ETD Preservation Network

Essentially all theses and dissertations created today are born-digital even if they are reviewed and read as printed works. Increasingly, universities worldwide are accepting electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs) in addition to or in place of print versions. How we care for these new digital resources is important in light of possible catastrophic events such as fires and hurricanes, as well as the more prevalent hardware, software, and human failures that all institutions encounter. We must be proactive in providing long-term digital preservation strategies to protect the important research and scholarship that comprises such an integral component of our institutional histories, or we run a high risk of losing it.

The MetaArchive Cooperative and the NDLTD joined forces in 2008 to begin offering preservation services for ETD collections by implementing a dark archive using the technological approach called distributed digital preservation network. Participants in this new archive may simply submit their collections for ingest into the network or they may participate in the Cooperative by hosting a LOCKSS-based networked server. All collections will be ingested into the ETD Archive by the MetaArchive system and copied, distributed, and stored on secure servers at least six NDLTD partner institutions. These servers do not merely back up the ETDs, but provide a dynamic means of continually programmatically checking all files and providing replacement files when necessary.

NDLTD/MetaArchive Preservation Strategy

Table of Contents

1. Why adopt the NDLTD Preservation Strategy?
2. MetaArchive Strategy
• How the ETD Preservation Network works
• Access issues
• Intellectual Property issues
• Retrieving files from the ETD Preservation Network
3. Organizing ETDs for preservation readiness
4. Standards
• File formats
• Metadata
• Conspectus Database
• MetaArchive Schema
5. Harvesting Frequency
6. Local institutional workflow
7. Authors’ responsibilities
8. How to Join the ETD Preservation Network
• Join the NDLTD
• Join the MetaArchive Cooperative
• Membership levels
• Members' responsibilities
9. Documentation
10. Training Opportunities
11. Staff/Personnel
12. Hardware
13. Software
14. Reports