Dear all,
Following up from the recent discussion concerning OpenSearch I thought that I could add a few things. I presented a paper (http://www.archimuse.com/mw2008/papers/makewell/makewell.html) at the Museums and the Web 2008 conference on Saturday. In this I detailed our project and how the need for a federated search came about.
For those who haven’t read up on it, the funding for the project has come from the ‘Invest to Save’ budget. This is about bringing improvements to the current set-ups, not creating new set-ups entirely. This means that the project is not about creating a new website (or server hosting) and this is certainly not to the detriment of the project.
It is a project between nine national museums and galleries to create learning resources for formal learners and help lifelong learners record how they are being inspired by the museums and galleries in the partnership. These resources will be spread out across all the partners.
How we could allow users to find collection objects was deemed important. As I explained in my paper, the problem is retrieving these from the deep web. The first possible solution we looked at was a Google Co-op search (back in late 2006) and we quickly realised (within about 10 minutes) that there was no way which this could bring back the data we required. Following the terms of the funding we investigated other possibilities and decided that OpenSearch was the best fit for all the partners for numerous reasons (summer 2007). It’s light-weight, easy to implement and, most importantly, gives us all the functionality we require for the project. Seb Chan details further information about how easy it is to implement OpenSearch on your website here: http://www.powerhousemuseum.com/dmsblog/index.php/2008/04/11/opensearch-it-isnt-all-that-hard/.
The National Museums Online Learning Project is not a ‘search all the national museums collections’ project. It’s also not an ‘implement OAI’ over all partners project. It IS a project about creating high quality learning resources and providing a structure for lifelong learners to interact with our museums and galleries. Different approaches to searching our collection databases can be made (e.g. OAI, OpenSearch or any other) and there is no reason why they cannot all be aggregated to form a larger museums federated search in time - if so required. It’s not good guys vs the bad guys depending on which solution you go for. Different approaches can be made on differing scales. I believe that anything else is unrealistic and that a pragmatic approach is needed in this area.
Please feel free to contact me directly if you have any questions regarding this.
Regards,
Terry
Terry Makewell
Technical Manager
National Museums Online Learning Project
Email: [log in to unmask]
Tel: 020 7942 2819
- --------------------------------------------------------------
China Design Now
Sponsored by HSBC
15 March - 13 July 2008 at V&A South Kensington
Book now on www.vam.ac.uk/chinadesignnow
Space Age: Exploration, Design and Popular Culture at V&A Museum of Childhood
24 November 2007 - 6 April 2008
Admission Free
Keep in touch - visit www.vam.ac.uk and sign up for our regular e-newsletter
- ---------------------------------------------------------------
The information contained in this message is confidential and intended only
for the individual named above. If you are not the intended recipient, or responsible for delivering it to the intended recipient you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution, copying, or disclosure of this information is prohibited and may be unlawful. If you have received this communication in error, please notify us by telephone on 020 7942 2353. This message has been scanned for viruses by the MessageLabs Email Security System.
______________________________________________________________________
~
**************************************************
For mcg information and to manage your subscription to the list, visit the website at http://www.museumscomputergroup.org.uk
**************************************************
|