Before I even applied for my current internship, which is in digital collections, I debated whether or not I should apply for a traditional archive internship ... processing, describing, ladder-climbing, etc... To be honest I do a little bit of those now. Actually, I do a lot of ladder climbing (it's a good thing I got over my fear of heights during a rappelling excursion in college), but I do a lot more than that as well.

My internship at HSP consists of two primary projects that will hopefully contribute to planning a digital preservation strategy:  1) Identifying materials within the collections that exist on digital formats, such as CDs and DVDs, and migrating the files to a separate, secure location, as well as identifying materials that exist on legacy formats, such as 3.5” and 5.25” floppy disks, WANG disks, audio cassette tapes, VHS tapes, open reel tapes, etc., and researching migration and/or emulation solutions to ensure their preservation; and 2) Interviewing the staff of HSP to determine the types of digital files that are being created during the course of business, how and where they are saved, and what is being done with them.

In my last blog post I wrote about HSP's ongoing wrestling match with its card catalog and the difficulties in converting legacy systems and data.  One thing I failed to mention is the importance of designing any information system with future data migration in mind.  This is of particular importance for an archival institution, like HSP, which has the end goal of maintaining records in perpetuity.