I was interested in the correspondence last week about archive
packages. We are investigating a suitable package for use at the
University of Birmingham and I should be very glad to hear more from
colleagues who are happy with the ones they are using. It needs to
conform to all the emerging standards and should also be able to
produce conventional lists on paper.
I am, at the same time, under some pressure to consider encoding our
existing lists, which have been done in a variety of styles over the
last 38 years. This could of course result in at least two and
possibly 3 access points for researchers being necessary for some
years- via our existing manual system ( a card index and lots of
typed lists) or via encoded lists on the web or via whatever package
we decide to go for. New collections would be dealt with by the
latter but it would be a long job to get all the existing collections
converted - hence the pressure to encode them instead, in order to
provide a critical mass quickly.
Are any colleagues also in the position of being urged to go down 2
different roads simultaneously? And, if so, could they tell me what
they think about it?
Chris Penney
University Archivist
Special Collections
Main Library
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham B15 2TT
Tel: 0121 414 5838
Fax: 0121 471 4691
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