Central Registryfor Digitized Objects:

Linking Production andBibliographic Control

Ralf StockmannGöttinger Digitization Center

As things are now

• Huge ventures in– Digitization

• Google• Microsoft• National programs• Local centers

– Accessibility• World Digital Library• European Digital Library• National portals• Google Book Search

As things are now

• We just face the dawn of mass digitization– Leaving behind the state of

manufacturing– Entering industrialization– Scanning Robots– Accessible Full Text (OCR)

Lack of …

• Coordination in digitization activities– Who scans what

where when in which quality and how will it be accessible

• How is “quality” defined?

• Do we agree on “what”?

Number of digitized items per volume

Co

sts

/ Val

ue Waste of Ressources

Facing the Consequences

Costs

AdditionalBenefit

TechnicalImprovements

The Solution• Central registry for digitized objects• Focused on the production context (no user

frontend)• API driven

– Application Programming Interface– Query / Ingest– Simple implementation into existing workflow-tools

• Batch mode (lists)• Open Source / free service• Matching on volume level

– Score / probability

Implementation

? ? ?

APIAPI

Aggregator / Normalizer / MappingAggregator / Normalizer / Mapping

Registry / Meta Data StoreRegistry / Meta Data Store

IngestIngest

Present Collections

QueryQuery

IngestIngest

Running Project

! ! !Notice of Intent

IngestIngest

Backend ServicesEROMM / EDL / OCLC / …

Backend ServicesEROMM / EDL / OCLC / …

Metadata Store• Bibliographic

– Title– Author– Date– Place of publication– Number of Pages (?)– Language– Print / Format– Edition

• Technical– Resolution– Color depth– File type / compression

• Accessibility– Institution– Persistent identifier– Rights– URL

• Status– Digitized– In Progress– Intended (Timeline?)– Requested?

Matching / Score„what“

Additional Judging„who, where, which quality, how accesible“

Decisive Factor„when“

Obstacles• (open source) Tools for automated matching /

scoring?• Interface for manual comparison / decision making• Multivolume works: low rate of uniformity (near

50% of physical SUB stock before 1900)• Unicode• Transliteration tables• Random bound books• Reliable identifier

– ISBN for old books?

• Anticipated rate of accuracy: 50 – 70 %

Appreciation of Values• The goal is NOT to build a reliable database in terms of

library standards

• But to prevent further waste of resources.

• If we manage to archive just 50% precision,

• We saved a min. 50% of founding!

Work Packages• Define metadata model• Set up database• Implement mapping tools• Define API calls• Implement API• Build some connectors to popular mass digitization workflow

tools (e.g. “Goobi”)• Establish ISBN workflow• Harvest existing sources• Start with a community of actual projects

• Get some (!) founding• Estimated schedule plan: 6 months

Thank You(stockmann@uni-goettingen.de)