KeepIt: Kultur, eCrystals, EdShare (and NECTAR) - Preserve It!

KeepIt! A JISC project to enable a diverse range of digital content presented by institutional repositories - research papers, science data, arts, teaching materials and theses - to be managed effectively today, tomorrow and beyond.

Reports: Final report to JISC (original project proposal)
Papers and presentations in: Repository, Slideshare
Blog: Diary of a Repository Preservation Project
Wiki: Training resources and bibliography

Contact: Steve Hitchcock, Project Manager
Twitter: @jisckeepit

KeepIt (April 2009 - September 2010) helped to close the gap between the digital preservation community and people responsible for live repositories. The project focussed on two key areas: KeepIt course for digital preservation of repositories, and the development and implementation of preservation tools for repositories.

Digital preservation is essentially planning and implementing data management requirements for today, tomorrow and the longer term. Repositories are entrusted by their institutions to manage their digital outputs, so data management is clearly a core activity, but extending that to longer term requirements has not happened yet on a wide scale. The types of outputs being produced across institutions that might be managed in an institutional repository (IR) include research papers, science data, arts, teaching materials and theses. Each presents a different challenge to digital preservation practices if these materials are to be effectively managed for longer-term access and use.

There are various preservation tools and services but little awareness or uptake by repositories, perhaps because these are complex and potentially costly. These activities have typically been presented to repositories as additional tasks rather than as integral to their current activities. The tools and the documentation have not usually been designed for these repositories. To change this KeepIt worked with a series of distinctive exemplar repositories to demonstrate the effective management of data over time. Through the KeepIt course the managers and representatives of each repository worked with specialists on the development of preservation strategy, policy and services for repositories, in turn becoming peer evangelists on digital preservation for comparable repositories.

This whole-team approach is essential to foster the emergence of repository preservation culture and services.

Repository partners - exemplars
UAL Research Online
UAL Research Online, institutional repository for University of the Arts London, focussed on the creative and applied arts.

ecrystals
Archive containing Crystal Structures generated by the Southampton Chemical Crystallography Group and the EPSRC UK National Crystallography Service.

edshare
A resource for collaboration and sharing of materials used in teaching and learning.

nectar
NECTAR, the Northampton Electronic Collection of Theses and Research, is the University of Northampton's open access institutional repository.

Funded by
edshare