Martin Wynne [email protected] with a lot of help from Ylva Berglund

Funded by:

© AHDS

Oxford Text Archiveand good practice in the creation

of electronic resources

http://ota.ahds.ac.uk

Martin Wynne

[email protected]

with a lot of help from Ylva Berglund

[email protected]

Funded by:

© AHDS

Case study: Terms of Address in Ben Jonson’s plays

• Database of all address terms

• Instances coded for various parameters– addresser/addressee, type of address,

reference, etc.

• Stored on computer + back-ups on floppy disks

• The creator is happy to share the resource…

Funded by:

© AHDS

Problem 1: Hardware/media

• Changes in hardware → data on old computer and floppies now largely inaccessible

• Storage media vulnerable

Funded by:

© AHDS

Problem 2: Software

• Specialist software → data tied into application

• Proprietary software → ongoing support for application reliant on commercial interests

• Program versions: compatibility, different platforms → not compatible

Funded by:

© AHDS

Problem 3: Coding/mark-up

• Personal scheme – not comparable to other resources– doesn’t work with generic software

• Documentation– resource soon becomes unusable if

documentation is inadequate or impossible to find

Funded by:

© AHDS

Problem 4: Sharing

• Dissemination– Awareness– Distribution– Sustainability

Funded by:

© AHDS

Solution 1: Hardware/media

• Migrate data from old hardware

• Don’t keep on only one machine

• Don’t store on vulnerable media

Funded by:

© AHDS

Solution 2: Software • Avoid specialised software unless

possible to migrate data

• Consider open source

Funded by:

© AHDS

Solution 3: Coding/mark-up

• Use standards

• Document!

Funded by:

© AHDS

Example: html

This is bold

This is bold

This is a noun

This is a noun

Funded by:

© AHDS

Example: COCOA<Q FRENCH><A SARTRE><T NAUSEE><L 1> %"$C' EST UN GAR*CON SANS IMPORTANCE COLLECTIVE,%%C' EST TOUT JUSTE UN INDIVIDU."%\L#-\F# \CE[LINE.%\L' E[GLISE\.%<F 00><L 1>%%AVERTISSEMENT DES E[DITEURS%% %$CES CAHIERS ONT E[TE[ TROUVE[S PARMI LES PAPIERS D' \

ANTOINE R\OQUENTIN.\%%$NOUS LES PUBLIONS SANS Y RIEN CHANGER.% …

Funded by:

© AHDS

Example: XML<s n="97">

<w type="AJ0">Normal</w>

<w type="NN1">economy</w>

<w type="NN1">return</w>

<w type="VBZ">is</w>

<w type="NN0">£262</w>

<c type="PUN">.</c>

</s>

Funded by:

© AHDS

Text Encoding Initiative (TEI)• Guidelines for the encoding of electronic

texts using XML

• For interchange

• Guidelines freely available

• http://www.tei-c.org/

Funded by:

© AHDS

Encoding

• Choose language/format– e.g. XML

• Choose coding scheme– e.g. TEI

Funded by:

© AHDS

Markup and encoding options

• Word processing files• PDF• Database• HTML• SGML• XML• Plain text• Unicode

Funded by:

© AHDS

Advantages of XML

• Standard not only in scholarly text encoding, but publishing, web, etc.

• Growing number of tools

• Community of users, support

• Re-usable skills, useful to learn

• XML resources good for repurposing

• XML resources good for preservation

• Disadvantages? Cost, complexity

Funded by:

© AHDS

Advantages of TEI

• Standard in scholarly text encoding,

• Community of users, support available

• Extensible

• TEI resources good for interchange

• Disadvantages:– Cost, complexity– Compromises to text integrity– Overlapping hierarchies

Funded by:

© AHDS

Disadvantages of TEI

• Cost, complexity

• Compromises to text integrity

• Overlapping hierarchies…

Funded by:

© AHDS

<sp cat=”NRS”>One officer said:</sptag><sp cat=”DS”>'This is like an episode from Inspector Morse."The victim was single but we believe he had several lady friends."It is possible that it was something in the background of one of those relationships that caused his death. ."We don't think he was linked with any criminals or involved in any secret wrong doing." .</sp><sp cat=”N”>Police have not ruled out the possibility of a contract killing by a hitman.</sp>

Funded by:

© AHDS

Oxford Text Archive

• Founded in 1976

• Collect, catalogue, preserve, and distribute high-quality electronic resources

• Advise creators and users

• Part of the AHDS

Funded by:

© AHDS

AHDS http://www.ahds.ac.uk

• Archaeology

• History

• Literature, Languages and Linguistics

• Performing Arts

• Visual Arts

+

• Executive

Funded by:

© AHDS

The OTA today

• About 2000 resources, in 25 languages

• Mostly primary texts, ‘classics’

• Language corpora

• Increasingly, more complex resources, with more intellectual content

• http://www.ota.ahds.ac.uk/

Funded by:

© AHDS

The OTA in the future

• New webpage– More information– New ways of accessing resources

• Workshops and training events– Digitisation workshop– For new projects– Specialised workshops

• New resources

Funded by:

© AHDS

Oxford Text Archiveand good practice in the creation

of electronic resources

http://ota.ahds.ac.uk

Martin Wynne

[email protected]

with a lot of help from Ylva Berglund

[email protected]

Martin Wynne [email protected] with a lot of help from Ylva Berglund

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