The Digital Preservation Coalition is partner in two projects recently funded by European Commission, called 'APARSEN' and 'TIMBUS'. These projects will influence and extend the work of the Coalition in the next three years and will considerably enhance the range of benefits associated with membership.
The APARSEN project (see http://www.alliancepermanentaccess.org/index.php/current-projects/aparsen/) seeks the establishment of a ‘network of excellence’ based loosely on the existing Alliance for Permanent Access but with a large number of new members and a series of specific work packages. The core concept of APARSEN is to provide a check against potential fragmentation of digital preservation research and development by seeking to establish a shared vision and forum for the exchange of ideas from the very many partners and agencies involved in this interdisciplinary activity. The proposal includes 28 separate work packages delivered over a four year period, ending in 2014.
Networks of Excellence are typically funded by the European Commission to extend and support existing programmes. Partners are required to demonstrate independently-funded commitments to research and development which will be enhanced through participation in the network. Consequently, the energies of the APARSEN Network are primarily designed to add value to research through communication, awareness raising, staff development, consolidation, dissemination and partnership. The large number of work packages is indicative of the wide range of digital preservation research which is currently underway in Europe.
Given the wide number of workpackages and tasks, the DPC is expected to play a diverse series of roles within the network. Fundamental to all of these actions, however, is maximising the impact and utility of any outcomes by representing the needs of the DPC’s 38 members within the network and disseminating deliverables to the DPC’s members. The DPC was accurately described within the negotiations for the project as a ‘multiplier’: every DPC member is by default also a member of APARSEN.
The DPC is leading work on ‘Staff and experience exchange’ and on 'Training Courses'. Together, these packagea aim to encourage the development of a well-connected and highly-skilled generation of professional leaders. They open the work of the APARSEN to junior staff by establishing a programme that will allow relatively junior staff to spend time working with colleagues in other institutions.
TIMBUS (see http://timbusproject.net/) - a shorthand for Timeless Business Processes - is designed to offer ‘timeless business processes and services’, filling a gap within existing preservation solutions. Migration tools now exist to provide long term management of data and emulation approaches and services are in development for long term access to software so that information objects can be rendered. However business processes rely on increasingly complicated networks of responsibility in which services and data are shared. The dependencies associated with a ‘web of services’ are seldom properly documented and the risk management required to assess and resolve these risks becomes increasingly complicated as the interdependence of services grows. If the execution context of business processes assumes that services and data are available, then digital preservation services will also need to provide mechanisms that describe and where necessary exhume defunct processes.
TIMBUS responds to emerging trends within business information environments. It acknowledges the declining popularity of centralized ‘in house’ business processes and supporting services and technical infrastructure in favour of the ‘Internet of Services’ in which software and platform are developed and delivered as a service. This on-demand architecture is popular because it provides greater flexibility and scalability at reduced costs – but it also raises questions of dependability and durability. TIMBUS will therefore establish the set of processes and tools necessary to ensure continued access to services over decades. It will do this by developing and expanding tools for intelligent enterprise risk management, service dependency monitoring, legalities lifecycle management and the virtualisation of distributed and interdependent services.
The DPC is leading on the dissemination and training workpackage within TIMBUS, aligning closely with part of its role within APARSEN and providing opportunities for DPC members to get early accress to these new and emerging tools and services.
A fuller briefing paper for members about both projects is available online [pdf 264kb login required].