Digital Narratives for Transylvania DH

Constructing NarrativeUsing Digital ObjectsAmplifying the Traditional Craft

Shawn Day

Transylvania Digital Humanities Centre / 30 April /1 May 2015

Agenda

Objectives

‣ A brief introduction to Metadata, it’s value and how it can be leveraged in Omeka as a digital narrative tool;

‣ To evaluate what digital narrative tools - such as Omeka or others - may be of use in sharing your research – and telling your story.

‣ Why à How

Logistics

‣ Sign-Up

Telling a Story OnlineExamples

Omeka in Action

‣ Example 2

Gothic Past

Hilda Tweedy

Metadata and the Story

Who works with Metadata today?

"If a resource does not have any associated metadata information, then it is essentially lost."

"If a resource has erroneous, inconsistent, or not enough metadata information, then it is essentially non-existent."

Why and How? - Basic Metadata

‣ What is this resource?

‣ Who created the resource?

‣ When was this resource created or published?

‣ Why was this resource created?

‣ Who owns or how do you purchase the resource?

‣ Can you re-use and/or share this resource? (Licensing)

Types of Metadata

‣ Descriptive metadata —> Identification;

‣ Structural metadata —> Referential;

‣ Administrative metadata —> Manage;

‣ Technical metadata —> Production Process;

‣ Preservation metadata —> Preservation Processes;

‣ Rights metadata —> Access and Use.

‣ Some or all

A Universe of Standards

http://www.dlib.indiana.edu/~jenlrile/metadatamap/seeingstandards.pdf

A Few Common Standards

‣ Dublin Core (ISO15836)

‣ Resource discovery across domains

‣ General and Abstracted

‣ GIS Metadata (ISO19115) —> OGC GML

‣ VRA Core - Visual Materials

‣ MODS (METS) —> MARC

‣ MPEG21 - Multimedia Resources

Why Metadata?

1. Facilitate Discovery of Content;

2. Help Organise Content;

3. Facilitate Harvesting of Content;

4. Support Archiving and Preservation.

A Rather Quick Introduction to Dublin Core

Just Enough to be Dangerous

TITLE

‣ Title

‣ <dc:title></dc:title>

‣ What the formal name of this resource - how would a user know it?

‣ Examples: title of a painting, photo, document; the name of a person when using the "person" item type; the name of a lesson plan.

‣ <dc:title>Arab Gentleman</dc:title>

SUBJECT‣ Subject

‣ <dc:subject></dc:subject>

‣ What is the domain area/topic (non-spatial or temporal) that the object is part of?

‣ Controlled vocabularies such as the Getty can help here.

‣ Typically keywords, key phrases, or classification codes.

‣ Examples: Library of Congress subject headings; subject-specific nomenclature.

‣ <dc:subject>Bell, Gertrude Lowthian 1868-1926 — Journeys — Pictorial works.</dc:subject>

DESCRIPTION‣ Description

‣ <dc:description></dc:description>

‣ What sort of short narrative will help a user to know whether this resource is relevant to their needs?

‣ This is often an abstract, a table of contents or even a graphical representation of the object

‣ Examples: a photo caption; descriptive information of an artifact/museum object; summary of a lesson plan; abstract or summary of a long document.

‣ <dc:description>[Arab gentleman - possibly Am’a Abdullah Pasha]</dc:description>

CREATOR‣ Creator

‣ <dc:creator></dc:creator>

‣ Who is responsible for making this digital resource - digtiser, digital author?

‣ The original author or the digitising institution?

‣ Examples: Author/authors; artists; photographers; institutional authors or producers, such as university or federal agency.

‣ <dc:creator>Gertrude Bell</dc:creator>

SOURCE‣ Source

‣ <dc:source></dc:source>

‣ From what resource did the derived digital resource come from?

‣ This can be a type, a descriptor but best practice recommends a string conforming to a formal identifier system

‣ Examples: Accession number; Collection of objects; Division of an archive or library.

‣ <dc:source>Gertrude Bell Papers, Special Collections, Newcastle University</dc:source>

PUBLISHER‣ Publisher

‣ <dc:publisher></dc:publisher>

‣ Who (what institution is making this resource available?

‣ If there is a license or copyright involved helps to determine this one

‣ Examples: actual publisher, if there is one; entity or consortium publishing digital materials.

‣ <dc:publisher>University Library, Newcastle University</dc:publisher>

DATE‣ Date

‣ <dc:date></dc:date>

‣ A point or period in the lifecycle of the digital object

‣ When was this scanned? When was it published?

‣ Consistency - decided by project management - documented

‣ Consider in relation to the coverage of the object

‣ Date is one of the trickiest fields to fill. You will want to decide how best to use it for your project for consistency. There is an open text field for date so that you can reflect the type of date information you have whether it is a very specific date MM/DD/YYYY or if it is "circa 1940".

‣ <dc:date>1905-03</dc:date>

CONTRIBUTOR‣ Contributor

‣ <dc:contributor></dc:contributor>

‣ Who (individual, institution, organisation - entity) is making this object available/responsible for its digitisation?

‣ Examples: person who contributed a story or file for an Omeka collecting project; owner or donor of collected objects.

‣ <dc:contributor>Special Collections, Newcastle University</dc:contributor>

RIGHTS‣ Rights

‣ <dc:rights></dc:rights>

‣ What restrictions are held in and over this resource?

‣ This is typically a statement relation to the intellectual and usage rights relating to this digital object

‣ Examples: spell out conditions of use for specific items here; Creative Commons type; Public Domain.

‣ <dc:rights>Reproduction of these materials in any format for any purpose other than personal research and study may constitute a violation of CDPA 1988 and infringement of rights associated with the materials. Please contact us for permissions information at [email protected]</dc:rights>

RELATION‣ Relation

‣ <dc:relation></dc:relation>

‣ What resources are related to this digitised object?

‣ Best practice is to refer to a <dc:identifier>

‣ Examples: a still image of a person entered as a "person" type.

‣ <dc:relation>Gertrude Bell Collection</dc:relation>

FORMAT‣ Format

‣ <dc:format></dc:format>

‣ What is the file format of this digital resource?

‣ Examples include size and duration. Recommended best practice is to use a controlled vocabulary such as the Internet Media Types (MIME).

‣ <dc:format>JPG</dc:format>

LANGUAGE‣ Language

‣ <dc:language></dc:language>

‣ What is the language(s) of the digital resource?

‣ Again best practice is to use a controlled vocabulary such as RFC4646

‣ Examples: English; Russian; Spanish, et al.

TYPE‣ Type

‣ <dc:type></dc:type>

‣ What defined type best represents the object you are referencing?

‣ Best practice to use the DCMI Type controlled vocabulary

‣ http://dublincore.org/documents/2010/10/11/dcmi-type-vocabulary/

‣ Examples: For consistency, use item type controlled vocabulary provided by Omeka: Document, Moving Image, Oral History, Sound, Still Image, Website, Event, Email, Lesson Plan, Hyperlink, Person, or Interactive Resource.

‣ <

‣ dc:type>Still Image</dc:type>

IDENTIFIER‣ Identifier

‣ <dc:identifier></dc:identifier>

‣ Where will a user find this resource via the web?

‣ A direct and unambiguous identification of the resource - unique and persistent - handle?

‣ <dc:identifier>658/2</dc:identifier>

COVERAGE‣ Coverage

‣ <dc:coverage></dc:coverage>

‣ To what defining place or time is this item relevant (spatial or temporal)?

‣ Typically relies on a controlled vocabulary relevant to the domain, ie. The Getty Museum / Research Institute

‣ Where appropriate, named places or time periods can be used in preference to numeric identifiers such as sets of coordinates or date ranges.

‣ <dc:coverage>Damascus - Syria</dc:coverage>

An Arab Gentleman – and a Digital Object‣ <?xml version="1.0"?><!DOCTYPE rdf:RDF PUBLIC "-//DUBLIN CORE//DCMES DTD 2002/07/31//EN" ‣ "http://dublincore.org/documents/2002/07/31/dcmes-xml/dcmes-xml-dtd.dtd"> ‣ <rdf:RDF xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#" ‣ xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/">

‣ <rdf:Description rdf:about="http://nclomeka1.omeka.net/admin/items/show/18"> ‣ <dc:title>Arab gentleman</dc:title> ‣ <dc:subject>Bell, Gertrude Lowthian 1868-1926 — Journeys — Pictorial works.</dc:subject> ‣ <dc:description>[Arab gentleman - possibly Am&#039;a Abdullah Pasha]</dc:description> ‣ <dc:creator>Gertrude Bell</dc:creator> ‣ <dc:source>Gertrude Bell Papers, Special Collections, Newcastle University</dc:source> ‣ <dc:publisher>University Library, Newcastle University</dc:publisher> ‣ <dc:date>1905-03</dc:date> ‣ <dc:contributor>Special Collections, Newcastle University</dc:contributor> ‣ <dc:rights>Reproduction of these materials in any format for any purpose other than

personal research and study may constitute a violation of CDPA 1988 and infringement of rights associated with the materials. Please contact us for permissions information at [email protected]</dc:rights>

‣ <dc:relation>Gertrude Bell Collection</dc:relation> ‣ <dc:format>JPG</dc:format> ‣ <dc:language>EN</dc:language> ‣ <dc:type>Still Image</dc:type> ‣ <dc:identifier>658/2</dc:identifier> ‣ <dc:coverage>Damascus - Syria</dc:coverage> ‣ </rdf:Description></rdf:RDF>

Keepinging the User in Mind‣ How will people find what they are looking for?

‣ How will they differentiate from one 'thing' over another?

‣ How will your information architecture refer to the digital objects?

‣ Useful for Straight Dublin Core: Dublin Core Generator

Lessons

‣ The world is fluid and formats and standards change

‣ How can I choose the right one?

‣ Be consistent and you can transform and evolve - Crosswalks

‣ How can I make the right decisions?

‣ I am a big fan of the Digital Curation Centre (DCC)

‣ They have some very useful tools: http://dcc.ac.uk

Exercise OneGetting Intimate with Digital Objects

Seeing Metadata in Action

1. Browse to http://www.memoriecolectiva.org/imagine~11~memorie-colectiva~child-and-car.html

2. Explore the context of the image within the collection - browse

3. Copy the Dublin Core information – digitally preferred 4. (NotePad)

Reporting Back

Introducing OmekaCollecting and Managing Digital Objects

Who’s Behind Omeka?: CNMH

‣ Roy Rosenzweig Centre for New Media and History

‣ Founded 1994

‣ George Mason University in Washington

‣ Collaborative Space Supporting 50+ Scholars

‣ To preserve and present history online

‣ Transform scholarship across the humanities

‣ Supported by grants from AHA, NEH, NHC, Library of Congress, Mellon, Sloan, Rockefeller and Kellog Foundations amongst others

Products

Zotero

Zotero [zoh-TAIR-oh] is a free, easy-to-use

Firefox extension to help you collect,

manage, and cite your research sources.

Omeka

Designed for cultural institutions, enthusiasts,

and educators, Omeka is a platform for publishing online collections and

exhibitions.

Omeka.net

Let Omeka.net host your collections, research, exhibits, and digital

projects.

THATCamp

Short for “The Humanities and Technology Camp,"

THATCamp is a BarCamp-style, user-

generated “unconference” on digital humanities.

Scripto

Scripto is a free, open source tool that enables

community transcriptions of document and multimedia files.

PressForward

PressForward is pioneering new

methods to capture and highlight orphaned or

underappreciated scholarship and

share it with digital humanists across the

web.

ScholarPress

Manage your class, publish research, or

collaborate on a conference

presentation with this hub for scholarly & educational plugins.

Anthologize

Anthologize is a free, open-source, plugin that

transforms WordPress into a platform for publishing

electronic texts.

Survey Builder

Build online surveys that are especially

applicable to oral histories.

Timeline Builder

CHNM Labs: Easily create and manage a timeline of historical events for

your website.

Serendip-o-matic

Serendip-o-matic connects your sources to digital

materials located in libraries, museums, and

archives around the world.

Web Scrapbook

Store all kinds of media items — URLs,

images, text, and movies — &

collaborate thru the CHNM online scrapbook.

What is Omeka?

‣ Omeka was developed at Center for History and New Media (CHNM) at George Mason University as a "next generation web publishing platform for museums, historical societies, scholars, enthusiasts, and educators." The feature-rich offering provides for the presentation, searching and browsing of digital collections along with a robust metadata management facility.

Situating Omeka

OMEKA Core Features‣ Based on Open Source

Technology: Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP;

‣ Free to Use, Free to Change;

‣ Easy to Use;

‣ Change Design using Themes;

‣ Add Functionality with Plug-Ins;

‣ Unqualified Dublin Core Metadata;

‣ Strong Support Community;

‣ Extensible, Scalable, Flexible;

‣ Interoperable

What is 'an Omeka'‣ An Omeka 'instance' contains:

‣ Items (digital Objects of various types)

‣ Collections (of objects)

‣ Sites (set of collections)

‣ Exhibits (curated subsets of site collections)

Exercise Two:Adding Digital Objects to a Collection

Workshop Logistics1. Hopefully you have been able to register and have confirmed your

username and password

2. Please access your User Account on

http://*.omeka.net/admin

‣ You are all SuperAdmins – really super!

‣ Our first objective is to Add an Item to the Collection

‣ Follow Along in Your Own Browser

Logging In

The Dashboard‣ The Dashboard is where it all happens

Item List‣ All of the digital objects

Add an Item

Specify Item Type‣ You can select from the default ypes supported by Omeka.

‣ These can correspond to the dc:type but not tied directly

Supported Item Types‣ Document ‣ Still Image ‣ Moving Image ‣ Sound ‣ Oral History ‣ Email ‣ Lesson Plan ‣ Website ‣ HyperLink

‣ Event (Time-Based Occurrence)

‣ Person (Biographic) ‣ Interactive Resource

Add an Item

Add an Item

Add a File to the Item‣ You can have one or multiple files;

‣ Depends on type of item.

Add an Item – Optional but Fun

Add Tags to the Item‣ Why Tags with all the DC metadata?

The Completed Item

Adding an Item and its MetaData

‣ Return to the Item List ‣ Choose Add Item

‣ Take your Metadata record and populate the item record ‣ Dublin Core more info: http://dublincore.org ‣ 15 Metadata Elements of a generic and wide-ranging number

of digital resources; ‣ Each Dublin Core element is optional and may be repeated

Where We are At : Item Added‣ Enter data to the best of your ability for the Dublin Core

info - bearing in mind not all fields are mandatory;

‣ Title, Description and Subject important.

‣ Title:

‣ Description:

‣ Subject:

Spend time thinking about your metadata in advance

‣ It’s really about best practice which means although you can touch and feel an object, you must define it properly first

Let’s Take a Look at What We Have

The Steps in Adding an Item

1. Go to the DashBoard 2. View Existing Items 3. Choose Add Item 4. Take the Metadata You Have along with the Image File

and create an Item and locate it geospatially. 5. Choose a Collection to which it belongs 6. Save and you are Done.

7. There is an alternative.

Batch Uploading

Remember this stuff?

Dublin Core in Excel

Batch Uploading

Managing Omeka

The Dashboard

Appearance - Themes

Plug-ins

Users

Settings

Building a Narrative ExhibitLeveraging Exhibit to Tell A Good Story

Create an Exhibit

‣ What is an Exhibit?

A carefully composed and curated digital showcase that organizes the images, texts, video, audio, and other uploaded items on your Omeka site into a coherent narrative for people to browse.

- Harriet Green, Librarian, University of Illinois Scholarly Commons

Create an Exhibit

‣ Exhibits consist of Sections and Pages and Groups of Collections and Items

‣ The first step is to take the time to plan your exhibit to consider basic user interaction.

Create an Exhibit

‣ Time spent at this stage is essential - define the display architecture

Consider Your Assets

An Object Driven Narrative

A Collaborative Narrative Platform

Considerations

‣ Browse versus Search ‣ Guided versus Serendipitous ‣ Navigation ‣ Story Arc ‣ The Glue ‣ Varying Levels of Engagement

A Simple Metaphor

‣ Museum ‣ Wings ‣ Rooms ‣ Tours ‣ Objects

A Simple Metaphor

‣ Omeka ‣ Collections ‣ Exhibits ‣ Pages ‣ Items

A Simple Metaphor

‣ Omeka ‣ Collections ‣ Exhibits ‣ Pages ‣ Items

Planning an Omeka Site1. What is the Primary Goal for the Site? 2. Who is the Primary Audience for the Site?

1. Who Else Might Use the site? - Secondary audiences?

3. What sections will this Site or Exhibit Include?

1. Items: (renamed however you would like Archive/Sources/Objects) links to a browseable list of items, sortable by type of item and tags.

2. Collections (renamed however you would like): groups of items, public can dig through collection to find items.

3. Exhibits: (renamed however you would like) Exhibits contain interpretative text and rely on items/sources/objects as their building blocks.

4. About-- a simple page good for publishing project descriptions, credits, rights, et al

4. Keyword Search box – option to link to advanced search page

Without Magic

Create an Exhibit‣ Make sure that the Exhibit Plug-In in installed and

Enabled

Create an Exhibit

‣ Add an Exhibit

Create an Exhibit

Add a Page

Populate Page Sections

So, Where are we Now?

You can Add Static Page

‣ Use the Simple Page Plug-In to Add A Static Page

Group Exercise : Build An Exhibit

Possible Sources

‣ http://www.getty.org ‣ http://ro.wikipedia.org/wiki/

Extending Collections

Thinking About Items in Your Site1. The item is the building block of your site.

1. Add the objects and materials you want to display in your site.

2. Add descriptions using some or all of the standard Dublin Core fields.

3. Once you have items in the Omeka archive, then you can build an exhibit with them or display categories of items organized by collections or tags.

2. Determine the types of items/sources/objects you plan to use in this site: (ie, Document, Still Image, Moving Image, Audio, et al),

3. Do you want to modify any of the item type fields or types? See Item_Types for additional types and explanations.

4. Do you need additional core fields? —> Install the Dublin Core Extended plugin.

5. It is wise to determine before you start building the item archive what type of consistencies you desire in your metadata--this may be especially true for fields such as date, publisher, creator, et al.

What About All those Lovely Plugins?

To Control Data Entry‣ Establish your own

Controlled Vocabulary for specific metadata fields?

‣ Make it easier for your team to enter consistent data?

‣ Install SimpleVocab

Use Library of Congress Subjects• Do you want to easily use

Library of Congress subject headings?

• Do you want to make it easier for entry and ensure consistency?

• > Library of Congress Suggest

Do You Want to Establish Your Own Taxonomy?

• Do you want to establish a controlled tagging schema? • You may add tags to individual items and exhibits; • Before building your archive you may want to devise this

schema to help control vocab and spelling; • Tags can help you pull together different items for the

purpose of arranging them on a map or creating navigational links to browse items with a specific tag;

• This is a standard feature for Omeka Items.

Do You Have Objects in other Repositories?• You may be able to batch add

them into your Omeka site. Can items be exported in a Comma Separated Value format? Is there an OAI-PMH harvestable set?

• Do you have hundreds of files, or large media files?

• Are you using Fedora?

Do Your Objects Have Locations?• Activate the Geolocation

Plugin. • You must geolocate each item

individually. • A Great way to browse a

collection.

Do You Want to Crowdsource Your Content?• Collaborate with MyOmeka • Create Custom Tags and

Annotations • Collect these to Author Posters

• Contribution Plugin • a way to collect stories,

images, or other files from the public and manage those

contributions in your Omeka archive as items.

Do You Want to Make Your Site Social?• Add social bookmarking

icons to the bottom of items; • Allow users to share links to

that item w/their social networks.

• Allow the public to ‘comment’ using the Omeka Comment Plug-In

Do You Want to Extend a Physical Exhibit?• The Reports And Codes

Plugin exports a list of items selected/browsed/matching criteria and generates PDFs of QR Codes.

• Use Mobile Devices to Browse Omeka Collectionss for more information

Do You Want to Have Users Read Supporting Documents Online?• Use the DocsViewer Plugin • Embeds a Google document

viewer into item show pages. PDF documents, PowerPoint presentations, TIFF files, and some Microsoft Word documents are supported.

Do You Want to Transcribe Items?• Crowdsource the

transcription of Omeka Items. • Uses MediaWiki, and Scripto

allowing items with files to be transcribed. Transcriptions are then captured into Omeka.

Extending Omeka Even Further

‣ Do you want to allow users to be notified of changes to your items, collections, or exhibits?

‣ —> Atom Output (Atom Syndication Format)

‣ Do you want users to be able to harvest objects to their own bibliographic managers (such as Zotero)?

‣ —> COinS metadata

‣ Do you want to track user demographics?

‣ —> Google Analytics

‣ Do you want to generate derivative images?

‣ —> Derivatives plug-in

Do You need Help?

http://info.omeka.net

Omeka in a NutshellPros

‣ Simple

‣ Lightweight

‣ Standards-Based

‣ Extensible

‣ Embeddable in other systems

Cons

‣ Scalability

‣ Restrictions on Look and Feel

‣ Extensive customisation means getting into code

‣ A few lingering mobile usage issues

Comparing omeka.net and omeka.orgFeatures omeka.org omeka.net

Server LAMP server required no server required

FTP client Required for file uploads and modifying Omeka not required

Web-based administrative interface Yes Yes

Storage Space Determined by your server admin Determined by your plan: 500 mb; 1 gb; 5 gb; 10 gb; or 25gb

File size limitationsDetermined by your server admin, with ability to use Dropbox

plugin for files that exceed that limit.32 mb maximum

Sites per Installation One website for one Omeka installationDepending on plan, multiple sites available managed by one

user.

Custom Domain Redirects You may point any Omeka installation to any domain name.No redirects available. All sites are subdomains of Omeka.net

(yoursite.omeka.net)

Plugins and ThemesAny and all available in Add-ons directory (see more on other

pages)

Not all Omeka plugins are available for use on .Net. And availability of those plugins depends on the plan chosen (see

more on other pages).

PricingFree: all versions of Omeka, and all of its plugins and themes

are free and will be always.Free basic plan will always be available, with other options

available for small fee: http://www.omeka.net/signup

Support User Forums: http://omeka.org/forums Help section with detailed instructions: http://info.omeka.net

Developers' Google Group: https://groups.google.com/group/omeka-dev/

Troubleshooting help form: http://info.omeka.net/contact

Advanced development: GitHub: http://github.org/omeka

Digital Narrative Alternatives

Alternatives

‣ WordPress

‣ Drupal

‣ Exhibit?

‣ ContentDM

‣ Duraspace (DSpace and Fedora) ‣ MapStory ESRI

‣ NeatLine ....

‣ Noting that Omeka and these all can co-exist

Wordpress

Exhibit

Neatline

Thank YouShawn Day - [email protected] - @iridium