Resources on Digital Preservation

In my Introduction to Digital Archeology article, I discussed how our present state of society and civilization would be perceived by future generations of digital archeologists.In this article, you will find a collection of links on how best to preserve digital information in its various forms.

• A Project for Preservation of Digital Data by Raymond A. Lorie, IBM Almaden Research Center. He mentions the Universal Virtual Computer (UVC) which can be embedded in the data to interpret it in the future.
• Digital Preservation: Paradox and Promise is an excellent article covering many aspects of the subject. Because it was written in April 2001, it is interesting to note how much prices and technology have changed in just a few years.
• From The National Library of Australia, PADI: Preserving Access to Digital Information, being a subject gateway to International Digital Preservation, with many sub-topics:
  • General Resources
  • Issues
  • Strategies
  • Rights Management
  • Data Documentation and Standards
  • Formats and Media
  • National Approaches
  • Digitisation
  • Digital Records
  • Digital Libraries
  • Management
• MIT's Technology Review had an article titled Data Extinction by Claire Tristram, October 2002. The article is accessible only to subscribers. However, you can read the highlights on Rick Klau's blog, as well as the posts in the discussion forums
• The Library at Cornell University has a section on their web site on Digital Preservation Management including Digital Preservation Strategies and Digital Preservation Management Tutorial.
• ITBusiness.ca article by Lynn Greiner where he mentions the Universal Virtual Computer, and the research IBM fellow Dr. Jai Menon
• The Long Now Foundation aims at reversing the "pathological short attention span" that present civilization takes. They are building a clock to demonstrate what they are all about, a library project, and an archive of data loss stories.
• Running old hardware can be a daunting task. Spare parts are not easy to come by, nor cheap.One proposed solution to this dilemma, proposed by the DEC VAX team lead, Bob Supnik, in this ACMQueue article, is using emulation on new hardware as a means to keep old hardware and software alive. He runs the Computer History Simulation project which is an Open Source project dedicated to this cause.This approach is not without pitfalls because of:
  • Hardware dependancies: CPUs can be moderately easily emulated. But emulating a physical piece of hardware, such as a proprietary tape drive, or paper punch is not possible, if you want to read the media.
  • Software licensing costs: If you need to run an old hardware, you probably will need an operating system and maybe an application. These pieces of the puzzle are not free, and could be fairly expensive to license.
• A Slashdot discussion on the longevity of Wikipedia and its importance as a cultural snapshot being available only in digital form at present.
• NIST conducted a survey on how long you want your media discs to last. This was covered in News.com.com, and a Slashdot discussion on the topic has some comments too.