This year's Christmas e-card from National Records of Scotland features one of the more light-hearted items from our Register House Plans series – a ballroom filled with cats enjoying a Christmas party, dancing, gossiping and having fun. We think that this could be the item containing the most cats in the NRS collections! In creating … Continue reading Feline Christmassy?
Aiming for quality: selection, capture, QA and preservation of the NRS Web Archive
This week we dig into the procedures that power the NRS Web Continuity Service. We are a multi-faceted service, dealing with numerous stakeholders and subject areas. With that in mind, we need to ensure our processes are efficient and effective, to help us deliver a high quality web archive. But what do we mean by … Continue reading Aiming for quality: selection, capture, QA and preservation of the NRS Web Archive
The NRS Web Archive and the NRS Web Continuity Service
So far in this blog series we have discovered government websites’ value as public records, and explored the world of web archiving. This week we combine these two threads, to introduce the NRS Web Archive and our Web Continuity Service. The NRS Web Continuity Service went live in February 2017. Delivered as part of NRS’s … Continue reading The NRS Web Archive and the NRS Web Continuity Service
What is web archiving? History, technology, collections
Following on from last week's introductory blog on web archiving this post takes a broader look at the technical and collecting environment of web archiving, as well as a brief look at its history. The World Wide Web was pioneered in the late 1980s to help share information more efficiently and effectively. Needless to say this … Continue reading What is web archiving? History, technology, collections
Voices from our Archives – Ewart Alan Mackintosh (1893 – 1917)
Image: Wikimedia Commons Today marks the centenary of the death on 21 November 1917 of the Scottish soldier poet Lieutenant Ewart Alan Mackintosh MC in the Battle of Cambrai. His death is listed in ScotlandsPeople, among the Minor Records (a copy of the volume ‘Officers Died in the Great War 1914-1919’, HMSO, 1919). Mackintosh was … Continue reading Voices from our Archives – Ewart Alan Mackintosh (1893 – 1917)
Surfing the Web…Archive!
Welcome to our blog! Over the course of few weeks, we will take Open Book readers on a tour of NRS’s new Web Continuity Service. Web archiving and Web Continuity represent an exciting new era for archiving at NRS, providing a digital tool that directly supports our mission to, “collect, preserve and produce information about … Continue reading Surfing the Web…Archive!
An Archival Anniversary
At National Records of Scotland, we're fortunate to have many experienced and long-serving members of staff but none can equal the record set by Dr Athol Murray. Dr Murray started working at what was then the Scottish Record Office in November 1953, at the age of 23. He still works with us now, albeit one … Continue reading An Archival Anniversary
Voices From Our Archives – John Maclean (1879-1923)
November 2017 marks the 100th anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia in 1917. The revolution shocked the great powers of the day and inspired supporters around the world, including in Scotland. Their stories, like those of millions of people from Scotland’s past, can be found within the NRS archives. John Maclean (1879-1923) was a … Continue reading Voices From Our Archives – John Maclean (1879-1923)
Digital Preservation for Local Authorities
For many archivists embarking on a Digital Preservation programme, the biggest challenge is knowing where to start. NRS has been helping local authority archivists to overcome this initial hurdle with two new tools to help archivists get started with digital preservation. Last summer, two Heritage Lottery-funded Skills for the Future trainees, seconded on year-long placements, … Continue reading Digital Preservation for Local Authorities
Conservation for the Nation
"The fundamental role of the conservator-restorer is the preservation of cultural heritage for the benefit of present and future generations..."* I remember very vividly John L. Sharpe, a rare book historian and conservator, teaching a class at my conservation course in Italy and describing conservation as a triangle with History, Science and Craft at each … Continue reading Conservation for the Nation
