Hi,
Checksums may be reassuring for checking that a file still has
integrity, but they leave open the question of what to do if the
checksums do not match.
There is a growing movement of people interested in trying to ensure
that digital preservation techniques exist to overcome this problem. One
of the most interesting applications to come out of this is LOCKSS (Lots
of Copies Keeps Stuff Safe) see http://www.lockss.org/lockss/Home for
details.
Most of the material archived using LOCKSS so far is from electronic
journals, with some government papers and the odd blog. LOCKSS acts as a
store, a proxy and a repairer. If applied to DSpace, it could enable a
kind of co-operative backup network to develop with copies of content
from repositories mirrored on a number of LOCKSS boxes. If your DSpace
was unable to deliver content it could be served up from LOCKSS acting
as a proxy instead. LOCKSS boxes spend much of their time contacting
each other to take part in integrity checking polls and repairing
content where required.
There is a recent survey of the digital preservation strategies
available at the moment at
http://www.clir.org/pubs/reports/pub138/pub138.pdf. De Montfort
University is taking part in the UK LOCKSS Pilot programme:
http://www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/programmes/programme_preservation/program
me_lockss.aspx.
Perhaps repository owners could use LOCKSS in either public or private
networks to look after the digital preservation aspects of managing
their content.
Regards,
Philip Adams
Senior Assistant Librarian (Electronic Services Development)
De Montfort University Library
0116 250 6397
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