[PDF Version of this text] The Digital Preservation Handbook describes Digital Preservation as the series of managed activities necessary to ensure continued access to digital materials for as long as necessary ... (digital preservation) refers to all the actions required to maintain access to digital materials beyond the limits of media failure or technological and organisational change.  But what does this mean for a community archive and why is it important?  Digital collections come in a huge variety of sizes and formats and there is no one size fits all for preserving them. This means that digital collections are very fragile and there are a range of risks involved in preserving this content. For example,   Changes in technology may leave collections unreadable or inaccessible as the software that interprets them becomes obsolete.  Without committed resource, such as time, and in most cases budget, the storage and management of digital collections will not be possible.  Changes within the community group might leave digital collections without a committed person to work on their preservation. Digital preservation requires a series of actions over time to ensure digital content remains alive, discoverable, accessible and usable.

The  DPC's Bit List of digitally endangered species explains more about the types of records at risk, why they are at risk and what can be done to help preserve them. Community created collections are on this list. 

There are three main strands that come together to help ensure effective management and preservation of digital collections. They are; 

• Technology 

• Management 

• Resources 

Without some work in all these areas, preservation of digital collections in any group or organisation won’t be possible. 

Ultimately, digital preservation is about making an investment in properly managing digital collections with common sense, consistency and an attention to detail. Careful planning for digital preservation will safeguard your assets and avoid the need for costly intervention further down the line. In addition, Documenting what you do, and why you are doing it, will help anyone who needs to preserve your digital collection in the future. 

You can find out more here:  What is digital preservation? 

Why does digital preservation matter? 

The collections held by your community groups have value. In most cases this value is historical, and the collections should be preserved so they can be accessed and shared for many years to come. Without digital preservation. Long term access to your collections will not be possible. 

Read more in the  Digital Preservation Handbook: Why digital preservation matters. 

What about digitisation, is it the same thing? 

No!  

Digitisation is the process of creating digital content from non-digital collections, such as paper volumes, sound recordings on a cassette tape, or film content on VHS tape. 

Digital preservation is the preservation of digital content over time. Once your physical content has been digitised, it should then be digitally preserved. Digitisation should not be started without a plan in place for how you will preserve the content you are creating going forward.  

Welcome to the Community Archives Digital Preservation Toolkit. This toolkit has been designed in collaboration with a wide range of Community Archive groups to enable you to tackle preservation of your digital collections.  

Digital Preservation can be complex, and there is no one size fits all process or workflow that works in all situations, but there are simple steps you can take to help safeguard your digital collections. This toolkit guides you through the basics in a series of levels to ensure that no matter where you are with your digital preservation journey, you will be able to find and implement guidance that’s relevant to you.  

Working to preserve your collections for the future is an important task and small steps can have a large impact. The toolkit has been designed to empower you to work on your digital collections with confidence. It will be continuously improved and added over time so if you have feedback or suggestions, please send your thoughts to karynDOTwilliamsonATdpconlineDOTorg. 

	How to use this toolkit An introduction to the toolkit and how it can be used.  Use this to find out more about how the toolkit works and what sections will help you most.
	Toolkit Matrix All the toolkit topics and level subjects arranged together in one place to help you decide what areas may be of interest to you.  Use this to see what is covered in each level of the ten toolkit topics.
	What is Digital Preservation? An introduction to the concept and practices of digital preservation and why we do it.   Use this to find out what digital preservation is, what it is not, and why it is important.
	Digital Preservation – Just One Thing This resource pulls all of the level one information together into a handy step by step guide.  Use this if you need a step-by-step workflow to get you started on your digital preservation journey.
	Explaining the Lifecycle Introduction to the record lifecycle, which explains about the processes a digital file goes through on its journey from creation to preservation and access.  Use this to learn about how the topics in the toolkit link to the record lifecycle.
	You Are Not Alone Collaboration is key to the success of digital preservation. This document details the options you have and how you can find out more.  Use this to learn about your options for collaboration with archive professionals and other community groups.
	Jargon Buster Acronym and glossary list of technical terms used within the toolkit  Use this if you find and terms or acronyms in the toolkit you don’t understand.
	A Basic Digitisation Guide This guide provides basic guidelines for converting physical materials into digital formats.  Use this before embarking on a digitization project.
	Adding Digitised Records to a Catalogue This guide explains the basic principles to follow and outlines several options for including digital copies in your catalogue records. Use this if you already have a catalogue and want to add digitised versions of your items.
	Thinking about using AI? Information on good practice in using AI. Use this if you want to understand how AI can be used to assist community groups.
	Case Studies A range of community archives have written about how they work with their digital content. Read their experiences here.  Use this to read more about what processes and practices other community groups are using to preserve their digital content.
	What Next? Resource List The toolkit provides a range of options to get you started on your digital preservation journey. This resource is for those who want to take the next step and build on what has already been achieved.  Use this to find out what other learning resources are available once you have used everything applicable to you from the toolkit.

The Community Archives Digital Preservation Toolkit was created as part of the Towards a National Collection spoke project, ‘Our Heritage, Our Stories’ (OHOS). A description of the wider project can be found here. The community archives for digital preservation toolkit was created in partnership with OHOS project representatives from the University of Glasgow. Our thanks to them for supporting this work.

The following is a set of example questions that might be used for an interview to gather information about the digital content that should be recorded in your organization’s DAR. They can be used as a starting point for developing your own question set: adding, removing, or tailoring the questions as needed to reflect the information you need to gather, how your interviews will be carried out, and organizational culture and working practices. This list is meant to be relatively comprehensive, so it is unlikely you would aim to cover all of these in a single interview session. Additionally, you may wish to consider the terminology used (are there particular terms used in your organization? Will you need to explain terms?)

1. How does your role relate to the creation, acquisition, and/or management of digital content?
2. Is there any particular digital content of digital content that you create, acquire, and/or manage?
   1. What is their purpose/significance?
   2. Is it important that they be preserved?
3. Who owns the digital content? (e.g. the organization, a partner organization, a donor, etc.)
   1. Are there any agreements in place in relation to ownership, use, and/or intellectual property rights?
4. Who has ultimate responsibility for managing the digital content?
5. What types of content are included? (e.g. file formats)
6. How much digital content is there? (e.g. in MB or GB)
   1. Is the digital content expected to grow? Can you estimate by how much and when?
   2. Are there multiple versions of particular content?
7. What tools, equipment, and/or software are used in the creation, acquisition, and/or management of the digital content?
8. Do you maintain, or know of, any documentation in relation to the digital content? (e.g. metadata, technical documentation, catalogue records, a data management plan.)
9. Where is the digital content stored?
   1. Is it backed-up regularly? How?
   2. Are there security measures in place? (e.g. permissions needed to access, password protection)
10. Does the digital content contain any sensitive data? (e.g. personal data, proprietary information about the organization that should not be shared)
11. Are there any particular risks to the digital content?
12. How long do we need to preserve and retain the digital content for?
13. Has there ever been any data loss?
    1. Could the digital content be recreated if it were lost?
14. Is access provided to the digital content? (e.g. to other colleagues, research partners, members of the public)
    1. Who are the current users of the content?
    2. Are there any other groups who might use the content in the future?
    3. Are there any ethical issues in relation to providing access? (e.g. the content includes information first nations/Indigenous peoples or vulnerable groups)
15. Are there any other people you think I/we should talk to as part of this information gathering process?
16. Is there anything else you would like to add?

The core recommended headings cover key information you may wish to capture in your DAR. The list is not, however, exhaustive in terms of the information you could capture and you may wish to expand on the headings depending on how you will use your DAR and they types of content and processes you have at your organizations. This page has a list of additional headings you may consider including in your DAR Template. As with the core recommended headings, these have been drawn from a collection of in-use DARs.

The following is a list of additional resources that can help with planning, building, and maintaining your DAR. Use this as a reference point for further reading on the subject.

General Resources

Novice to Know-How: Digital Preservation for Beginners training – A training course offering a practical introduction to digital preservation.

https://www.dpconline.org/digipres/prof-development/n2kh-online-training

The Digital Preservation Handbook – An authoritative and practical guide to digital preservation.

https://www.dpconline.org/handbook

Awesome Digital Preservation – A community-owned list of resources for digital preservation.

https://github.com/digipres/awesome-digital-preservation#get-started  

DPC RAM – A broadly-scoped maturity model for digital preservation that supports benchmarking of current capabilities and future planning.

https://www.dpconline.org/digipres/implement-digipres/dpc-ram

NDSA Levels of Digital Preservation – A maturity model focusing on the more process-orientated elements of digital preservation.

https://ndsa.org/publications/levels-of-digital-preservation/

DPC Topical Notes Series – A set of 2-page introductions to key digital preservation issues written in plain English for use in advocacy and when talking to non-specialists.

https://www.dpconline.org/digipres/discover-good-practice/tech-watch-reports#topical-notes-series   

The National Archives (UK) Digital Preservation Workflows – Guidance on how to establish digital preservation processes at your organization.

https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/archives-sector/advice-and-guidance/managing-your-collection/preserving-digital-collections/digital-preservation-workflows/  

Advocacy

Executive Guide on Digital Preservation – A guide containing messages and motivators that can be used to communicate with senior executives, legislators, and budget holders, as well as decision and policy makers, about digital preservation.

https://www.dpconline.org/digipres/implement-digipres/dpeg-home

Business Case Toolkit – A toolkit to help with preparing a business case for securing resources.

https://www.dpconline.org/digipres/implement-digipres/business-case-toolkit

The Bit List – A list of “digitally endangered species” that can aid with advocacy.

https://www.dpconline.org/digipres/champion-digital-preservation/bit-list

Characterization Tools

DROID - https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/information-management/manage-information/preserving-digital-records/droid/

FITS - https://projects.iq.harvard.edu/fits

Siegfried - https://www.itforarchivists.com/siegfried/

JHOVE - https://jhove.openpreservation.org/

Data Accessioner - https://github.com/digitalpowrr/DataAccessioner

Risk Management

DiAGRAM – A tool to help with managing risks to your digital content.

https://diagram.nationalarchives.gov.uk/

SPOT – A model for understanding technological risks.

https://www.dlib.org/dlib/september12/vermaaten/09vermaaten.html

DRAMBORA – A model and tool to allow practitioners to audit digital preservation risks.

https://www.dcc.ac.uk/tools/drambora

Metadata

Dublin Core - https://www.dublincore.org/

PREMIS - https://www.loc.gov/standards/premis/

This section provides guidance on the information gathering methods you might use to gather the data for your DAR. Use this to find out how to gather the necessary information to populate your DAR.

It is important to carefully plan out how you will gather information for your DAR before beginning the process. This will help you to ensure you have considered all of the key factors:

• The scope of the content you are hoping to gather information on.

• The time, resources, and tools you have available to help with the information gathering, including the people who will be undertaking the task and the skills they have.

• The sources (people, documentation, and systems) you will gather information from.

It is essential that you are realistic about the amount of information you will be able to gather and that you ensure you have the focus time needed to dedicate to this task. Without a clear and realistic plan your DAR may become a half-finished resource that is never fit for purpose. Do remember that capturing something simple is better than nothing and you should not get caught up in worrying about it being perfect from the outset. Figure out the essential information fields and populate those first. These can be built out over time with more data elements as you have time and/or they are needed.

You may also consider a federated approach to capturing information and updating the DAR. In this approach you might be responsible for setting up the structure of it, and managing and monitoring its use, but responsibilities for information updates sit with data owners or creators. This approach can be helpful with advocacy and engagement or if you are capturing information for a large organization and/or with a wide scope. It does, however, also mean that you are beholden to the data owners, their willingness to complete the DAR, and the quality of data they produce. Before using such an approach, consider what level of buy-in there is for the process, whether colleagues can be relied upon to keep it up to date. Including DAR updates in process documentation, putting out regular reminders, and carrying out checks can all help with ensuring the necessary data is added. Some practitioners have also found environmental sustainability (not keeping unnecessary data) to be a good motivator to encourage participation. You may also need to consider what the consequences might be if colleagues do not keep the data up to date, in particular, the impact it might have on collections management capabilities.

We will now look in a little more detail at some of the key data sources and methods for capturing data for your DAR in the following sub-sections:

1. Existing Data Sources
2. Physical Storage Media
3. Characterization Tools
4. Survey
5. Interviews

Existing Data Sources

No matter the scope of your DAR, you will almost certainly look to gather information from the range of existing systems and documentation maintained by your organization. Data sources may include:

• Accession/acquisition records and paperwork

• Documentation provided by depositors

• Records in cataloguing systems

• Reports from Digital Asset Management or Digital Preservation Repository systems

Before beginning information gathering it can be useful to create a list of these relevant systems and documentation maintained by your organization, the types of information they may contain, and the format of that information. This can then be used to plan how to prioritize gathering information and what you will look for where. For example:

• Accession records and acquisition paperwork may be the best place to find information on ownership and intellectual property rights;

• Descriptions of the digital content can potentially be harvested from cataloguing systems; and,

• A repository report might include details of the number of files included and their total size.

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Physical Storage Media

Depending on the processing status of the content held by your organization, you may need to carry-out a survey of unprocessed external/legacy storage media. The extent of this survey will depend on the time and resources you have available. Some issues to consider are:

• Is there a list, or can a list be generated, of all of the accessions/digital content containing such storage media?

• Where is the media stored? Has it all been collected together and is easily accessible, or is it stored amongst physical content, and therefore might be difficult to locate?

• Is there any documentation that lists what is on the media?

• What types of media are there? Will you require technical help, new hardware, or to consider outsourcing data access and copying?

You will also need to consider carefully if you will simply be viewing the content to gather information, or do you have the time and resources to undertake copying of the content onto more secure storage ready for processing? This may significantly increase the time required for the task, but overall, it will be a more efficient use of resources, be less risky than multiple uses of the media, and mean the content will likely be on more stable and secure storage.

Ideally, surveying and processing digital content held on physical media would be a priority due to the high level of risk associated with these storage formats. But in reality, you may find that carrying out such a survey is not feasible as part of your initial information gathering, due to time available, the complexity of the media, and how it is stored. If this is the case, it is recommended that you consider addressing physical storage media as a possible next step or follow-on project, to ensure your DAR is comprehensive and that you have mitigated the high level of risk to content stored on this type of media.

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Characterization Tools

Characterization is the process of identification and description of what a file is and its defining technical characteristics, such as file format, size, and the software used to create it. There are a number of characterization tools that can be used to generate this information for a group of files held in one or more folders. These are, therefore, particularly useful for capturing summary information such as “Number of Files” and “Total Size” for your DAR, without having to manually count and calculate everything.

A characterization tool can generate this information for small amounts of digital content in seconds, although longer processing times might be required for larger amounts of digital content. Indeed, some tools may struggle with particularly large-scale digital content. In this case, you will need a computer with sufficient processing power and/or you may need to analyze the content in sections.

You can find more information on the range of characterization tools that are available via the COPTR tools registry and some of the commonly used tools are included in the Useful Resources section below. Some tools are accessed via a user interface like the software and apps you will be familiar with using, while others can only be run using the Command Line interface. The free training course Novice to Know-How also includes more detailed information on understanding digital files and characterization, as well as providing demos of a tool called DROID. It is possible to run DROID from a user interface as well as from the Command Line.  The DROID tool demos are also included in the Digital Preservation Handbook.

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Survey

If your DAR's scope is relatively wide, for example if you are aiming to include details of digital content at your organization still in active or semi-active use, you may find it helpful to capture information for your DAR by circulating a survey. The benefits of using a survey are that you can gather information for a large group of people quickly, you may capture details of content that you were unaware of, and, if the survey is well-designed, the data captured can be in easily processable formats that might translate directly to DAR fields. The downsides of using surveys are that you must rely on the goodwill of others to ensure the right people complete the survey, and the data may vary in quality.

If you do plan to use a staff survey to gather information, you should consider the following:

• Does your organization subscribe and provide access to a specialist survey tool, such as Qualtrics, SurveyMonkey, or TypeForm? These can provide useful functionality for creating, structuring, and analyzing the data from your survey. If these are not available, you may consider using a free service like Google Forms.

• Make sure to carefully consider the questions you add to your survey. Aim for clear, jargon-free questions and an emphasis on easily processable data where possible. For example, use answers with check boxes, pick lists, or data validation to ensure data is entered in a consistent way.

• Limit the number of questions that allow text-based answers. The information gathered is more likely to be of variable quality and will take significantly longer to process.

• Consider how you will communicate about the survey. Will you distribute it via email, an intranet site, and/or a newsletter? Are there particular members of staff you should send targeted messages to? How many reminders should you send? Would offering accompanying information sessions help to increase engagement? Do you need to work with managers to have them encourage staff to complete the survey?

Finally, it is important not to underestimate the amount of time you may need to spend analyzing the data captured from a survey before it can be included in your DAR. As mentioned above, text-based answers can take a significant amount of time to process, and even more straight-forward quantitative data will likely require some quality checking to make sure it is fit for purpose.

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Interviews

Interviews are another potential information gathering approach that can be helpful for building your DAR. They can be particularly useful when information gathering is being carried out by an individual or small team, but the content is managed and/or created by a larger number of people. Interviews will provide an opportunity for an in-depth dive into the knowledge an individual may have amassed, but perhaps not documented, about content they manage or have created. For example, they are very good at unearthing details about content hidden away in a forgotten corner of the staff shared storage, that might otherwise have been missed. Interviews are, however, very labor intensive to plan, stage, and analyze, so it is important to carefully consider if you have the time and resources available to include them as part of your information gathering process.

If you do plan to include interviews, then it is useful to consider the following:

• What questions do you need answered? You will find that you are able to cover fewer questions than you might think in a session.

• Are your questions clear and jargon-free? Is there any specialist terminology that you need to include and will have to explain?

• What type of interview format will work better? Structured, semi-structured, or unstructured?

• What information do you need to provide to the interviewee(s) ahead of time? A participant information sheet with a description of what will happen during and after the interview is useful. This can include venue information, if you wish to record the interview, and the list of questions.

• Is there a suitable venue available for the interview(s)? This can be in-person or virtual. It should be somewhere that both you and the interviewee feel comfortable.

• Make sure you are well prepared for the interview; with all of the documents you require and any note-taking tools or recording equipment ready.

An example set of interview questions to help with building a DAR are included in this toolkit. You can use this list as a starting point for developing a question set that is suitable for your own needs, matching the DAR template you have designed. Also, as with surveys, make sure you have adequate time available to analyze the outcomes of the interviews. Extracting the information you need and formatting for inclusion in your DAR might take a significant amount of time.

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This section provides guidance on how to design the template for your DAR. This includes general tips on things to think about, recommendations for key headings to incorporate, and some suggestions about particular formats and tools you can use to practically implement your plan.

1. General Tips for Developing Your DAR Template
2. Recommended Basic Template
3. Choosing a Format and Storage Location for Your DAR

General Tips for Developing Your DAR Template

The following are some general items to consider when you are developing the template for your DAR. Following these tips will help you to create a DAR that is easier to use and update.

• Use agreed lists of terms to be used and/or set formats for individual data elements where possible. This will help to ensure the capture of good quality data, as well as making it easier to manipulate. This can be implemented by having clear guidance on the terms to use under particular headings, or by using functionality like drop-down lists for data entry.

• Consider carefully who will be updating the DAR as well as who needs to use it. Some staff members may be more technically proficient than others and this may guide the format you choose for your DAR.

• You may also wish to add a layer of security to help control who can make edits to the DAR. This might be implemented using password protection for editing the document, or by placing it in storage where you can control access permissions.

• Remember to find a balance between trying to be comprehensive and the time taken to complete entries. Consider starting with a simpler set of essential headings and growing these over time.

  • Also consider if some columns might be marked as “required” or “optional”.

• Reduce duplication of effort by only including information that is captured in other systems (e.g. accession or catalogue records) where there is good reason. For example, the information in other systems is not readily accessible or is not consistently captured for digital content.

• Depending on how you manage digital content, you may wish to use separate tabs, sections or DARs for different types of content. For example, separating born-digital content and digitized content into different areas.

• Consider adding a dashboard that automatically generates key statistics about the digital content, and graphs and charts that provide visual representations of the stats. This may include total counts of number of files and the size of content, as well as breakdowns or these figures using factors such as year received or current processing status. This information is then readily available for advocacy purposes.

• Finally, if you have a digital preservation repository system in place, consider aligning the headings of your DAR with reports that can be produced by the repository to help streamline the information.

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Recommended Basic Template

This subsection provides an overview of the headings (or data elements) that we recommend you include within your DAR. These recommendations were derived from an analysis of 14 real-world DARs shared by practitioners. The most commonly used and fundamental headings are included here. Additional possible headings you may consider adding are included in Appendix One of this toolkit. Some of the headings below may duplicate information held in other systems. A note has been added to the description field for headings you may choose to omit to reduce duplication.

For each heading below, we have included suggestions as to how it might be formatted, as well as a description of the information you might record under each. If alternative names for the heading were used in any of the analyzed DARs, they have also been included. You may find one of these alternatives better matches the terminology used at your organization.

Accompanying this toolkit there is  an Excel spreadsheet DAR template that includes each of these headings, a ready to use statistics dashboard, and guidance for completing and updating the template. This is free for you to download, edit, and use to help create your own DAR.

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Choosing a Format and Storage Location for Your DAR

In addition to selecting the headings and data elements for your DAR, you must also decide the format in which to maintain the information and where the DAR will be stored. When selecting the right format and location you will need to consider:

• What software options you have available and what functionality they offer that will help with building, managing, and using your DAR. For example:

  • Do you want to control data entry on certain fields by implementing pick lists?

  • Do you want to save your data in a flat table structure or develop a structure with more complex data relationships?

  • Does it need to have inbuilt security functionality to stop unauthorized edits?

• Who will be adding information to and/or using the DAR? What software do they have access to and feel comfortable using?

• Where is the DAR going to be stored? Is it possible to manage access permissions based on its location?

  • Your DAR will contain a lot of important data about your organization’s digital content, and it is important to keep this secure. Make sure to consider security when selecting both the creation tool and storage location.

Excel spreadsheets are the most commonly used format for the creation of DARs as the software is relatively ubiquitous, it can support controlled data entry and validation, and you can also add data visualizations such as summary tables, graphs, and charts. These can even be added as a separate statistics dashboard. Free alternatives to Excel include Google Sheets and LibreOffice Sheets.

Spreadsheets are not, however, the only format options for your DAR. If you want to have a more complex data structure, as mentioned above, you may wish to select a database format for building your DAR. This will likely require a higher level of technical skill but does offer the advantage of developing a user interface for data entry and editing. Do keep in mind though, that these formats can be more difficult to maintain over time due to their complexity. Other, simpler, options that have been used by practitioners include a table in a Word or other word processing document, the Lists functionality in Teams, or using pages in Sharepoint.

Once you have selected the format and storage location for your DAR, take time to ensure it has been set up correctly and that functionality has been well tested before starting to input information in earnest.

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