The team has already accomplished a lot in October, since the last project update. Here is a recap of our current status and upcoming activities:
Current project status:
- The project team has finalized recruitment for previously posted project positions and is now engaging in the final stages of recruitment of a digital preservation consultant, who will help engage our stakeholders, gather and tabulate use cases, and create functional requirements for the new digital preservation repository solution. We aim to onboard the digital preservation consultant by mid-November. The project architect will join the team this Monday, October 24.
- Members of the project team are engaging with colleagues from peer institutions in order to gather feedback on similar projects, turn up opportunities for collaboration, and learn from their experience with adoption of existing digital preservation solutions from commercial vendors and open-source collaboratives.
- Earlier this week we released the public website for the project, which now hosts important resources, planning documents, and status updates. The website can be found at the following link: https://sites.harvard.edu/drs-futures/
Next up:
- Finalize member recruitment for the project Executive Committee and hold the first committee meeting in December 2022
- Finalize recruitment of digital preservation consultant and finalize contract
- General activities in Discovery phase: Fall 2022 – Summer 2023
- Engagement with DRS stakeholders across the University to develop comprehensive understanding of diverse needs, goals, and aspirations regarding long-term stewardship of the University’s digital collections
- Development of functional and business requirements based on stakeholder consultations and use cases
- Engagement with peer institutions and digital systems vendors to explore the current digital repository landscape
Future updates:
We will send periodic updates on the project’s progress to HL Comms. The project Executive Committee, Stewardship Standing Committee, and Born-Digital Stewardship Advisory Group, representing the concerns of the whole HL community, will also receive monthly updates.
Please don’t hesitate to reach out to us with any questions at: drs-futures-feedback@hu.onmicrosoft.com.