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Success story
Union Historical Archives invests in digital preservation
deda tech was able to understand the customer’s needs by specifically analyzing the technical requirements and combining them with open-source solutions available on the market, while adhering to international standards.
Recognized as the sole official historical archive of all European Union institutions, the Historical Archives of the European Union (HAEU) are the repository for all the information that researchers and citizens seek about the Union and beyond, and they also house more than 160 private collections belonging to European figures, politicians, movements, and associations.
Accessibility and preservation are the key words that define their mission; their goal is, in fact, to ensure the long-term preservation of all the knowledge entrusted to them and to serve as a central hub for collecting a wide variety of documents from various agencies and institutions.
Service centers
54 countries
R&D Divisions
12
Industrial patents
35
Evolutions
European tender award and start of the Digital Preservation project.
Digital Preservation System Project nomination for Digital Innovation in Cultural Heritage and Activities Observatory Award.
Joint presentation by deda tech and EUI on the Digital Preservation project at the Community Archivematica’s CAMP 2019, held at CERN in Geneva.
Publication paper: “The service model for Long Term Data Preservation, accessibility and interoperability at HAEU” at GARR 2019, Turin.
SCENARIO
Develop a strategic repositioning project.The Historical Archives of the European Union play a very important role; since 1983, they have been collecting all documents of historical interest produced by the EU institutions, preserving sources of great value to the entire community.
In fact, the European Regulation stipulates that EU institutions are required to submit all official paper documents they produce to the Archives; however, this does not apply to digital documents, for which each individual institution is responsible for archiving.
With the digital revolution, the vast collection of paper documents—we’re talking about a collection of 400,000 documents—has been expanded to include 20,000 files, including videos, audio recordings, floppy disks ( which were later replaced by CDs and USB drives), photos, PDFs, and websites. This has raised two important questions:
- Do we have enough space for all the documents that need to be stored?
- If technology evolves, will they still be readable in a few years?
These issues have become challenges for the Archive—namely, ensuring that the documents remain accessible and intact even thirty years from now, while creating the conditions to preserve everything that has been digitized, since digital media become obsolete more quickly than physical ones.
The Archives therefore needed to develop a strategic repositioning plan that would establish them as a central hub for observing and studying all matters related to the process of European integration.
deda tech was able to understand the client’s needs by specifically analyzing the technical requirements and combining them with open-source solutions available on the market, while adhering to international standards endorsed by the community (ISO 16363, ISO 14721) and the OAIS (Open Archival Information System) Reference Model.
At the same time, the project takes into account the coexistence of two different modes of knowledge sharing: B2C with the general public and B2B with customers of digital storage services, who must be able to access their data as needed.
The proposed solution successfully met the Archive’s structural and financial needs, enabling deda tech to win the bid and distinguish itself through its expertise in this area.
Proposal and solution
Among the best digital preservation solutions was identified Archivematica, which is completely open source.
Archivematica, fully open source, micro-services workflow and architecture, aligned with the OAIS reference model and all relevant standards for the historical archives context. The Tender Team mapped the requirements with available documentation for the community of such a solution and estimated the project, finding full fit with the client’s economic and project needs. The choice of an open source solution made it possible to minimize customizations by reducing the risk of the durability of the solutions over time and better ensuring data integrity. This also influenced the choice of methodology used in the 4-year project, where much emphasis was placed on project management: PMBOK methodology.
In the first phase of the project, we focused on the development of the Digital Preservation System with the on premise mode, resulting in the output of two strategic documents for Historical Archives activities: the Digital Preservation Strategy Plan and theICT Plan. These also constitute the first results of the project by redefining the organization’s operations in light of the new context in which it operates. In the second phase, on the other hand, we moved on to the design phase, defining the functions desired by the user communities and described in usage models (Use case) and to the implementation phase of the Digital Preservation System and the related service model. deda tech still deals with the maintenance and possible developments of the system, defined in this phase, always in the on premise mode and through technical support services.
Particular attention was paid to the procedural aspect. As agencies and institutions began to take an interest in organizing Archives to deposit their digital records, it became clear that the reliability of the system offered lay not so much and not only in the quality of the technical solution and compliance with standards, but in identifying the right processes residing around the system. Therefore, it was decided to take great care in regulating the deposit, defining the process steps: how the data should be sent, who is responsible for receiving it, and so on. Two were the winning elements:
- Preparation on the topic and the required standards, by the deda tech project team;
- The identification of a quality open source digital preservation solution with ad hoc functionality for archives.
The listening-oriented approach was fundamental during the initial workshop phase, where the exchange of views led to some inspiring ideas. We were impressed by the project team’s vision on the topic and their in-depth knowledge of the standards; they lived up to our expectations and took particular care—which we truly appreciated—in preparing the documentation.
Director - Historical Archives of the EU
Achievements
Define new processes for managing digital archival services and new digital skills.The Archives’ strategic investment has made it possible to establish new processes for managing digital archival services and to develop new digital skills for monitoring and managing long-term preservation.
A key factor was the decision to involve people from the very beginning, with a focus on training and the development of new skills in line with international standards.
Archives have several tools at their disposal: a preservation strategic plan, an IT strategy, a migration plan, guidelines, and a submission agreement, all of which ensure the long-term preservation and accessibility of documents.
At the same time, security strategies were strengthened by following the SWOT methodology and conducting a risk assessment.
The Historical Archives of the European Union have now achieved their goals:
- Ensure long-term preservation despite continuous upgrading of technologies;
- Repositioning the EU Historical Archives as a service provider in certified digital repository;
- Demonstrate expertise and reliability in data collection and storage procedures, thereby generating interest from agencies and institutions.
Through the successful implementation of the project and the subsequent maintenance service, Deda Tech has, over the years, enhanced the stability and security of the digital preservation system by using persistent identifiers in the information packages.
Furthermore, the integration of reporting and log management functions has made it possible to meet the needs of the internal digital preservation service and to facilitate the monitoring and administration of the service.
Looking ahead, the Archive aims to foster ever-greater participation from the international community and to develop a service that is interoperable with those of other European institutions—in particular, the European Commission—enabling connections and insights that would have been unthinkable in the world of traditional paper-based archives.
With the support of deda tech and the expertise demonstrated by the project teams, it can ensure the continuous updating of technologies to preserve information and make it easily accessible and usable, while also pushing toward new developments such as the implementation of semantic networks (via artificial intelligence) that connect other archives to the system.
