RE: "My advice to such people would be - DON'T!! ...Far better to adopt
the API/Linked Data interface
offered by your friendly SPECTRUM-compliant systems supplier, and give
them a target which they have already programmed for. That way, it is
more likely that your data will actually be used, and merged with data
from other institutions in newly-developed web offerings."
I'd agree that's sensible for small institutions, and another way of
putting it would be that a decent API is a functional requirement for
system procurement
Andrew Lewis
Digital Content Delivery Manager
Digital Media department
Victoria and Albert Museum
South Kensington
London SW7 2RL
020 7942 2373
[log in to unmask]
Digital Media blog: www.vam.ac.uk/digital
http://linkd.in/andrewlewis
@rosemarybeetle ( https://twitter.com/rosemarybeetle )
>>> MCG automatic digest system <[log in to unmask]> 22/02/2014
00:03 >>>
There are 2 messages totaling 273 lines in this issue.
Topics of the day:
1. API - Essential (Desirable) Checklist for sharing collections
content (and
Getty Art & Architecture Thesaurus as linked open data!)
2. Training: Wordpress for museums and non profits: beginners
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Date: Fri, 21 Feb 2014 10:52:26 +0000
From: Mia <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: API - Essential (Desirable) Checklist for sharing
collections content (and Getty Art & Architecture Thesaurus as linked
open data!)
I've collected some information on 'making good APIs' on the GLAM API
wiki at
http://museum-api.pbworks.com/w/page/56963312/Making%20good%20APIs
but as Richard says, you shouldn't need to (or want to) roll your own
these days.
It might be worth looking at compatibility with the Europeana/Digital
Public Library of America APIs http://pro.europeana.eu/api
http://dp.la/info/developers/codex/ as it'd make it easy for someone
to update their code to include your sources. Or you could just
contribute your records to Culture Grid / Europeana and make them
available that way.
In other API/machine-readable data news, the Getty have just released
their Art & Architecture Thesaurus (AAT) as linked open data. More at
http://blogs.getty.edu/iris/art-architecture-thesaurus-now-available-as-linked-open-data/
It seems to be SPARQL only at the moment, and under an Open Data
Commons Attribution License (which I'm not familiar with compared to
Creative Commons) If you're not immediately familiar with the AAT, you
might have encountered it in collections databases. There's a
browseable version at
http://www.getty.edu/vow/AATHierarchy?find=&logic=AND¬e=&english=N&subjectid=300000000
According to
http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/vocabularies/lod/index.html
the Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names (TGN) will be coming in July,
The Union List of Artist Names in January 2015, and The Cultural
Objects Name Authority (CONA) in July 2015. They've been promised for
a long time so it's great to see release dates.
Cheers, Mia
On 20 February 2014 11:29, Richard Light <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:
> On 20/02/2014 09:36, Dicken, Jude wrote:
>>
>> API - Essential (Desirable) Checklist for sharing collections
content
>>
>> In a short time I've learnt a lot about API - thanks again to
everyone who
>> shared info.
>> Maybe an unanswerable question, but if you were to write a checklist
for
>> what is essential (and desirable) in an API for sharing collections
content,
>> what would it contain?
>
> OK, I'll have a go:
>
> * delivers information in one or more widely-used
machine-processible
> formats (e.g. XML, JSON, RDF[1])
> * uses sector standards where possible (e.g. SPECTRUM-XML,
CIDOC-CRM,
> LIDO)
> * prevents the release of sensitive and confidential information
via
> filters and/or access controls
> * provides a flexible query mechanism, whose syntax is ideally
based
> on a standard (e.g. OpenSearch, SPARQL)
> * if it supports updating, has suitable access controls to prevent
> unauthorised updates
> * serves to "publish" each collections item with its own unique,
> persistent identifier (ideally a dereferenceable URL)
> * is dynamically linked to live collections data, so it always
> delivers live information without the need for manual
intervention
>
>
>> I'm hoping there are other API-newbies out there (without in-house
IT
>> specialists) who'd find this kind of checklist useful when
considering
>> writing a brief or scoring matrix for building an API.
>
> My advice to such people would be - DON'T!! Developing a custom
API,
> especially for a small institution, is creating exactly the same sort
of
> hostage to fortune as an in-house cataloguing system "written" in
FileMaker
> Pro or Access. And we /all/ know better than to do that, now, don't
we? :-)
>
> Putting to one side the horrendous self-imposed long-term problem of
> maintaining your new API, think of it from the data consumer's point
of
> view. They want to gather information from a number of data
sources,
> including yours. Now they have a new interface to manage and write
code for.
> They won't thank you. Far better to adopt the API/Linked Data
interface
> offered by your friendly SPECTRUM-compliant systems supplier, and
give them
> a target which they have already programmed for. That way, it is
more
> likely that your data will actually be used, and merged with data
from other
> institutions in newly-developed web offerings.
>
> Richard
>
> [1] RDF isn't quite the same sort of beast as the other two, as it
has a
> variety of serializations. Worth bearing in mind, though
>
>
>>
>> Thanks as always,
>>
>> Jude.
>>
>> Jude Dicken (Miss)
>> Documentation Officer
>> Manx National Heritage
>> Eiraght Ashoonagh Vannin
>>
>> Manx Museum, Douglas, Isle of Man, IM1 3LY
>> t: +44 (0) 1624 648071
>> e: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
>> w: manxnationalheritage.im<http://www.manxnationalheritage.im/>
>>
>>
[cid:3447139970_412422]manxheritageshop.com<http://www.manxheritageshop.com/engine/shop/index.html>
>>
>>
>>
[facebook]facebook.com/manxnationalheritage<https://www.facebook.com/manxnationalheritage>
>> [twitter]twitter.com/manxheritage<https://twitter.com/manxheritage>
>> [flickr]flickr.com/groups/_mnh<http://www.flickr.com/groups/_mnh>
>> [vimeo]vimeo.com/manxheritage<http://vimeo.com/manxheritage>
>>
>>
>>
>> Isle of Man. Giving you freedom to flourish
>>
>>
>> WARNING: This email message and any files transmitted with it are
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>> currit marish as ta shoh coadit ec y leigh. Cha nhegin diu coipal ny
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kied
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phost-l
>> shoh, doll-shiu magh eh, my sailliu, as cur-shiu fys da'n choyrtagh
cha leah
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rish
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>> Rheynn ny Boayrd Slattyssagh t'eh bentyn rish.
>>
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>>
>
> --
> *Richard Light*
>
>
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------------------------------
Date: Fri, 21 Feb 2014 12:55:10 +0000
From: Mike Ellis <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Training: Wordpress for museums and non profits: beginners
Hey all
We’ve just announced our first online course: Wordpress for museums
and non-profits (beginners).
As this is our first one, we’re limiting attendees to 20. More info
and booking here: http://bit.ly/1fEX7sY
** Use the code “MCG" when you book and you’ll get 20% off - but
only for the first 5 people who book...**
Blurb / audience / what you’ll learn:
-----------------------------------------------
Wordpress has become *the* CMS of choice around the world, powering a
large proportion of popular websites. It's free, open source, easy to
use and great to develop for. As such, it's an ideal tool for museums,
galleries and non-profits - and provides the means to create beautiful,
easily maintainable sites.
This 4-week online course is a perfect starting point for novices who
are looking to set up a site using WordPress or have been given the
responsibility of editing an existing site and want to understand how to
make it work better.
Find out more about how our online courses work at
courses.thirty8.co.uk/faq
** You **
> might be a content person, a marketing person, a curator - or maybe
just starting out doing some work on the web
> want to understand how to create a simple, functional, easy-to-edit
site for your institution
> don't need to be technical / a geek! On this course we won't get into
any coding - everything we do will be within the WordPress dashboard,
which is all point and click. (If you're interested in getting under the
hood with Wordpress, join our mailing list - we'll be announcing more
Wordpress courses soon...!)
** Course Outline **
Week 1: introduction
> Getting started
> Understanding the difference between WordPress.com and Wordpress.org
> Hosting and installation
> Introduction to the WordPress Dashboard
Week 2: writing content
> Getting WordPress ready: posts, pages, comments
> Editing
> Managing comments: moderation
> Using the Media Library: photos, documents, video
Week 3: making your site look and work differently
> Themes
> Templates
> Plugins
> Widgets
Week 4: managing your site
> Backing your site up
> Keeping things up to date
Cheers!
Mike
_____________________________
Mike Ellis
Thirty8 Digital: a small but perfectly formed digital agency:
http://thirty8.co.uk (http://thirty8.co.uk/)
* My book: http://heritageweb.co.uk (http://heritageweb.co.uk/) *
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End of MCG Digest - 20 Feb 2014 to 21 Feb 2014 (#2014-39)
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