[Nhcoll-l] Digital objects vs. physical objects in collection management databases and how to manage them

[Liath Appleton]

I love this question! We've discussed this quite a bit around here. Since
most of our images are attached to individual specimens or as a group photo
of the entire lot, we do not make digital images a preparation on
their own. The reason being that if you pull a photo for publication, you
will want to know which individual is represented in the photo. If we pull
an individual specimen out of a lot to be photographed separately, we make
that specimen a separate prep and attach the image to it. We did toy around
with making some of our really nice, high res, images their own
preparations for tracking purposes. For example, if someone wanted to use
an image in a publication, we could "loan" the preparation, but it ended up
creating problems and ultimately it made more sense to just have a separate
prep for that particular specimen with its images attached. However, it is
possible in our database to have a digital-only preparation. If an imaged
specimen were to become lost or destroyed, the images associated with it
would remain as the preparation. So in a sense, that would be a
digital-only preparation. This is the case for a few of our specimens that
we haven't been able to find in our collections, but were photographed many
years ago. Hopefully, those specimens will eventually be found and reunited
with their images. In this case we have a preparation type "digital" to
make it clear for those doing a search that there is no physical specimen
to borrow. As to your question concerning counts, I'm not sure I have a
good answer for that one. I only include actual specimens when reporting
counts, however, in the future there could be a need for digital count. If
for instance there were a fire, and much of the physical collection were
destroyed, then the digital collection would become more important. This is
definitely something to think about. In this case, I would include my
preparations listed as digital-only in my count. The short answer is that
although I personally think of images as attachments, I do think it is
important to have a system in place for digital-only preparations in the
future. We don't know where technology will go next, and there may be
reasons to have separate preparations that we haven't currently
considered.---Liath

Liath Appleton
Collections Manager
Non-Vertebrate Paleontology Lab
University of Texas at Austin
Bldg PRC122 - campus mail code R8500
10100 Burnet Road
Austin, TX 78758

SPNHC Connection Editor (newsletter at spnhc.org)
SPNHC Web Manager (webmaster at spnhc.org)
www.spnhc.org


On Mon, Aug 24, 2020 at 3:16 PM Bentley, Andrew Charles <abentley at ku.edu>
wrote:

> Hi all
>
>
>
> I am trying to resolve a philosophical conundrum brought on by the
> ever-increasing mountain of digital data being produces from and associated
> with natural history collections.  My question is whether digital
> representations of an object (images, CT scans, etc.) should be treated as
> preparations of an object in a collections database similar to other
> physical preparations or treated differently?  For instance, in a fish
> collection like mine, you have a lot that has a certain number of
> specimens.  Some of those may be subsequently cleared and stained or have
> skeletons prepared.  These are traditionally handled as preparations of the
> original lot with the same catalog number (although in some collections
> they are treated as separate catalog numbers).  Now, however, you have
> digital representations of those physical objects such as images, CT scans,
> etc.  Should these also be treated as preparations or be treated
> differently - as digital products or linked as attachments to the physical
> objects?  To me, they are not physical objects but digital representations
> of the original object.  As such, they are somewhat different to a
> preparation.  This has implications when totaling traditional counts of
> objects in a collection as well as when publishing data from a collection
> to the aggregator community.  In some instances, this may be governed by
> the data model and business rules of the CMS you are using or by your
> personal preference.
>
>
>
> I would be interested in hearing your views on this and how you handle
> this in your collection as I am not sure there is any community consensus
> as to which way to handle these.  I have heard of both methods being used
> in various collections.
>
>
>
> Thanks in advance
>
>
>
> Andy
>
>
>
>      A  :                A  :               A  :
>
>  }<(((_°>.,.,.,.}<(((_°>.,.,.,.}<)))_°>
>
>      V                   V                  V
>
> Andy Bentley
>
> Ichthyology Collection Manager
>
> University of Kansas
>
> Biodiversity Institute
>
> Dyche Hall
>
> 1345 Jayhawk Boulevard
>
> Lawrence, KS, 66045-7561
>
> USA
>
>
>
> Tel: (785) 864-3863
>
> Fax: (785) 864-5335
>
> Email: abentley at ku.edu
>
> http://ichthyology.biodiversity.ku.edu
>
>
>
>      A  :                A  :                A  :
>
>  }<(((_°>.,.,.,.}<(((_°>.,.,.,.}<)))_°>
>
>      V                   V                   V
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Nhcoll-l mailing list
> Nhcoll-l at mailman.yale.edu
> https://mailman.yale.edu/mailman/listinfo/nhcoll-l
>
> _______________________________________________
> NHCOLL-L is brought to you by the Society for the Preservation of
> Natural History Collections (SPNHC), an international society whose
> mission is to improve the preservation, conservation and management of
> natural history collections to ensure their continuing value to
> society. See http://www.spnhc.org for membership information.
> Advertising on NH-COLL-L is inappropriate.
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.yale.edu/pipermail/nhcoll-l/attachments/20200825/ffe02df2/attachment.html>