Hi everybody, I think we're all painfully aware that the best we can do at the height of our powers, no matter how much coffee we pour down our gullets :-), will be a lower-case best practise document. How could you possibly define best practise when the practise, good or bad, has barely started? :-) All of this just to say that I completely agree with Jerry - I think pooling local guidelines (which I happened to term best practise) is what we're after, and then an upper-case Best Practise would definitely be an endeavour of a different scale which could develop based on those initial local guides. Let's gather offline and see what we can come up with! Guenter At 1:08 PM -0800 3/26/2002, Nancy Hoebelheinrich wrote: >Hi, Jerry, et al: >Seems like a very reasonable plan (although that shouldn't stop you from >having more coffee if you'd like, heavens!) I think it's a great idea to >reconnoiter offline to figure out what those of us who've spoken up about >needing guides are really thinking we need. At this stage, it may well be a >more advanced tutorial & "first" practices as opposed to "best" practices, >or a registry of planned uses for contact purposes, for instance. We could >bring the results of those discussions back to the list when we've got >something to suggest. I understand that Stanford has some facilities for >visual networking that I will explore to see whether the appointed > anointed? self destructive?) group could use that for an offline meeting. >I'll report back to the small group members unless they let me know they're >not interested or have a better idea, of course. Make sense? >Nancy Hoebelheinrich > >**************************************************** >Metadata Unit Coordinator, Cat Dept >3rd Floor, Meyer Libr >Stanford Univ Librs/Acad Info Rsrcs >Stanford CA 94305-6004 >phone: 650.725.6843 fax: 650.725.1120 >[log in to unmask] > >-----Original Message----- >From: Metadata Encoding and Transmission Standard >[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Jerome McDonough >Sent: Tuesday, March 26, 2002 11:59 AM >To: [log in to unmask] >Subject: Re: [METS] fledgling METS Best Practise? > > >At 09:14 AM 3/26/2002 -0500, you wrote: > >>I think we're working on parallel courses. At MATRIX, we've been >>investigating and implementing OAIS for about a year now. We're certainly >>planning on using METS in various Information Package roles, so we'd be >very >>interested in participating in the development of a METS Best Practices. >Our >>projects tend to be distributed across several countries, with partners of >>various backgrounds and training, and we would be both eager and pleased to >>share practices as they develop. We have a pressing need for such a guide >as >>well as an interest in helping to develop it. >> >>So I find myself echoing Nancy - I'll volunteer us to work with the >>community on developing a guide, but how do we go about coordinating a >>working group? > >I'm somewhat concerned that we don't get too far ahead of ourselves here. >I definitely agree that it would be a good thing for people in the community >to start exchanging information on local practices with regards to >implementing >METS, but we are still in a phase which I can only characterize as >experimentation >and R&D with regards to using METS for practical work. I think we don't >really >have enough experience with METS at this point to define what 'Best' >practices with >a capital 'B' might be. > >This is not to say that I think such a document is a bad idea; I just don't >see >us as quite ready to declare definitively what best practices are. As a >step >towards getting there, I think it would be an excellent idea for >institutions which >are using METS in their local systems and who are willing to provide some >documentation regarding local METS practices to write up a document >describing >their local practices and send it to Morgan for including on the METS >website. >When those documents are available for the community to review, I think >we can start looking at what people are doing similarly/differently and >start >making more informed recommendations about best practices. > >It might help if we're all documenting the same thing, however, so at the >risk of shamelessly abusing whatever miniscule amount of authority I >possess, I volunteer Guenter, Nancy, Scott, Bartek and Morgan to confer >together off-list on the question of 'What do you really want to know about >what other people are doing with METS?' and come back to the listserv >with suggestions for people drafting local practice guidelines for posting >on >the METS website. > >Does this sound like a reasonable plan? Or should I have had that >second cup of coffee this morning? > > > >Jerome McDonough >Digital Library Development Team Leader >Elmer Bobst Library, New York University >70 Washington Square South, 8th Floor >New York, NY 10012 >[log in to unmask] >(212) 998-2425 -- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Guenter Waibel Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive Digital Media Developer http://www.bampfa.berkeley.edu/ Digital Imaging SIG Chair, MCN http://www.mcn.edu/visig_subscribe.taf [log in to unmask] Phone 510-643-8655 Fax 510-642-4889 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~