Re: Archive Collection and Archived Item

In terms of ArchivedItem, I really think changing the definition of ‘ArchivedItem’ so it no longer reads "An item in an archive collection.” would help clarify the situation. What’s the best way of moving this forward?

Owen

Owen Stephens
Owen Stephens Consulting
Web: http://www.ostephens.com
Email: owen@ostephens.com
Telephone: 0121 288 6936

> On 11 Apr 2017, at 13:45, Richard Wallis <richard.wallis@dataliberate.com> wrote:
> 
> Hi Giovanni,
> 
> Your view of the generic nature of ArchiveCollection (Therefore, a fonds, a series, a subseries, a collection, a set of sparsed objects may all be subsumed under ArchiveCollection according to the its definition.) is what I had in mind when I made the original proposal.
> 
> Both Jane and you express confusion as to why ArchiveCollection is a sub-class of ArchivedItem, which is initially understandable.  The reason I proposed it that way is to make pragmatic use of the way Schema.org is constructed.  
> 
> ArchivedItem <http://archive.sdo-archive.appspot.com/ArchivedItem>, when added as an additionalType of any other Thing (CreativeWork, Product, whatever) effectively makes available properties to describe attributes of its membership in an archive (provenance, accessAndUse, itemCondition, location, transfer, etc.).   If the Type of Thing is unknown ArchivedItem could potentially be used as the only Schema Type.
> 
> When looking to describe an ArchiveCollection, the majority of those properties would also be of use in its description.  To achieve this the proposal could have either individually added these properties to ArchivedCollction or, as I proposed, just make it a subtype of ArchiveCollection. 
> 
> ~Richard.
> 
> Richard Wallis
> Founder, Data Liberate
> http://dataliberate.com <http://dataliberate.com/>
> Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/richardwallis <http://www.linkedin.com/in/richardwallis>
> Twitter: @rjw
> 
> On 11 April 2017 at 13:06, Giovanni Michetti <giovanni.michetti@ubc.ca <mailto:giovanni.michetti@ubc.ca>> wrote:
> Hi Jane,
> 
> I would stick to the definition of ArchiveCollection, which is "A collection and/or archive of physical or digital items." (http://archive.sdo-archive.appspot.com/ArchiveCollection <http://archive.sdo-archive.appspot.com/ArchiveCollection>).
> 
> The Archival Extension doesn't define what an archive is (as a set of objects--an archive is either an institution or an organization, according to the definition of Archive). However, it is quite clear that the definition of ArchiveCollection intends to cover any aggregation of items, that is, the term 'archive' in the definition is used in a very generic sense. Therefore, a fonds, a series, a subseries, a collection, a set of sparsed objects may all be subsumed under ArchiveCollection according to the its definition.
> 
> Using a single class to identify any type of aggregations (including no aggregation at all) is consistent with the most relevant archival standards: ISAD uses "Unit of description" and EAD uses "Component". Recently, ICA proposed a draft model (RiC) where they identified two classes, Record and RecordSet (along with RecordComponent), which is a bit different from the other models, yet is based on a single class identifying any aggregation--that is, no need for fonds, series, etc.
> We can discuss whether we need to distinguish between the single item and its aggregations, or it is better to just stick to a simpler model, ie "Component" like in EAD. However, going to your questions, I don't see any problem in considering both your examples as being instantiated under ArchiveCollection. The same for the properties.
> 
> I don't understand very well why ArchiveCollection is a sub-class of ArchivedItem in the Extension, so I share your doubts.
> 
> As I wrote in some earlier message, I have many doubts about this model. For this reason, I started investigating it further with some colleagues of InterPARES Trust, in order to provide some systematic comments on the Archival Extension. My aim is to share the comments in a month.
> 
> Regards
> 
> Giovanni
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Il 11/04/2017 11:16, Jane Stevenson ha scritto:
> Hi there,
> 
> I had a huge email written as I was working this out, but I’ve tried my best to distill it down to one essential question…..
> 
> There is a type ‘ArchiveCollection', which has ’super types’ of CreativeWork’ and ‘ArchivedItem’ with properties we can use to describe our thing(s).
> 
> To take an example, let’s say I wanted to have schema.org <http://schema.org/> markup attached to:
> 
> A collection or ‘top level’ description: https://archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk/data/gb2607-ec/1-12 <https://archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk/data/gb2607-ec/1-12>
> 
> A lower level description: https://archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk/data/gb2607-ec/1-12/ec/7 <https://archiveshub.jisc.ac.uk/data/gb2607-ec/1-12/ec/7>
> 
> All I know about these are that one is ‘top level’ so that there are no parent levels above it, but there may be child levels. The other is lower level, so it has at least one parent level.
> 
> Can I just treat the lower level ’thing(s)' as type=ArchiveCollection? So, I can I use the properties from CreativeWork and ArchivedItem for both the top level and lower level group of stuff?
> 
> I don’t want to distinguish between collection and item actually within the archive; I just want to apply schema.org <http://schema.org/> markup using the appropriate types and associated properties.
> 
> Richard defined Collection:
> 
> “ArchiveCollection: The collection/grouping/assemblage of archived items. Descriptive properties reference the collection as a whole.”
> 
> I want to separate this out from what archivist thing of as an archive collection, and treat it simply as a ‘group of things’ or even just one thing if that represents a stand-alone collection. Is this correct?
> 
> The archive.schema.org <http://archive.schema.org/> defines ‘ArchivedItem’ as ‘an item in an archive collection’. But I thought it was a ‘type' that is applied to ArchiveCollection? I didn’t think it actually related to ‘item’ meaning a single thing.
> 
> I think there is some confusion in the documentation between the term ‘ArchivedItem’, which I understand to be a type that can be applied to an ArchiveCollection, with properties of ‘archive-ness’,  and an actual item in a collection (and we don’t usually describe single items anyway). It maybe doesn’t help that the properties within ArchivedItem are ‘item’ - e.g. itemDescription, itemLocation, itemProvenance. Can I see them as archiveunitDescription, archiveunitLocation, archiveunitProvenance.
> 
> NB - that’s why in EAD we use ‘unit’ and not anything like ‘item’  - because we can only know that it is a unit within a whole.
> 
> cheers
> Jane
> 
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