Metadata and CONTENTdm

What is CONTENTdm?

CONTENTdm is high performance storage and retrieval software for multimedia collections (now distributed by OCLC)

How does CONTENTdm use metadata?

All metadata in a CONTENTdm record can be easily revised, and even global revisions are very easy
Metadata can be easily exported from CONTENTdm

Metadata can be relatively easily imported into CONTENTdm

The metadata sitting on the CONTENTdm server can be exposed to the OAI harvesters on a project-by-project basis
Empty fields are automatically suppressed from the user display
Stopword lists determine which metadata terms are hotlinked in a CONTENTdm record. We have already alerted Mary to the fact that we need to consult with her on these because we aren't satisfied with the hotlinking in the current displays

For a compound object, the item can have page-level metadata, as well as object-level metadata

Behind The Scenes:

CONTENTdm provides a default metadata field properties configuration workspace
with the Dublin Core elements -- to which you can:

add an unlimited # of additional elements (fields can be repeatable)
revise field names and map them to corresponding Dublin Core elements
determine the order in which they display
determine whether or not they display
determine whether or not they are searchable
determine which ones will use a controlled vocabulary
reconfigure these field properties at any time

The only field that CONTENTdm requires for a digital object is a title field; additional metadata can be added to a record at any time.

Each project has its own metadata workspace and its own metadata entry template, but we often re-use the field property definitions and templates.

The template for metadata entry is extremely flexible -- allowing the establishment of constant data (to reduce the amount of repetitive metadata entry) and allowing for the implementation of the controlled vocabularies.

What metadata standards does UNR follow when creating projects using CONTENTdm?

Both UNR and UNLV follow the WSDSG/MWG* Western States Dublin Core Metadata Best Practices (v.1.2, January 2003)
For art resources, we could use VRA Core
The Western States Dublin Core Metadata Element Set is used to create basic object cataloging with CONTENTdm software providing a flexible template which is customized for each collection

What do we mean by a CONTROLLED VOCABULARY in terms of CONTENTdm?

either a prescribed list of authority-controlled terms, such as LCSH
a list of commonly-used terms
or terms already used in a project's metadata

Official controlled vocabularies often used for metadata entry in CONTENTdm:

For names:

Library of Congress/National Authority File: http://authorities.loc.gov
Union List of Artist Names (Getty): http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/vocabulary/ulan
USGS Geographic Names Information System: http://geonames.usgs.gov/gnishome.html

For subjects:

Library of Congress Subject Headings: http://authorities.loc.gov
LC Thesaurus for Graphic Materials: http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/tgm1/
Art & Architecture Thesaurus (Getty)http://www.getty.edu/research/conducting_research/vocabularies/aat/
Chenhall's Nomenclature (The Revised Nomenclature for Museum Cataloging)

Nevada-specific tools:

The Nevada subject headings, created by a statewide group, are used in many of our projects. Nevada and California place names, extracted from on the GNIS, are also used in the Images of Lake Tahoe project. Only the Nevada place names controlled vocabulary was used in the Sagebrush Vernacular project. An Excel version of the Nevada place names, sorted by county, is freely made available here for others' use.

What To Do About Vocabulary Conflicts?

DC Subject: LCSH vs. AAT

-- Church buildings vs. Churches

DC Coverage: LC vs. Board of Geographic Names

-- Moscow vs. Moskva

The challenge is to meet the needs of diverse collections and users while maintaining consistency within and between databases

The good news is that the controlled vocabularies, as is true for all metadata within CONTENTdm, is infinitely modifiable at any time

The metadata that has been entered can be "parked" in such a way that a staff member at a higher level can then review it before approving it

What tools are used to ensure compliance of our CONTENTdm projects with these metadata standards?

Participation in the Mountain West Digital Library, a project of the Utah Academic Library Consortium, requires that we use certain required fields in our CONTENTdm projects, so that the metadata for our projects can be harvested by the MWDL's multi-site harvester. To ensure that each of our projects includes these required fields, our collection specific fields are mapped to Dublin Core using a required fields checklist
You can view the "crosswalks" that have been formulated for these projects, along with the Library of Congress cataloging tools used (see below). The Getty's metadata standards crosswalk between 9 standards is used for project planning

What are the benefits of following metadata standards in our CONTENTdm projects?

Increases coherence and intelligibility of the descriptions of the digital objects
Enhances reliability of retrieval
Enhances compatibility with other projects (cross-database searching)
Makes maintenance of, migration of, and harvesting of the metadata easier
For each project, I'm hoping to work with Mary on creating both project-specific data dictionaries to document the instructions for the metadata entry for each data element, as well as statewide data dictionaries that move us toward standardization of the usage of data elements at both university libraries

Dublin Core mapping for cross-collection searching
	Project A	Project B
DC:Creator	Photographer	Artist