ArchivesSpace—Record Creation
Record Creation
- The Archivist creates Resources. These are the collections in the system. Other staff members may be assigned the tasks of entering the elements within a Resource.
- On the record page for the Resource (Collection) most of the items will be managed by the Archivist other than the Notes section. This is where the Biographical/Historical, Scope and Contents, Related Materials, Separated Materials, Bibliography, etc. notes are placed. These individual notes can be added in any order, but once all of the notes are put into the system, click on the Apply Standard Note Order button and they will be shuffled into our preselected order.
- A Resource has children. Depending on the size and arrangement of the collection, it can be very simple or more complex. For example, the Lee University Collection is very complex with multiple levels of Series, Sub-series, Files, and Items. On the other hand, a small collection may only include a few “Items” as children of the Resource record.
- You can think of this as an outline.
- In this example, capital letters (A, B, C) are children of the Roman numeral (I), and siblings of each other. Arabic numerals (1, 2, 3, 4) are children of capital letters and siblings of each other. Lower-case letters are children of Arabic numerals and siblings of each other. Etc.
- This does not reach across groupings, though. That is, the lower-case letter “a” in Sub-series 2.2 is not a sibling of the lower-case “a” in Sub-series 1.1 since siblings only apply under a same parent.
- Series are always children of Resources (Collections). Sub-series are always children of Series, but a File or an Item can be a child of the Resource or a Series or a Sub-series. And an Item could also be a child of a File, though we won’t do that all the time.
- This does not reach across groupings, though. That is, the lower-case letter “a” in Sub-series 2.2 is not a sibling of the lower-case “a” in Sub-series 1.1 since siblings only apply under a same parent.
- Once you know the arrangement from an existing Finding Aid document or from working with the Archivist, click on the Add Child button in the resource navigation box near the top of the Resource record
- This will add a child of the currently highlighted line to the bottom of the list.
- We will always use Title and Level of Description on these records for children of the Resource, as well as making sure the Publish box is ticked. If it is a Series or Sub-series record, that may be all that is entered. For Files and Items, there will be more information entered.
- Priority fields of entry include these, whenever possible:
- Language, Dates (of Creation or Copyright, especially), Agents (Creators and Sources and sometimes Subjects), Subjects, Notes (Abstract, Physical Description, and Related Materials are some common notes to use), and Instances
- Priority fields of entry include these, whenever possible:
- Level of Description — the pull-down menu has several options, several of which we do not use currently. The common ones we use are File, Item, Series, and Sub-series.
- Series and Sub-series are larger groupings of things that are often in multiple housings. A File (in our usage) is a narrow grouping, often a single file folder, but without itemization more specific than that; e.g., “Charles Beach, Letters.” Item is used when our description is at the level of individual objects, such as each individual letter in that folder of Beach letters.
- We will always use Title and Level of Description on these records for children of the Resource, as well as making sure the Publish box is ticked. If it is a Series or Sub-series record, that may be all that is entered. For Files and Items, there will be more information entered.