Re: [ARSCLIST] Network storage best practices

["Casey, Michael T" <micasey@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Kevin,

We are exploring similar issues at the Archives of Traditional Music as
part of the Sound Directions project. A few resources I have recently
found helpful:

1. IASA TC-04, which you may know about, contains high-level digital
mass storage principles plus specfic information on various storage
options.

2. The PrestoSpace project website has tutorials on storage and on media
migration at http://prestospace-sam.ssl.co.uk/index.html

3. Two digital library-oriented articles that discuss data integrity
issues, modeling threats, etc. The first comes out of the LOCKSS
initiative which may not be appropriate for storing audio, but the basic
ideas are important.

Requirements for Digital Preservation Systems
A Bottom-Up Approach 
http://www.dlib.org/dlib/november05/rosenthal/11rosenthal.html 

A Fresh Look at the Reliability of Long-term Digital Storage (technical
report, work in progress 08/05) http://www.arxiv.org/abs/cs.DL/0508130 

I'd be happy to talk further privately to compare notes if useful.

Mike

---------
Mike Casey
Associate Director for Recording Services
Archives of Traditional Music
Indiana University

(812) 855-8090
micasey@xxxxxxxxxxx 
-----Original Message-----
From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List
[mailto:ARSCLIST@xxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Ganesh.Irelan@xxxxxxxx
Sent: Thursday, February 16, 2006 9:02 AM
To: ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [ARSCLIST] Network storage best practices

Dear Russ Hamm,

>> You said, "the necessity to adhere to high standards for data
integrity... My belief is that >>organizations have turned over much too
much power to IT departments - just because no one else >>understands
the technology. IT too often tells organizational management what they
have to do >>rather than the other way around."

You capture perfectly my concern.  It is those "high standards for data
integrity" that I am trying to identify best practices for so that I can
steer the conversation with our IT staff a little better than I am
presently able to.  

I am confident we have a good backup plan, S-DLT copies separated
geographically (although the archival data is not treated any
differently than the corporate data), a high quality server
infrastucture with clean power and fire suppression.  But, it is what I
don't know, how to confirm the integrity of data through all steps of
ingest, preservation and access, that I am most concerned about.

OAIS is a great "high level" approach which we are looking into but, it
is not meant to address technical issues on the level that I am trying
to.

Thanks again everyone.

Kevin