Your name:

Janine Delaney

Your organisation (if applicable):

ARANZ

Your role in organisation (if applicable):

Vice President

Contact email address:

janine@micrographics.co.nz

Contact phone number:

04 XXXXXXXXXX

I am making this submission:

as an individual

on behalf of my organisation

General Feedback: Please Evaluate the Standard against its Goals

agree

disagree

1

2

3

4

5

The standard will support and improve government recordkeeping in New Zealand.

The standard clearly specifies minimum requirements for the creation and maintenance of metadata for electronic records under the Public Records Act 2005.

The standard will enable organisations to incorporate metadata into electronic systems managing and creating records.

Which document are you submitting comments for with this feedback form?

Select one per form

Recordkeeping Metadata Standard

Technical Specifications

General

We support the collaborative approach that Archives NZ has taken in adopting the NAA standard, and hope this will move Australasia closer to a common metadata set.

General

An entity model for the technical specification would be helpful, especially with Relationship being introduced as entity rather than a reciprocal link.

TS 3.1

8

PREMIS also uses a multi-entity model. A mapping between the two schemas would be helpful.

TS 4.5

14

“Other metadata elements – particularly those that describe entities other than records – may already exist in organisation systems for other purposes”

Good point, but an example would be helpful here.

Include more analysis about how the two standards integrate and overlap

TS 1.2

TS 2

16

Element and Sub-element descriptions.

Where elements contain sub-elements it should be clearer that data is captured only at the sub-element level and not at the element level.

The PREMIS data dictionary has a field “Data Constraint” and uses the term “container” to show that an element doesn’t directly hold data.

RS

21-92

Full Description of Metadata Elements:

Could you please include an example for the type of data for each element or sub-element.

This is often key to understanding what the definition/purpose/comments fields are trying to convey.

See Examples field in the PREMIS Data Dictionary

TS Ref. 4.2

29

“Provenance relationships” it would be helpful to explain this.

NB. The terms contextual relationship is used elsewhere in the Specification (C2.5 P.99)

TS Ref 6

31

The concept of the relationship as an entity in its own right is relatively new (are there any actual implementations?) Even with some understanding of the Series System this element is hard to follow.

Some confusion is due to the overuse of the term relationship i.e. in a nutshell you are talking about a relationship between a relationship entity and two related entities !!

A clearer example would help this (Chris Hurley’s recent series of articles on relationships have some excellent diagrams and illustrations). As it is the examples Agent-Agent, Agent-Record etc. are ambiguous as the essence of this element and its sub-elements are contained in the hyphen.

It might help understanding if Element 26 Relation came before this one and if there were unambiguous cross references between them . e.g. ‘either use Element 6 or use Element 26’.

Include Chris Hurley’s diagrams to illustrate this

An entity relationship model that shows how the 5 entities work together would also be helpful (see comment above)

TS Ref 7.1

35

In the Definition field the phrase “Relationship (event)” needs explaining.

The comments in element 7 (p.34) try to explain this but are too opaque. e.g. “This element is used to store the previous values of elements or sub-elements when a relationship between two entities (i.e. an event) results in changes to one or more current values…” ??! Does this refer as it seems to suggest to previous values of all elements (i.e is it the history log for all 28 elements?) or does it only refer to changes to the relationship entity elements (7.1 & 7.2)

I think the Technical Specs would benefit from a much-expanded section on relationships and the relationship entity with practical examples of what they encompass and how they might be implemented. ( in plain English with plenty of diagrams please!)

TS Ref 10

41

A cross-reference from element 10 to element 12 (Rights) would be helpful to clarify that this element (Security) does not include internal security settings and restrictions on records within for example EDRMS.

TS 10.1 & 10.2

41-42

Both sub-elements refer the user to schema D5. What is the difference between these elements??

(Example would help – as above)

TS 16.1

56

“NGGLS” should this be NZGLS ?

TS 16.1

56

What are the abbreviation (codes) that the comments refer to? Appendix C6 does not include these.

TS 16.2

56

Please clarify how Temporal Coverage differs from the start/end date sub-elements (4.1 & 4.2)

TS 18.1

62

Why is there an asterisk on “reference number* in the Definition field? There is no apparent footnote.

TS 19

68

The wording in the Conditions of Use field is rather singular.

Simplify to “Must be used if the record is digital”

TS 26

83

Recommend you have a 5^th sub element “Relationship definition” in line with the ASA manual “Describing Archives in Context: A Guide to Australasian Practice” and Archives NZ’s GAIMS implementation (i.e see Relationship notes in Archway).

This allows users to explain relationships which may not be well represented by broad concepts e.g. control and succession.

TS 26.1

84

Is it a given that all entities being referenced have a unique system identifier or that what is referenced is even an entity?

Ie. Where does Relations allow for the notion of “associations” where the thing being cited in a relationship is not a registered entity within the recordkeeping/descriptive system.?

TS 26.3

86

Some relationships are defined by single date rather than a range.(e.g. sucession, destruction).

It would be worth mentioning that the start and end dates can be the same, or allow for a single date/time in relationships

TS 27

88

As for the Relations/Related Entity elements it would be helpful if there was an umbiguious cross-reference from Event History and Related Entity to explain they are two alternative ways to structure the same information.

TS 27

89

Last paragraph in the Comments refers to the “metadata prescribed as mandatory in Archives NZ Digitisation Standard”

Could you please reference this more precisely (i.e. which section/ page of the Digitisation Standard?)

Appendices

The inclusion of specific schemas is an excellent addition to the element set . It makes the Technical Specification more useable and should promote interoperability across Government.

TS C2.1

97

In electronic records there may be smaller units than item that are managed within the system

TS C2.2

97

The highest agent category in table C2.2 is Organisation. This has several implications::

1. Organisation means something different in Archives NZ’s entity model (equivalent to whole of govt)

2. The terms organisation and agency tend to be used synonymously and interchangeably. We note that there is no agent type “Agency” in the schema although this is a key entity in many implementations of the series system.

3. The Category Type Schema illustrates but doesn’t resolve the principle of scalability in entities e.g. how you identify an entity depends on what level you are starting from. The inbuilt assumption for this schema is that the top level is that of government department / territorial or regional authority. This is not going to accommodate more collaborative cross-agency or sectoral groupings.

TS C2.2

97

The Definition for Organisation is self-referencing i.e. “A distinct and recognisable body, such as an organisation…”

C4

102

This Schema and C14 should be the same (they are both naming relationships).

C4

102

The format of this table makes it difficult to understand.

C5

104

As noted above (6 p.31) the overlap between the terms ‘relationship” and “entity” open the definitions to misunderstanding .

C6

105

The Jurisdiction Scheme refers users to Archway for historical names of Territorial and Regional Authorities. However, the jurisdiction entity in Archway is completely different to this concept of Jurisdiction. (this is an element). Territorial and Regional Authorities are instead registered as agencies in Archway

Archives NZ in conjunction with the Archives authorities of Australia may need to clarify and standardise meaning if the same term is being used to describe different things.

C6

105

In element 16.1 this is referred to as the “NZGLS Jurisdiction Scheme” . If this is correct can the title or pre-amble of the Appendix be updated to reflect this.

C6

105

How is the Jurisdiction Schema (and other schemas) going to be managed across time? I.e. the Concept of Otago Regional Council means something specific in 2008 but could be quite different in 2040

The schema needs to be managed as a record or better still, each authority as a separate entity (if you added the Archway agency code, the relationship type and relationship dates you would fix it to a specific context).

C14

116

The statement “This schema provides a definition for every possible relationship type for each entity” is incorrect. There are many relationship types that are not included.

C14

116

This is a key schema for the Metadata Element Set and one that should be considered widely before adoption. E.g. How will it be managed? Can it be extended, who authorises this?

Can Archives NZ explain the rationale for adopting the Queensland (draft) schema? Is this being proposed as the standard for all of the State, Territorial & National Archives Authorities of Australia & NZ?

C15

123

As above

D6

Could you please reference the =section of SIGS this appears in.

“Level” is listed – is this a typo?

The list of levels appear to be different in the manual could you please confirm.

D8

Why has the Getty Thesaurus been prescribed as the schema for place and geographic area? (is this widely used by NZ government agencies?)

It would be preferable to use an NZ source of authoritative place names