Digital Library Toolkit: Building a small digital library on a shoestring

Digital Library Toolkit:Building a small digital library on

a shoestring

Miraida Morales miraidam@gmail.com @MiraidaM on Twitter

The project:to build a digital library of heraldry design for the

National Library of Puerto Rico

Sketch of flag of Vieques

Cataño, studies for coat of arms

Cataño, Sketches for coat of arms & flag

The man:Roberto Beascoechea Lota

b. 1915-d. 2004

1956: went to work at the newly formed Institute of Puerto Rican Culture as a historian and advisor

Eventually to become Director of the National Library of Puerto Rico

The collectionUnprocessed

Organized in folders by municipality only

Handmade sketches, handwritten notes, bibliographies, correspondence, invitations to official unveilings, telegrams, drafts of heraldry description, glossaries of heraldic terms, official memoranda

The process

PlanningInventory

& Selection

Platform, metadata scheme

DigitizationUploading files

& metadata creation

Prototype & Digital Library

3 months

ChallengesBudget: $0

Government holidays: 5 in July alone

AC system in the Library broke

No access to scanner or hard drive until last week in June

Government closures due to tropical storms

An organized collection of resources For a specified group of users

What is a digital library?

Planning

Users Collection

Choices!

So many choices

Evaluate

Resources

• Drupal in Libraries (ALA Tech Source) book and website

• LYRASIS Digital Toolbox best practices, guidelines• LYRASIS Mass Digitization Collaborative• Open source software documentation• User communities• “A checklist for evaluating open source digital library

software.” OIR, 30 (4).• A Framework of Guidance for Building Good Digital C

ollections (NISO)

Workflow

Coda

• Don’t forget to test!• Fail fast• Tweak, adjust• Re-test• Add more stuff!