Workbook on Digital Private Papers > Administrative and preservation metadata > Preservation metadata
Preservation metadata
Example of PREMIS in action in the context of a personal digital archive
A repository accessions the archive of Politician X; during the negotiation surrounding the transfer of the archive to the repository, Politician X grants the repository permission to undertake preservation actions on the material in the archive to which she holds the rights, and this is documented in the terms of agreement covering the placement of the archive with the repository. The accession of the archive includes a draft speech by Politician X (an Intellectual Entity) in Locoscript format (an Object). The repository's policy determines that all Locoscript files should be migrated to Rich Text Format on ingest, so that they may be accessed on contemporary computing platforms. An archivist authorises the migration, which is performed by some migration software. The end result is a new Representation of the same Intellectual Entity (the speech). Using the PREMIS data model, the following entities are identified and linked together using their identifiers:
archive:1 - Archive of Politician X
This Intellectual Entity will be described by a METS file containing the collection level information that will be needed for the long-term preservation of the archive:
- PREMIS rights metadata which records permissions given by Politician X to the archive to undertake preservation actions on materials to which he holds intellectual property rights.
- PREMIS object metadata to document the environment(s) used by Politician X in the creation and use of her archive.
- Basic collection level EAD metadata to record some descriptive and administrative metadata about the accessions, including reference to related analogue materials in the archive.
- A METS structMap, detailing the original order of the archive as submitted to the repository in the following manner Accession(s) > Physical container(s), e.g. hard disk /CD-R > Folder(s) > File(s).
intellectualEntity:1 - Speech by a politician
MS. Politician 23, the speech of the politician, is the Intellectual Entity that will be described in an archival description. As a result of the migration Event, the speech has two Representations: the original Locoscript file (representation:1) and the Rich Text Format file (representation:2).
Its METS file contains:
- Basic descriptive metadata, such as title and creation and modification dates, extracted from the original file as a MODS record.
- METS structMap which points to the METS files of Representations of the Intellectual Entity.
- METS structMap which points to the METS file of collection, accession or folder objects to which the Intellectual Entity belongs.
representation:1 - the original
This Representation links to intellectualEntity:1, to file:1 and the representation:2.
Its METS file contains:
- PREMIS object metadata for the Representation level.
- METS fileSec detailing the Representation's component Files.
- METS structMap detailing the structure of the Representation's component Files.
file:1 - the Locoscript file
file:1 has a relationship with representation:1. It also has a relationship with its derivative Rich Text Format file and event:1, the migration event.
Its METS file contains:
- PREMIS object metadata for the File level.
- METS fileSec providing the location of the File described.
- METS structMap.
representation:2 - the first migration
The Representation links to intellectualEntity:1, to file:2 and to representation:1.
Its METS file contains:
- PREMIS object metadata for the Representation level.
- METS fileSec detailing the Representation's component Files.
- METS structMap detailing the structure of the Representation's component Files.
file:2 - the Rich Text Format file
file:2 has a relationship with representation:2. It also has a relationship with file:1, from which it is derived and event:1, which created it.
Its METS file contains:
- PREMIS object metadata for the File level.
- METS fileSec providing the location of the File described.
- METS structMap.
event:1 - migration
event:1 has relationships with file:1 (the Locoscript file), file:2 (the Rich Text Format file), agent:1 (Ms Archivist, the agent authorising the event) and agent:2 (the migration software).
Its METS file contains:
- PREMIS event metadata.
- METS structMap.
agent:1 - Ms Archivist
agent:1, the archivist authorising the migration, will be referred to by event:1 (the migration event).
Its METS file contains:
- PREMIS agent metadata.
- METS structMap.
agent:2 - migration software
agent:2, the software performing the migration, will be referred to by event:1 (the migration event).
Its METS file contains:
- PREMIS agent metadata.
- METS structMap.
rights:1
rights:1 records that the politician who created the speech (MS. Politician 23) has granted the repository licence to undertake preservation actions in respect of all the material in the politician's archive to which the politician holds the rights. Rights:1 therefore has a relationship with representation:1 and representation:2 in this scenario.
Its METS file contains:
- PREMIS rights metadata.
- METS structMap.
