BRIDGING THE GAP

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BRIDGING THE GAP The National Archives Malaysia
Experience
by
Saemah Mokhtar
National Archives of Malaysia
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The objective...
To provide the means to enable a film and audio
tape to survive for the present and future
generation to enjoy and study as a tangible
record of the past and as important part of the
cultural heritage
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The technology

• Practical format
• Storage
• Technology advances

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the transision
Changes in the media used for storage create new
possibilities for preservation of and access to
cultural materials
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strategies

• Training
• Partnership

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Training
Moving operations into the electronic environment
requires not only new tools, but new roles ,
responsibility and skills. Many work processes
must change and the time and effort devoted to
each step in a process may change as well. The
individual tasks with this new responsibilities
should received appropriate tools and adequate
training to fulfill them.
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Partnership
Institutions with some knowledge of preserving
AV can work together in the process of digitizing
our collections.
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Experience of the National Archives of Malaysia
1996 an integrated system of archival services
was developed 1996 - website was
built 1998 pilot project of data
conversion 2000 Data Conversion Project
(DC1) 2001 An additional application known as
web- COMPASS were develop to link
COMPASS to the National Archives
website 2002 Data conversion Project
(DC2) 2003 Data conversion Project (DC3)
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The e- SPARK project

• Objectives
• To conduct and assesment of the current status of
  electronic records archives management
  implementation within the Malaysia public sector
• To weight against Malaysias current initiative
  with other international adoption and
  implementationof electronic records archives
  management in Malaysia to support the
  e-government objectives
• To identify and recommend a set of implementation
  strategy to reposition electronic records
  archives management in Malaysia to support the
  e-government objectives
• To identify and develop the policy, guidelines,
  process and prcedures to preserve the public
  sector electronic records

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Figure e-SPARK project approach
Surveys conducted -280agencies (41
responded) Interviews conducted with 30 selected
agencies
. . Policy
Local assessment
Assessment report
. . Standards, guidelines,
Process and Procedures
Strategic direction Arkib Unified
Model Electronic Records and Archives
Management Interagency Business
Process Implementation Strategy and
Plan Proposed Organization Model
. Final Report
International assessment and Gap Analysis
(IAGAR)
Planning and preparation
.. .. System spefications
. Education
Guidelines
International assessment (IA)
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specific guidelines for specific environments

• managing electronic records in
• unstructured environment
• managing electronic records in
• structured environment
• managing electronic records in
• the web environment

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establishment of The Documentation and
Preservation Centre for AV materials
for the specialised needs of the AV collections.
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conclusion
Since the introduction of the digital techniques,
great hopes have been expressed in the
audiovisual archives that this technology would
offer simple solutions to overcome the pitfalls
of the analogue world. However, requirement of
new tools, new roles, responsibility and skills
as well as funding and legal concerns need to be
considered before venturing into digitization
project. Though digitization has proven to be
possible for nearly every format and medium
presently held by archival institutions, we still
have to grasp the implications of those
technologies and understand what digitization of
our collection means to the institutions patrons
and the public. By moving on and understanding
the changes can we be able to bridge the gaps.
And the National Archives of Malaysia has taken
positive step in doing so.