On Apr 3, 2008, at 11:33 AM, Vejnar Robert J. wrote:

> Again, Mr. Browning, for some strange reason, refuses to listen to  
> what
> (or read) what the professionals in the field have determined.
OH, I like that. Determinations are funny things. Some folks will  
cling to them as if they are dogma while others realize that they are  
moving targets.

>  I find
> this both humorous and insulting.  I did not spend years in graduate
> school and years in the profession to be lectured by non-professionals
> on how best to preserve materials.
Got up on the wrong side of the archive this morning, did you?  
Strictly speaking, we're not talking about preservation of materials,  
but rather the ability to have materials electronically available,  
equids of entirely different species, much less colors. We've gone  
from the originals to B&W smudgy copies in microfilm/fiche to B&W  
scanned copies in e-format to color copies in e-format. Techno- 
advances allowed that to happen.
>
>
> I have not come across many archivists - because we have no  
> professional
> training in it - who would dare think they knew enough to instruct
> professional archaeologists on how to dig in the dirt.
One of the strengths of archaeology is that we come from different  
backgrounds (or at least my generation and the preceding ones did) and  
we adapt our techniques to what works. We've had good ideas come from  
entirely outside the profession and adopt them wholeheartedly as we  
are smart enough to realize we don't know it all and are willing to  
learn. So, if you come onto one of my digs and have a good suggestion,  
I will adopt it. Or course, I don't speak for everyone and there may  
be a few hidebound diehards who won't listen, but they're well known  
anyway and won't listen inside the profession, much less outside it.

>  If the
> archivists will refrain from trying to instruct archaeologists on  
> how to
> do their work then I would hope the archaeologists would refrain from
> trying to instruct the archivists on how to do theirs.
Instruct? Not me. I am simply relating how my limited knowledge of  
computers has allowed me to move all my stuff over from the various  
systems, formats and media to be currently useful. Other folks do it  
as well.

The technology market will overtake those who spend a lifetime arguing  
about which standards and formats are going to work best. There are  
those who wait for the perfect solution and there are those who get on  
with it, imperfect as any system may be.

Archaeologists use all sorts of tools generated by others to do their  
work, and are not generally inventing them. Archivists, as the keepers  
of the materials, are also adopting the technology, and are not  
generally inventing it. The LVA had a great initiative to digitize  
their map collection. It was expensive and it worked. Unfortunately,  
due to budget cuts, it was shelved. That has been lamented inside and  
out of LVA for years.
>
>
> And no, if it's electronic, it is NOT necessarily migratable.
But the other 99.99% is and that is my point. Certainly there is odd  
stuff that hasn't made it due to format issues. For instance, I can't  
get an old (1999) Sharp Zaurus ZR-5800 to talk with a current computer  
and there is nothing on the market that works that I can find. The  
software gurus who do the current edition Zaurus say there is no way.  
Good thing I got all my data out before that bridge went down.

Lyle Browning


>
>
> Robert Vejnar
>
> Archivist
> Emory & Henry College Archives
> Holston Conference Archives
> P.O. Box 948
> Emory, Virginia  24327-0948
> 276-944-6668 - office
> 276-944-4592 - fax
> [log in to unmask]
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history
> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Lyle E. Browning
> Sent: Thursday, April 03, 2008 11:20 AM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Despondent
>
> I've not completely been working in isolation for the last 25 years.
> If I with all my myriad computers can do it, then there is absolutely
> no reason why folks who do this for a living cannot do the same.
> Arguing about how many electrons fit on the head of an electronic pin
> (which "standard" is to be the one true benchmark of 100 years e-
> standard) brings to mind the comment McGuffey had about a "gourd full
> of gnats."
>
> Having gone through this discussion umpteen times on this and other
> lists over the years, I have visited the various archivist websites
> mentioned and what stands out is that the situation is analogous to
> the war of the various computer systems competing for dominance in the
> infancy of computers. And I still see that the thinking is dominated
> by folks with a paper-based mentality rather than forward looking to
> electronic solutions. Sure, if one sticks a 3.5" floppy on a shelf and
> expects to read it 10 years later, one is absolutely pig-ignorant of
> the media and gets exactly nothing unless one is very, very lucky. But
> if you see it as migratable media and go back over it, one has useful
> data.
>
> Text based files, databases and the like aren't a particular problem.
> Image files aren't a problem. In my world, CAD drawings that are put
> into anything other than CAD go "flat" and have to be re-drawn if
> needed for research. That's a problem. My simplistic solution is to
> migrate my own files from the last 20 years into the next generation
> or system of software and to keep them up to date. Surely if I can do
> it, it can be done anywhere. At the macro level, there are programs
> that do batch conversions now of image types.
>
> And at the risk of accusation of putting forth a "just-so" story: I
> have also witnessed the migration of the archaeological and
> architectural history records data from the Department of Historic
> Resources from their refusal in the early 1980's to embrace electronic
> media to going with what was called IPS (Integrated Preservation
> Software by the developer and Incredibly Persnickety Software by the
> users) to the current imperfect but getting better DSS (Data Sharing
> System?). IPS had an intentional bug in it whereby data migrated from
> one field to the next unless the developer was there to "fix" it in a
> timely fashion. When that was no longer possible, it took a while to
> get it sorted out. But it did happen and those folks had no money but
> the will to make it happen. It may not yet be perfect but it was
> migrated from the old system to the new. The folks at DHR aren't
> sitting around waiting for Godot, but rather are dealing with their
> data and when a unified system comes along, it will undoubtedly be
> moved across to it. In the meantime, research is better than it was by
> a long shot.
>
> After all, when it's electronic, it is migratable.
>
> Lyle Browning
>
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