Notes from METS Editorial Board teleconference meeting

September 4, 2008

Present: Brian, Rick, Richard, Jenn, Patrick, Robin, Nancy

Absent: Markus, Adam, Tobias, Rob, Morgan

Agenda:

> 1\. Board vacancies (Nancy and Patrick)\
> 2. METS Profile Development (Jenn & Brian)\
> 3. METS & SKOS exploration (Nancy & Rob?)\
> 4. METS & web archiving? (Tobias)\
> 5. METS Registry issues (Rick)
>
> 6\. Round robin updates (all)
>
> 7\. Planning for face to face meeting at DLF in Providence (all)

1.  Board vacancies

Nancy and Patrick reported that a large and talented pool of people had
applied for the three open positions on the Board. The applicants that
we received were grouped into 3 different categories based on areas of
interest / expertise that would be of use to the Board including XML /
Technical / Developers, Metadata Specialists, and Commercial
Implementations. The applicants were divided into those pools and the
top two candidates were interviewed by telephone. Based on the CV's,
interviews and references, the recommendation was made to invite Terry
Catapano from Columbia University, Arwen Hutt from UCSD, and Joachim
Bauer from CCS Gmbh to the Board. The recommendations were accepted and
pending no objection from those not attending the meeting by early next
week, Nancy will invite the candidates to join the Board beginning with
the face to face meeting at the DLF Fall Forum in Providence in
November. All the other applicants will be reminded that the meetings
are open, and they are welcome and, indeed, encouraged to attend the
Board meetings when possible.

2.  METS Profile Development

Jenn summarized the report that she had sent out previously, stating
that the Profile Review Group had concluded that there were three main
objectives to focus upon:

a.  Add features to the Profile Schema requested by METS and METS
    Profile implementers

b.  Make METS Profiles easier to create

c.  Provide a specification mechanism for METS Profiles that allows them
    to be machine-actionable

The Profile Review Group concluded that each of these three priorities
is worth pursuing. A proposal made by this group covers priorities 1 and
2; priority 3 is considered as a next step that would likely need
external funding to implement.

The Profile Review Group has recommended some specific changes to be
made to the Profile Schema although in the short term the basic
structure of the METS Profile Schema should remain unchanged. A small
number of additions will be made, but at this time a complete overhaul
of the Schema is not necessary. The additions to be made should be:

1.  Import some document features from XHTML such as lists, links, and
    embedded images.

2.  The ability to attach XML snippets as examples to requirements
    specified in the Profile.

3.  Add a Document Model section. This section will be made up of simple
    text describing what the objects are that the Profile deals with,
    and could include information such as whether the profile is
    intended for an OAIS SIP, AIP, or DIP).

4.  Add a Use Cases section. This section would either link to
    descriptions already posted online by the Profile creator, or embed
    within the Profile documentation such as a diagram of a business
    process that uses a METS document conforming to the profile. It
    would primarily be used to describe different requirements for METS
    documents at different points in their project lifecycle with a
    single profile, connecting a processing action with a specific
    feature of a METS document. The Use Cases section would attach use
    cases to specific requirements via ID/IDREF, when a requirement is
    only valid for a certain use case.

The Profile Review group has also recommended that a web-based profile
generation tool be created to promote a more streamlined process for the
creation of valid METS Profiles. This tool would facilitate the creation
of a basic METS Profile in XML that can then be enhanced by hand by the
Profile creator prior to registration. Markus has developed some design
principles for the functionality of the tool, and Patrick has offered
the hosting of the form at Brown University along with the assistance of
one his XML developers to create the form using XForms.

The suggestion was made to propose a Birds of a Feather session at the
DLF Fall Forum in Providence to get feedback upon the proposed changes
to the profile schema and the Web based profile creation tool. Jenn
volunteered to draft the proposal for review by the Board, and submit it
to the DLF Program committee.

Jenn will also add more specific information to the profile revision
proposal about which XHTML methods the Profile Revision group would like
to add to the profile schema so that a developer (from the Board such as
Rick or one of the new members) could take the schema forward and revise
it per the requests. Hopefully, the re-draft of the profile schema would
be available for review then at the face to face meeting and the BOF.

3.  METS & SKOS exploration\
    Nancy reviewed the notes from the meeting at the Library of Congress
    which were mailed out to the Board on 7/23/098. Since then, Clay
    Redding has made the draft service available to a small group of
    people and is seeking feedback before opening it to a larger public.
    At the request of various Board members, Nancy will ask Clay to
    share the draft service with all Board members, and also see if it
    would be possible for Clay to join us at the Board meeting in
    November to discuss the service and its ramifications for METS.

4.  METS & web archiving

Since Tobias was not present at the meeting, this topic was tabled.

5.  METS Registry issues

Rick reported the need to get new contact names for several of the
implementations including Oxford University. Richard provided a name for
Rick to contact. CDL is another one. Brian will ask Stephen Abrams whom
we would like to have as the contact person. Robin reported that Andrea
Goethel would probably be the best person and will send the email
address to Rick. Nancy will send the email address of Stefan Funk to
Rick who might well be the best contact person for the University of
Goettingen now that Markus has left.

6\. Robin Robin updates:

Richard will be writing a standards description for METS for the
E-Framework project in the UK, and will also check the registry
information for the Digital Curation Centre which might need updating.

Active Task List known updates:

-   Nancy has a draft of the video storyboard to share with the small
    group in the next several weeks.

-   Examples of VRA Core -- where should they go? Morgan is still
    working on the Live METS examples page, so it's unclear where to put
    them as the only other examples. The web re-design group may need to
    meet to keep this issue accomplish this task. In the meantime,
    Patrick will send the Brown examples for VRA & METS to Trish Rose at
    VRA and will keep them for us until we have a place to post them on
    the METS website.

-   Nancy will set up a meeting with Clay Redding at LC regarding the
    textMD changes that have been proposed, if possible along with
    Robin, Rick, Nancy and anyone else who is interested.

-   Rick will follow up with Glenn Gardner to see is the Chinese
    translation of the METS schema has been added to the METS website
    yet.

-   No one had any objection to adding the Spanish translation of the
    METS Overview and Tutorial to the METS web page and asking for
    feedback from Spanish speakers to be sent to the METS Board and to
    Roberto et Brun who has done the translation.

-   DDI exemplar document. Patrick suggested that it might be a good
    idea to get some DDI people together with METS around DLF to talk
    about the best way to proceed with creating an exemplar METS
    document with DDI. Nancy will purse this with Patrick offline.
    Suggestions for attendees included Steve Morris from NCSU, Micah
    Altman from Harvard, and Arwen Hutt from UCSD.

-   Rick will take on the task of harmonizing the annotations in the
    schema against the METS Primer, and changing the annotations to
    match the text in the Primer. Changes would be made to a separate
    copy of the schema. The goal would be to try to get the list of
    these changes made for the November Board meeting.

-   Robin has a goal of preparing for review at the November Board
    meeting the checklist of places where the text needs to be changed
    when the schema changes.

-   Robin will send the AES draft schemas to Tobias for his review as he
    was looking for advice on which to use. Example documents can be
    found on the Indiana Library web site as well.

-   Jenn will be re-drafting a METS profile based on a revised METS
    PREMIS Best Practice document and will re-submit to the Board for
    review.

-   Nancy reported that she understands Tim Cole is in the process of
    creating an example of how OAI-ORE could be used with a METS
    document. She will contact Tim to see if he could share what he is
    drafting and/or join the Board for a discussion of the topic at an
    upcoming Board meeting.

6.  Planning for METS Board Meeting on Monday, November 10^th^ all day,
    presumably starting with breakfast at about 8:30 am, meeting
    starting at 9 am.

-   Will all day meeting rather than split b/w two days

-   Plan to have a period at the beginning of the meeting for fuller
    introductions of each Board member and an orientation to Board
    policies, procedures, and sources of information for the new Board
    members.

-   Brian will send out a notice to the METS list about the deadline for
    any new change requests to be considered at the next meeting.

-   Nancy will post a draft agenda and send a notice out to the METS
    list and the DLF-ANNOUNCE about the date & location for the meeting
    in the very near future so people can include attendance in their
    plans if desired.

-   Richard Gartner will be able to join us for part of the time via
    telephone, so arrangements need to be made for a speaker phone or
    polycom in the room.