Lou Judson <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
Is this a proper use of =93normalize=94 in the archivist industry? I
would think standardize would be more correct.

In the terminology of archives and digital preservation, normalize means to
transfer files into preservation formats, that is, non-proprietary, or open
source, or a format which will be reasonably easy to work with and read
going into the future. For example, it is common to transfer from MS Word
to PDF/A, since PDF/A is, for the moment, the more stable and
non-proprietary format. This means that archivists need to be aware of
formats that are becoming unusable for a variety of reasons, such as
changing hardware standards, and they may need to re-normalize, either by
going back to the original file, or if that is no longer possible, by
migrating the normalized file to a new format. Exactly WHICH formats to
normalize to is not at all standardized, which is probably why the term is
"normalize", although that is just a guess of mine.

--
Matt Snyder
Archivist
Special Collections Unit
The New York Public Library
[log in to unmask]





-- 
Matt Snyder
Archivist
Special Collections Unit
The New York Public Library
[log in to unmask]
Tel: 917-229-9582