Visual Resources Association
25th Annual Conference, Kansas City, Mo.
Data Standards Committee (DSC)
Report of meeting, 28 March 2007
Core/DSC documentation and webpages
The VRA website has been revamped and the Core 4.0 [http://www.vraweb.org/projects/vracore4/index.html] and DSC [http://www.vraweb.org/organization/committees/datastandards/index.html ] webpages will be updated soon. At this time, committees are not able to make changes directly and so will be going through Chris Hilker to have them updated.
Managing all of our Core documentation brings up version and archiving issues. We will use Moodle as a staging area for new documents as well as for current work and archival versions. Elisa Lanzi will add the rest of the committee to the Moodle site, based at Smith, already being used by the CCO editors. As we move forward, it will be necessary to figure out how to do versions: incremental changes (MARC documentation uses colored text for later additions), numbering scheme (4.0.1, 4.0.2 probably).
In the Core 4.0 version Jan distributed before the meeting, the Relation type derivedFrom/sourceIs seemed wrong. Those mean the same. (addendum: after conference, Jan confirmed with Patricia Harpring that the text on the CDWA website was wrong and will be changed to derivedFrom/sourceFor). Core documentation will be similarly updated. For similar purposes, Brown is using isDerivative/hasDerivative. Bard builds intrinsic relationships but not extrinsic. Brown has a button to build reciprocal relationships. VireoCat builds them on the fly. UCAI built work/image relationships but not work/work.
The Core examples are being updated and need to show everything. It would be good to have a place where additional examples could be submitted, perhaps a blog/wiki sort of social comment area. Trish mentioned that we should establish a registry of Core 4 users and migrators. Patrick and Nori are trying to FRBRize IRIS.
Education/Outreach
Now that Core 4.0 is finalized, how do we go about teaching folks about the Core and CCO and how they interact and intersect? Linda McRae has developed a template for CCO training. We should try all sorts of information spreading: library school class sessions, chapter workshops, exercises and questions, self-tutorial, inserting content, webinar (Susan said Scholars Resource had contemplated using Webinar software but found it too expensive; someone else mentioned Text Soup from OCLC). Richard mentioned that METS has an annual “opening day” where people present what they’re doing with METS; maybe we could have Core Days. http://www.loc.gov/standards/mets/mets-present.html. Educause or DLF might also be places for training or funding. Funding might be possible from the VRA Foundation which is being formed. DSC should work with CCO Committee and VRA Education Committee on these matters. (*Elisa suggested putting together a memo to the board explaining what our needs are) We need a users registry to take the temperature. We probably need a business plan, parent institution, and host, with approval and review of training.
Other DSC initiatives
How do we interact with the Getty vocabularies? Getty had short conference session on contributions which will be repeated at ARLIS/NA conference in Atlanta in late April. It would be helpful to have lists of who’s working on contributing what headings (either individual headings or areas of expertise). We should probably talk to Getty and see how DSC can best help the growth of the vocabularies. The NACO and SACO models were discussed but parallels are limited.
Leadership and Goals for 2007/2008
Trish and Margaret will be the co-chairs for the next two years. Current committee membership is about 18 people. Trish and Margaret plan on identifying goals for the next two years and forming groups to carry out tasks. Some mentioned that they have particular interests, for example, Johanna mentioned education.
It was discussed that there are a number of the people on the VRADS list are infrequent contributors (“lurkers”) and whether they should be considered members and allowed to stay on the listserv. It was determined that lurkers would be allowed on the listserv but only those folks who can commit to being on particular task groups and contribute to the DSC work will be considered members.
Attending:
Johanna Bauman - bauman@bgc.bard.edu
Sherman Clarke - sherman.clarke@nyu.edu (recorder)
Nori Duncan - slides@brown.edu
Jan Eklund - jeklund@berkeley.edu (outgoing chair)
Kathleen Hardin - khardin@ucsc.edu
Amy Jackson - amyjacks@uiuc.edu
Elisa Lanzi - elanzi@smith.edu
Linda McRae - mcrae@arts.usf.edu
Emerson Morgan - em@artstor.org
Vickie O’Riordan - voriordan@ucsd.edu
Trish Rose-Sandler - trose@ucsd.edu (incoming co-chair)
Linda Takata - ltakata@fas.harvard.edu
Richard Urban - rjurban@uiuc.edu
Margaret Webster - mnw3@cornell.edu (incoming co-chair)
Ann Whiteside - awhites@mit.edu
Susan Jane Williams - susan_williams@hotmail.com
Patrick Yott - patrick_yott@brown.edu
