Call for development collaborators! Canadian Archival Accession Standard (CAAIS) implementation

[Dan Gillean]

Greetings, all! 

The following message was recently posted on the Canadian ARCAN-L archival mailing list. However, it would be possible to coordinate collaborative sponsorship even if you are not Canadian!

The new Canadian Archival Accession Information Standard (CAAIS) is the first national accession standard. It was modeled after the ICA's existing descriptive standards and its implementation would be a vast improvement of AtoM's accession module, for all users - not just Canadians! You can peruse the standard here: 

• http://archivescanada.ca/CWG_AccessionStandard  
  

Message follows below. 

Greetings Colleagues,

The completion of the Canadian Archival Accession Information Standard (CAAIS) v.1.0 presents Canadian archivists with an opportunity. We can now begin to consider how we wish to implement the standard into our archival and record keeping digital systems. The standard came together as a collaborative effort and we would like to maintain this approach. Many institutions are using AtoM to manage their archival information. As an open source application it is a good candidate for collaborative implementation of the CAAIS. The implementation would necessarily involve Artefactual Systems, the original designer of the application. The most important component of this potential collaborative effort is cost. I would like to initiate the potential implementation of the CAAIS as an accession module in the AtoM software. To do this I would like an expression of interest from any institution willing to offer funding to contribute to design and implementation. Depending on how many institutions are willing to participate, we could request a new estimate dividing up the work into a number of distinct parts that each institution could sponsor separately. As a separate module, divided into components, this might be a more palatable approach for financial procurement offices with control of budgets for this type of work.

Version 1.0 of the CAAIS is available on the Canadian Council of Archives website: http://archivescanada.ca/CWG_AccessionStandard

I look forward to receiving expressions of interest from archival institutions.
Respectfully,

Raymond Frogner
Head of Archives,  National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation / Directeur des archives, Centre national pour la vérité et la réconciliation

Office/Bureau 303
Chancellor’s Hall, 177 Dysart Road
University of Manitoba
Winnipeg, MB R3T 2N2
Ph: 204.474.6550  

Dan Gillean, MAS, MLIS
AtoM Program Manager
Artefactual Systems, Inc.
604-527-2056

@accesstomemory