3.3 Procedural Accountability and Preservation Policy Framework

3.3 Procedural Accountability and Preservation Policy Framework #

3.3.1 - The repository shall have defined its Designated Community and associated knowledge base(s) and shall have these definitions appropriately accessible. #

Response #

Please refer to SP’s Designated Community Definition for a description of who the repository identifies as its Designated Community. This information is freely available online.

Responsibility #

  • OCUL Director
  • Digital Preservation Librarian

Documents #

  1. Designated Community Definition

3.3.2 - The repository shall have Preservation Policies in place to ensure its Preservation Strategic Plan will be met. #

Response #

SP’s Preservation Implementation Plan provides specific information on the steps SP uses to meet the requirements of its Preservation Strategic Plan.

Content Note - Journals #

The Preservation Action Plan - Journals provides implementation information specific to the Journals content type.

Responsibility #

  • SP Director
  • Digital Preservation Librarian

Documents #

  1. Scholars Portal Preservation Strategic Plan
  2. Preservation Implementation Plan
  3. Preservation Action Plan - Journals

3.3.2.1 - The repository shall have mechanisms for review, update, and ongoing development of its Preservation Policies as the repository grows and as technology and community practice evolve. #

Response #

Please refer to Scholars Portal’s Review Cycle for Documentation Policy. The repository commits to reviewing its policies on a regular basis, or whenever there are major changes to its operating environment such as hardware refreshment, large-scale data migration, disaster recovery, or significant staffing level changes.

Responsibility #

  • OCUL Executive Director
  • Digital Preservation Librarian

Documents #

  1. Review Cycle for Documentation Policy

3.3.3 - The repository shall have a documented history of the changes to its operations, procedures, software, and hardware. #

Response #

SP documents major changes to its organizational and technical infrastructure in its annual reports to OCUL Directors. These reports record the history of changes in ongoing and planned projects, contractual obligations, organizational structure, staffing levels, operating procedures, hardware, and software. SP preserves copies of these reports. In addition, SP preserves copies of minutes of meetings and budgets in order to record the history of key decisions made by staff. SP’s Organizational Chart identifies appropriate staff who can explain repository practices and workflows.

SP retains historical versions of software in its code versioning system so that changes to critical processes can always be reversed. Please see 5.1.1.6.1 for additional details.

Risks #

While SP documents the history of major changes to its organizational and technical infrastructure, there is a risk that minor changes, which may turn out to be significant at a later time, are not recorded in an easily accessible or understandable format or not recorded at all.

There is a risk that personnel who know the repository intimately will leave the organization at some point. To minimize this risk, SP keeps a record of changes (see Explanation above) and uses well known technical components. Please see the Risk Analysis and Management Strategies document for more information about SP’s strategies for reducing the impact of personnel departures.

Responsibility #

  • SP Director
  • Digital Preservation Librarian

Documents #

  1. SP Annual Reports (available on request)
  2. Minutes of Meetings (available on request)
  3. SP Organizational Charts
  4. Risk Analysis and Management Strategies

3.3.4 - The repository shall commit to transparency and accountability in all actions supporting the operation and management of the repository that affect the preservation of digital content over time. #

Response #

SP is committed to transparency and accountability in all areas of its operations and actively discloses a large amount of information about its activities. Documentation about SP’s governance, staffing, repository administration, technical procedures, and history is available to the Designated Community and the general public on SPOT-DOCS, the repository’s collaborative documentation portal. Exceptions include certain contracts, financial documents, and other privileged information, which are available on request. Contact information for staff is available on SP’s website.

SP reports to OCUL Directors on a semi-annual basis and regularly convenes various topical sub-committees and working groups made up of representatives from the Designated Community. Please see OCUL’s Committees & Groups directory and Reports & Digests for more information. Reports and meeting minutes produced by these committees are available to authorized community members on SPOT-DOCS.

SP successfully completed the Trusted Digital Repositories Audit & Certification process by the Center for Research Libraries (CRL) in 2013. CRL published the results of the audit as Report on Scholars Portal Audit.

Content Note - Journals #

To provide users with information about the long-term preservation of individual journal articles, SP has implemented a ‘Preservation Status’ view for each journal article. This provides information that demonstrates the effectiveness of the repository’s preservation practices.

Responsibility #

  • SP Director
  • OCUL Directors
  • Digital Preservation Librarian

Documents #

  1. OCUL Committees & Groups
  2. SPOT-DOCS
  3. OCUL Reports & Digests

3.3.5 - The repository shall define, collect, track, and appropriately provide its information integrity measurements. #

Response #

SP uses a number of techniques and tools to safeguard the integrity of information. These procedures are defined and documented in the Quality Control Specifications and Fixity Check Procedures. Records of these actions are stored in system log files and the preservation metadata for each object. Once an object has been successfully ingested into the repository, all integrity checking is tracked using PREMIS Event entities and made visible to users in a ‘TDR Status’ view for each journal article.

Risks #

SP is in the process of generating digest values for content that was ingested before the repository adopted its fixity procedures. Until this process is complete, some files do not have digest values and are not candidates for regular fixity testing.

SP does not generate digest values for its preservation metadata files. In other words, there is no fixity check for the fixity values. It should be noted, however, that these files are subject to the MarkLogic database’s internal consistency checking.

Monitoring Commitments #

SP operates a rolling test of digest values. Fixity tests that produce a mismatch are automatically reported to staff through the repository’s issue tracking system. See 5.1.1.3.1 for more information. SP staff monitor developments in mechanisms to measure the integrity of digital information and will upgrade the repository’s procedures if necessary.

Responsibility #

  • Digital Preservation Librarian

Documents #

  1. Quality Control Specifications
  2. Fixity Check Procedures

3.3.6 - The repository shall commit to a regular schedule of self-assessment and external certification. #

Response #

SP is committed to the regular review and re-certification of its preservation activities as part of its goal of retaining Trusted Digital Repository status.

In addition, SP carries out constant self-assessment of its policies and procedures, as described in its Review Cycle for Documentation Policy. SP also reports to OCUL Directors on a semi-annual basis and receives feedback on its performance.

Responsibility #

  • SP Director
  • OCUL Executive Director
  • Digital Preservation Librarian

Documents #

  1. Review Cycle for Documentation Policy