Contextual Wrappers I & II

Contextual Wrappers mark I was a JISC funded project involving the Fitzxilliam Museum, K-int and Collections Trust. The project investigated various options for creating and delivering collection level descriptions to provide an interpretive context to metadata for groups of object records, thus releasing further value from aggregated object and collection records. The research questions addressed included:

 

  • How appropriate is a flat structure model of aggregation in which object records are presented without context?
  • What is the value of introducing CLDs as an intermediary stage in the search/browse process?
  • Should certain metadata attributes for objects and collections be inherited from a record higher in the collection hierarchy?
  • Can improvements be made within Culture Grid to assist the linkage between groups of related records?
The project was succesfully completed in July 2011 and a follow-up project - Contextual Wrappers II - was subsequently funded to implement some of the suggested enhancements to Culture Grid.  This project is being conducted with the support of The University Museums Group; University Museums in Scotland and the Theatre, Egyptology and Portraits Subject Specialist Networks.  It is due to complete in July 2012.
More information about Wrappers II on the project blog.

 

 

The project will investigate ways of creating and delivering collection level descriptions to
provide an interpretive context to metadata for groups of object records, and provide technical
innovation to release further value from aggregated object and collection records. It will make
use of a significant set of existing and new object and collection level metadata supplied for
aggregation within the Culture Grid, maintained by the Collections Trust. The ways in which
collections from an individual institution can be defined will be explored, including the “is part
of” relationship between records and the most effective ways of presenting this to the end user.
The research questions addressed will include: How appropriate is a flat structure model of
aggregation in which object records are presented without context other than the search
criteria? What is the value of introducing collection level descriptions as an intermediary stage
in the search/browse process? Should certain metadata attributes for objects and collections
be inherited from a record higher in the collection hierarchy? Can improvements be made at
both the institutional data supply level and the aggregation level to assist the linkage between
groups of related records?