Source

Present: Ashley Augustyniak, Lee Berry, Ron Brashear, David Caruso, Michelle DiMeo, Anna Headley, Hillary Kativa, Stephanie Lampkin, Cat Lu, Gillian Maguire, Erin McLeary, Sarah Newhouse, Daniel Sanford, Patrick Shea, Jim Voelkel

Absent: Andrea Tomlinson

Software Upgrade and Path to Soft Launch:

Soft launch target is summer 2017, roughly the 3 year mark from the project start.
- Digital Collections & Web Teams had meeting. We are not waiting for rebranding due to the long timeline.
- The hard launch can wait for the rebranding.
- When the soft launch happens the name hydra in the URL will be replaced with a more meaningful one. This involves talking with Chuck and Ponce.
Currently there are still many unknowns with website integration. The goal is to hammer these out in meetings with 20/10 web contractors.
Others in the room who met with Web Team regarding digital collection content currently on the website were told it will remain up until Hydra launches then go down.
- It is unclear exactly what that means. The slideshow will still be there but other images may be taken down.

For the soft launch there will be a number of changes to Hydra as it currently is
- Facet browsing will be improved prior to launch (More facet info)
- Search functionality will be extended to additional fields
- The display snippet for search results will be adjusted to show different fields. Creator term(s) will always show, not the generic term creator/maker.
- Blank/unused fields on an item page will be collapsed/hidden
- Sufia will be upgraded from 6.5 to 7.2 to support multi-item works
  - Currently Anna is working on building a migration path for 6.5 to 7. Hasn't yet been done in the Hydra community.
- The lightbox display tool will be used initially after migration, but there is a goal to move to a IIIF compliant viewer, possibly before soft launch.
- Once a Sufia 7 migration is completed, Digital Collections team will provide training for catalogers on the new workflow.

Questions:

What is the timeline for the Sufia 7 migration?
- The aim is November but there are still issues to be worked out before a hard date can be given.
Will content that goes down on the website be directly mirrored by content in Hydra or will it be taken down without necessarily having the same images in Hydra yet?
- General consensus seems to be that it will not be a 1-1 mirroring of data.
- Sloan has discussed points of integration (possibly uploading images into Drupal with links back to Hydra) but these are still unclear in details.
- Website's basic structure will remain unchanged and Hydra will be added in, possibly as a search box in each section of the website that searches only items matching the section (rare books, archives, museum, etc).
  - Information design is based off user studies the website team has done with Night Kitchen but Digital Collections team has not seen those yet.
- Library warned that the website tried to automatically pull images from Othmeralia but formatting and resizing issues caused problems.
  - IIIF image viewer on Hydra may allow that to process to be automated in the future so that pulling into Drupal could be more automated.
- Generally speaking most website issues are TBD until a meeting with 20/10 and further details are available.

Curating Collections:

The goal of the soft launch is have to something representative of the different sections of the CHF (Museum, Library, Rare Book, Archives)
The soft launch won't be limited to access on site, but it will not be announced and it will have the beta tag.
Meeting this past summer with curators identified 3 broad themes to build the initial digital collection around.
- This has been challenging due to technical limitations: no Works (multi-page objects) in Hydra, and photography challenges with space, objects and equipment.
- As a result curators have branched out into other themes as well.
  - This has proven to be positive: much of the content selected has been very exciting. (e.g. Second Skin museum exhibit and archival stamp collections)
With the soft launch coming, what should be in Hydra and what would be a problem if it was missing?
- Archives: Inability to ingest multi-file works is currently limiting content, but there are no major missing areas. Would be happy to launch as-is and keep building.
- Photographs: There are no major missing areas.
- Rare Books: Some major acquisitions that had a high profile should be included in Hydra, such as selections from recent Debus acquisition. The Newton manuscript and the Rittman Manuscripts were mentioned.
  - Rittman is not yet cataloged, which needs to be done before it is in Hydra.
  - Many user requests for manuscripts, so it would help to put them online. We will start with testing ingest of smaller multi-file works (front and back of a letter) before ingesting books that are several hundred pages long.
- Museum: Chemistry sets are a priority, then glassware, and then electro-chemistry. Given that soft launch date is close to opening of Decay exhibit, some material from that should be included, too.
  - Pulling some objects for quick photography sessions is a possible idea.
  - Objects in the exhibits may be on loan, so wouldn't go in Hydra. This was an appeal of Spotlight to allow linking the objects at other institutions.
  - For Second Skin, there are objects on the mannequin which can be done prior to the final dressing on Monday.
    - The full sized adult mannequin will require some setup in another room, possibly a Conference Center room.
    - Standards for mannequin shots are needed.
  - An exhibit field on metadata template would be useful to track what digital objects have been in an exhibit. Exhibition history would be tracked elsewhere, but could add multiple fields if used in multiple exhibits.
    - How should staff-curated exhibits made via Exhibit Labs be treated? Unsure, but open to future discussion regarding use of Exhibit or Collection fields.
- Oral History: Currently waiting on Works to add objects.
  - There are still questions on viewers for both pdf transcripts and audio recordings. Will need to sit down with oral history when ready.
- Modern Library: Things look good.
  - Ron suggested that Library includes some highlights from recent donor collections (e.g. Flavor Chemists)
- Ron and Erin shared the opinion that an eclectic collection was not seen as a flaw as long as some key areas are covered. Others agreed.

Everyone generally content with current photography and metadata workflow.
For future selection and curation, no one expressed a strong interest in collective check-in meetings to guide curators' selection.
Michelle can check-in individually with people on selection and workflow. Curators can search Hydra to see what other departments are selecting.

Downloads:

Should people be allowed to freely download images? Are we comfortable with free high res tiff currently available?
- At the start of the project there was excitement about a more open access goal.
- Rights and Reproduction (R&R) tends to cost more in salary than is gained from fees.
- Will photos include embedded metadata that CHF is the creator, just in case the image gets used widely.
  - Doesn't match user behavior - won't check this.
  - Many online tools such as Facebook strip the technical metadata
- Hillary suggested possibly adding an intermediary step to have users check a box to acknowledged the R&R terms and details before downloading (e.g. JSTOR)
  - Scholars and publishers often contact R&R to confirm the permissions, so this can help with clarification.
  - Public domain works should be clear that they do not need any permissions.
  - Some of this will be address when designing website. Conversations have already begun. For example, should R&R page on website be copied into Hydra or linked to the website?
  - Anna confirmed that a lighbox could pop up that pulled the rights metadata from the record. A link could be placed to full R&R data on another page and link to RightsStatements.org
  - Sarah brought up the difference between the legal requirements and the best practice ethical goals when dealing with this issue and that is a good idea to distinguish between them.
  - Hillary stressed importance of putting the responsibility for checking permissions for use onto the user.
  - Everyone seemed to share a broad concern for making sure the user understands what their rights are in regard to the image, not a concern for limiting access or downloads.
    - Jim mentioned another library incorrectly adding a copyright warning on public domain works. Everyone shared the belief that works in public domain should be clearly presented as public domain.
  - Cat recommended adding a sample citation somewhere that shows users how to correctly cite this work.

Will there be analytics about downloads?

Some of this is possible in Google Analytics, other parts may use the Sufia reporting tools.
Everyone agrees reporting tools would be helpful. Much enthusiasm for this in Hydra community, as well.

Facets for Browsing:

Cat gave a list of current goals for facet browsing:
- Subject/Topic
- Maker/Creator
- Genre
- Type
- Division
- Date
- Rights
- Lower priority facets were listed as
  - Language
  - Place
  - Medium
  - Collection
- Will there be a date slider?
  - Probably. Date boxes may also be included.
  - What about fuzzy dates and date ranges? Anna explained how this is handled in the index (1910s indexes as 1910, 1911, etc.)

Any Other Business:

Do we need to bring digital collections content from Drupal into Hydra?