The Oxford Google Digitization Project

Frances Boyle

Overview

Why - reasons

What - content

When - timelines

How - outline process/activities

Then what….

Why - 1

This project is primarily about access not conservation

An opportunity to expose content to a far wider community than is possible at the moment or in the near future

Builds on the work of the Oxford Digital Library (ODL) and OULS strategic initiatives e.g. ELISO project

Portfolio of the ‘born digital’ growing so the project affords us the opportunity to build up collection of digitized copies of locally held material

Why - 2

The synergy between missions:

Bodley’s ‘Republic of Letters’

Google’s ‘to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful’

Bring more Oxford content into the digital landscape making it available for scholarly and public benefit

Also facilitating access to the material for University members

What - 1

Direct discussions with Google since 2003

The extensive collection of out of print (and out of copyright) material identified

Oxford differs from other partners in this aspect of our agreement

Decision made to begin with the 19th century material

Looking at approximately 1 million items

Win/win situation for both parties

What - 2

The scanning operation to take place on OULS premises, at Osney Mead

Virtually all costs met by Google

Oxford costs: local staff time & expertise

The deliverable being two digital copies

English Law if there are issues relating to contract

Contracts differ for each of the partner institutions

When

Timelines:

planning work began at the beginning of 2005

looking towards the Autumn to commence scanning operations

initially a 3 year contract

There will be a ramping up phase to allow testing of the workflows/output

How - 1

Selection of material is done by OULS

Scanning techniques are non-invasive

Appraisal stage is part of the workflow

Any book that would be released to reading rooms likely to be in a fit state to be scanned

‘Slow track’ process for fragile material

How - 2

OULS staff will work closely with Google staff e.g. training on how to handle the material

Each component of the workflow must be comfortable for both parties

A large complex logistic operation that will not compromise the service to our users

How - 3

Current activities:

Facilities – refurbishment/fitting out of space

Business perspective:

Devising & testing workflows for each of the components

Collection profiling work

Completed a paper exercise of an envisaged workflow

This workflow put to the test over a 3 day trial in May

Involved activity & cooperation from many different OULS teams

How - 4

Evaluating the outcomes of the trial - proved a very useful exercise

Compiling a matrix of libraries/collections to inform the business decisions e.g. distribution of material, access issues etc

Steering Group overseeing the project with various working parties looking at the specific issues e.g. facilities, legal etc

Oxford specific challenges – uncut material, access, disparate collections

How - 5

Large raw images from scan stations

Derivatives are delivered in standardised formats

What is returned per volume:

JPEG2000 (probably)

OCR

Audit of production process

There are quality control processes at Google & Oxford

Linked to OLIS catalogue record

Ongoing software/hardware developments to improve the process

Then what…

Future challenges include building the infrastructure of the ODL

Develop access routes to the content to customise the Oxford experience

Cognisant of the changes in the information landscape

Implementation - What - 2

Useful links

http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/google/

http://print.google.com/googleprint/library.html

G& Uni are free to exploit non exclusively,

SERS

SERS

2004-06-08T14:01:27