Grant-funded University Project To Combine Features of Two Archives Systems

The library at New York University (NYU) was recently awarded a $1,094,996 grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to lead a partnership of three academic libraries to combine features of two archives management systems—Archon and the Archivist's Toolkit (AT)—into one project, ArchivesSpace, which, like its predecessors, will be open source.

The other two libraries are those at the University of California, San Diego—whose staff codeveloped AT with NYU's—and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, whose staff developed Archon. Both previous systems, which are used to organize archival materials for large and small collections, are in wide use: Archon's website lists some 60 academic, government, and other institutions, while AT's lists more than 80 in the United States and abroad.

David Millman, director of digital library technology services at NYU, told LJ that the project, which is planned for development until February 2013, aims to combine the best features of the two tools. "For example, Archon is a web-based application that can be easily installed and has an interface that can be learned quickly. The AT, while not web-based, has a very rich data model and extensive reporting capabilities," he said. ArchivesSpace, he said, will be both web-based and have strong reporting and data structures.

In August 2009, the AT development team announced that the Mellon foundation had invited the libraries to submit a proposal to integrate features of the two systems "into a single hybrid application that will support description, collection management, and access of archival materials."

The high-level functional requirements [PDF] for the project were developed by Archon and AT developers and submitted for comment by the archivist community via listservs in late 2009. Among the broad requirements are a data model that will "allow for quick search, retrieval, and display of information of any kind...scalable to millions of records."

ArchivesSpace will effectively replace Archon and the AT, although the two previous systems will continue to exist. Major developments for the old systems, however, have already ceased. "While we continue to support the AT and Archon, in the sense of bug-fixes and responding to questions, we expect that our support for the AT and Archon will be phased out over time," Millman said, adding that part of the ArchivesSpace development project will be dedicated to helping libraries migrate from the old systems to the new one.

Though ArchivesSpace will be open source, institutions will be asked to join a membership organization, in which they would be able to "participate in the governance of ArchivesSpace and in the prioritization of enhancements and fixes," according to the project announcement. Millman said that the final plan for membership will be finalized over the next few months.