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Henny, Is your EAD Management System homegrown? It sounds excellent. I thought you might use ICA-ATOM, but if so, I didn't realize it could do all that. Thanks, Nathan On Thu, Jul 26, 2012 at 3:17 AM, Henny van Schie < [log in to unmask]> wrote: > Michele, > > In the National Archives of the Netherlands we do track revisions to our > finding aids. We have two systems, a manual one with <revisiondesc>, and an > automated one in our XML database. > > The content model of the element <revisiondesc> is: > <revisiondesc audience="internal"> > <change> > <date calendar="gregorian" era="ce" normal="20101021">21-10-2010</date> > <item> > <num>2</num> > Free text, not standardized, describing the change > <name>name of the agent, sometimes a script</name> > </item> > </change> > </revisiondesc> > > Obviously, not all changes are recorded. > Recorded are: > Mandatory: > - all accruals, expressed by one or more added <c# level=”file”> > elements (an element with level=”file” contains the description of a > deliverable unit: a folder, box, book, map, etc.); > - splitting up a deliverable unit into two or more new and smaller > units, expressed by one or more added <c# level=”file”> elements and the > removal of the original one; > - removal of deliverable units as a result of appraisal or transfer > of archival material to other archives; > > Highly recommended (the processing archivist decides): > - addition of new texts in <p>, <list> or <table> in the descriptive > block elements (<bioghist>, <processinfo>, etc.), at any level; > - addition of new annexes (concordances, definition lists, > glossaries, bibliographies); > - addition of new schemes (genealogical tables, organogram charts); > - removal of elements, containing text; > - general facelift of a finding aid (rearrangement of descriptions, > conversion of the 19th century spelling into modern spelling); > - generic adaptations (conversion from DTD tot Schema). > > Not recorded are: > - individual corrections (typing and marking errors); > - corrections, additions and removals of small parts of texts of > individual elements; > - changes as a result of synchronization with other systems; > - changes in rendering and presentation (i.e. <table> replaced by a > <list>). > > The automated process of tracking revisions (versioning) is done by our EAD > Management System. This system keeps a copy of all changes in all EAD > instances in our dedicated XML database. It is possible to compare any > specific version of an EAD instance with any other version of that > instance. It is like comparing selected revisions on the 'view history' > page of a wiki. > > The manual tracking method is for reasons of accountability: our successors > might want to know what we have done with the archival descriptions and the > archival material. The automated versioning is to prevent disasters: if you > have lost a big, manually into EAD converted finding aid, by accidentally > saving an empty or corrupted version of it, you know what I mean ;-). >