CDASH Document Items

This page discusses the notion of CDASH Document Items as catalog records attached to digitized documents within the digital collection management environment provided by Omeka-S.

Topic Index

CDASH Document Items: Metadata Properties

The table below outlines each of the properties for the CDASH Document Item and provides guidelines for entering their contents. For more information on the concept of a CDASH Document Item, and on how to handle Omeka Items, see CDASH Schema.

Required Properties

Name	Description
Resource Template Pull-Down	All CDASH Places use the CDASH Document template.
Class Pull-Down	All Place Items use Choose Bibliographic Ontology: Document.
Document Type Pick from list.	Each document Item is assigned a type -- e.g. Interior Image. These types are assigned during the bulk import process or chosen from the list, CDASH Document Types.
Number of Pages Integer	This value is useful for assessing the relevance of search results.
Place Item Omeka Item Resource*	Use the Omeka Resource button and the associated item picker tools to choose the Place Item that will be the parent of the current Document Item.
Rights text	If a document has a known copyright status enter it. Defaults to: Rights status not evaluated.

* Keep in mind that the value of Cdash: PlaceItem is an "Omeka Resource" which means that it is a pointer to a place item. This is not to be confused with the usage of the term of the same name as the property that serves as the title for a Place Item -- which takes a simple text value. The reason this property is re-used in this way is to simplify the search of items related to a place whether they should be places or documents.

Required Derived Document Properties

Several document properties are derived by assembling values from the property of the document's parent place. This work is accomplished by the GeoSync function. If you are creating document items by hand, you should keep in mind that these derived properties must be initialized (even with dummy values) or the GeoSync function will not be able to assign new values to them.

Name	Description
Document Title Text	CDASH Document Titles that appear on Document Show Pages are now autmatically generated by concatenating the name of the document's parent Place Item and the document's Document Type property. If you have a more specific title for a document, use Alternate Title(see below)
Place Marker Use Mapping Tab	Use the Mapping Tab to set the position of the marker See screen-Shot In the case of Document Items, the exact location of the Place Marker is not important, since it will synced with the PDIX function. But each document needs to have an initial Place Marker.
Neighborhood Pick From List	Each cdash document item is assigned to a CDD Neighborhood. To enter a neighborhood manually, use the button provided to pick from the list of CHC neighborhoods. The automatic item uploader adds a second value for Neighborhood. Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA to make CDASH records compliant with cataloging standards.
Research District Pick from List	Each cdash document item is assigned to a CHC Research District. Pick from the list of CHC neighborhoods.
Street Sort Key Text	This string is used for sorting items according to their street address. This key consists of the street name (with "_" for spaces), concatenated with an 8-digit string consisting of the house number left-padded with zeros. Example: Massachusetts_Ave_00000077
CDASH Folder Use Item-Set Tab	CDASH Folders are implemented as Omeka Item-Sets. To choose an folder, use the Item Sets tab at the top of the edit page. Every Document Item should be associated with one and only one folder.

Optional Values for Document Items

Name
Alternate Title Text	If the document has a title other than the CDASH default title, you can enter it here.
Author, Photographer, Artist. Text	If the credit for the content of the document is known, enter it here. If the creator is well known, use the buttons provided to choose a name from the Library of Congress Name Authority or the Getty List of Artist Names. Otherwise, just enter the name.
Creation Date Date	If the creation or issue date for the document is known, use the date picker widgets to enter a date. A plain four-digit year is sufficient.
Description Text	A description of the document which might appear as a caption.
Subject/s Text	One or more keywords or phrases that help to categorize documents. These wil be most useful if they are consistently applied. Use the buttons provided to search through the Library of Congress Subject Headings or the Getty Art and Architecture Thesaurus. or pick from a list of list of frequently used CDASH Document Subjects. Even though all of the CDASH documents are concerned with Architecture and Buildings, these subjects are be included in the event that more generalized discovery systems harvest CDASH metadata to refer to items.

Legacy Document Properties

The batch accession process creates a couple of properties that turn out not to be updated or used by Omeka. It happens that they can be used to trace the lineage of document items in the event of accidents.

Name	Description
CDASH Document Identifier Text	This value is created during the batch accession process. It is very useful for tracing tht lineage of documemt items if they should ever become dis-associated form their links to Folders or Place Item. Because the Batch itentifier is included in the ID, it is very handy for finding the origibal media assocuiated with a document.
CDASH Folder Text	This folder reference was used during the bulk import process to associate each document with a single folder (item Set). After the Institutional accession of items the link between an item with its "CDASH Folders" (really, Omeka Item-Sets) is managed through the Item Sets tab on the item edit page. Although the values for an item's CDASH Folder property are not updated, they may be useful for tracing the lineage of an item in case something happens to the omeka item-set or its links.

Name

Description

CDASH Document Identifier
Text

This value is created during the batch accession process. It is very useful for tracing tht lineage of documemt items if they should ever become dis-associated form their links to Folders or Place Item. Because the Batch itentifier is included in the ID, it is very handy for finding the origibal media assocuiated with a document.

CDASH Folder
Text

This folder reference was used during the bulk import process to associate each document with a single folder (item Set). After the Institutional accession of items the link between an item with its "CDASH Folders" (really, Omeka Item-Sets) is managed through the Item Sets tab on the item edit page. Although the values for an item's CDASH Folder property are not updated, they may be useful for tracing the lineage of an item in case something happens to the omeka item-set or its links.

Controlled Vocabularies for Document Items

The following lists are used as pick-lists to normalize the assignment of key-words to CDASH Document Items. These lists are implemented and managed with the Omeka-S Custom Vocab module.

CDASH Document Types and Default Metadata Properties

The CDASH Document collection is initialized through a semi-automated rough sort process that resulted in the assignment of scanned images to one of thirteen pre-defined item types. These are document types that were chosen to comprise a nearly-complete categorization of the types of documents contained in the Building Files collection.

Classification of document types is accomplished quickly by looking at one-inch thumbnails of scanned pages, selecting pages that belong together, then dragging their icons into a bin according to the type of document represented.

Assignment of document types determines the assignment of several default item properties like titles, subjects that set up various search and filter and navigation possibilities.

The table below exposes the configuration of document types and corresponding default properties that are set in the CDASH Rough Sort toolkit [link forthcoming].

Automatic Title Assignment for Document Items

DUring the bulk-upload process, the title for each document is constructed by concatenating the Place Name associated with the document, a hyphen, and the Document Type. For example:

77 Massachusetts Avenue - Photo Contact Sheet

CDASH Document Types

Code	Type
AI	Architectural Inventory Form
RF	Research Form
RN	Research Notes
HS	Historic American Buildings Survey
SM	Supplemental Material
DM	Demolition Memo
AM	Published Material
VP	Plan View
VE	Exterior View
VI	Interior View
VD	Detail View
CS	Contact Sheet
EP	Ephemera

CDASH Recommended Subjects

Assigning subject keywords to document items causes them to be more amenable to search, filtering and discovery.

To save time and to promote consistency, CDASH metadata editors are offered a list of CDASH Subjects that they can pick from. The list is easily editable by a user with administrative permission.

Users will always be able to choose from other lists or just type free-text.

These terms are drawn from popular authoritative conventions wherever possible.

Before we start the data enrichment phase of CDASH this list should be substantially ammended.

CDASH Document Subjects

Architecture
Buildings
Structures
Architectural Documents
Published Material
Photographs
Application Forms
National Register of Historic Places
Landmark Buildings
Survey Form
Research
Descriptive Notes
Historical Commission
Correspondence
Plans
Interior Views
Exterior Views
Site Plans