If it is, then we should all pack up and go home or do something more constructive with our lives!

I am referring to the recent over reactive and unhealthy interest in [ ROI – Risk of Incarceration ] type of Electronic Discovery driven disposition. RIM is about an holistic approach to the management of an organisations business or government processes. Disposition in itself plays a relatively small, but important role in the overall scheme of things. Escalating disposition to its current level of interest & activity has resulted in a distortion of its position in the total scheme of RIM.

At the ARMA International 2007 Annual Conference held in Baltimore 7th to 10th October I spent most of my time attending sessions & some time on the Exhibition floor speaking with vendors touting their wares. If I did not know better [and obviously many do not] I may have been forgiven for believing that the answer to the above heading statement was in the affirmative & was true & correct.

Why?

************

At one stand where the representative was successful in grabbing my attention with his demeanor I asked the representative if he could tell me what he was offering. I was exposed to a dissertation on the merits of his product which was to save me from the regulators and to address all of my regulatory requirements, for a fee of course. I responded that I was impressed with his enthusiasm & vigour but what was he offering in regard to various RIM issues e. g. classification, controlled vocabulary – CV, Business Classification Schemes – BCS, version control & how did his product offerings add up to the requirements as detailed in ISO 15489-1:2001 Information and documentation — Records management — Part 1: General, and SO/TR 15489-2:2001 Information and documentation — Records management — Part 2: Guidelines?

His honest response, and he was brutally honest, was that he was a salesman & what he was telling me about his product was the limit of his understanding of RIM.

He confided in me that had no idea about the questions I was asking as he did not understand this RIM STUFF.

The beauty of this conversation was that this person was aware that he did not understand RIM whereas many others on the exhibition floor & elsewhere pretend that they understand. There is a consensus of opinion being discussed within RIM circles [and also within ARMA] of the need to educate the vendors in the reality of RIM. We, the RIM professionals are being constantly bombarded by solutions given to us from above & also from THE MAJOR VENDORS when sadly they do not understand the PROBLEM let alone the SOLUTION.

In the early 1990’s, at least in Australasia & also elsewhere, Archivists realised that their ability to preserve information [the thing that they had being doing for centuries] was at peril due to the overwhelming use of Personal Computers – PC’s and the demise of the Central Records & Information Management Registry.

This issue of the demise of the Central RIM Registry process generally went unnoticed in the USA as the Central RIM Registry process [to the best of my knowledge] was not practiced in the USA as it was in most of the of the previous British Empire, in various European Countries & in particular Australia. The solution as worked out over a number of years by the Archivists, Records Managers & others eventuated in the creation of the Australian Records Management Standard AS 4390 in the mid 1990’s. The principles espoused in this earthshaking document formed the catalyst and basis for the adoption of the ISO 15489 RIM standard in the early 2000’s, or 2001 to be exact.

The degree of misunderstanding in the offerings from vendors stretches across the gambit of suppliers from the smallest up to the giants & is highlighted in an incident in the case of Microsoft when its Microsoft Records Management Team Blog stated in a posting on Wednesday March 28th 2007 that – We are taking a break from posting on this site because all of the topics that we had wanted to blog about have now been posted. The Microsoft Records Management Team Blog started on April 10th 2006 to much fanfare and it’s disappeared less then twelve [12] months later because Microsoft had learnt all it needed about the RIM STUFF. Sorry to be a disbeliever but I do not buy this assessment. Am I targeting Microsoft? And the answer is a big NO. All of the players want a part of this increasing $ spend and Microsoft is no exception. Microsoft is unique as they are THE or one of THE major players in this market & in my personal view, they & others have got it wrong in targeting the end of the process E.G. disposition while not addressed the whole.

SPECIAL NOTE: No other supplier has ever taken the level of interest that Microsoft did in the RIM profession. When Microsoft created its RIM Blog, many in the RIM profession [ myself included ] applauded the interest shown & thought at last we had a major world class vendor who would champion the RIM cause due to the interest & effort it was making to understand RIM and that they would provide us with at least some of the solutions required. Time will tell if that is the case but I am not optimistic about a positive outcome that meets the needs of the RIM profession from Microsoft or for that matter any of the majors getting a toehold in RIM via their own efforts in the case of Microsoft or via the acquisition of specialist RIM vendors.

I was unkind enough back in 2003 in an article entitled – Is records management to be the next new buzzword? – to make the statement  

“The blue sky merchants, snake oil promoters, unscrupulous salesmen and charlatans will be drawn to the honey pot of potential rewards in minutes of it appearing to be the new hot and valuable product”.

This was well before the release of the 2005 study that suggested in 2007 that $2.865 billion dollars would be spent on e- Discovery in the USA. Source: Socha Consulting LLC

What am I promoting? 

I have a small ask and that is that the vendors employ known, capable & experienced Records Managers & Archivists to assist them to understand the process of RIM & at least to be aware of the guidelines and directives as detailed in the International Standard ISO 15489-1 & 2. Committing to listen to the RIM profession for a period of only TWELVE – 12 months to fully understand the complexity of this profession is not an acceptable proposition. I have been exposed to RIM in a commercial & professional involvement since 1960 or forty eight [48] years & I am happy to say that I continue to learn something new about this wonderful RIM profession almost every day.

Enough about the KING and the other major players, now back to reality.

We must understand that this thing RIM is not Rocket Science & good RIM is in fact a set of rules & processes based on Common Sense.

That said Common Sense is a rare commodity & in my view should be reclassified to what it really is, and that is Uncommon Sense.

Horror stories in RIM abound & everyone has theirs to tell. As a consultant in this marvelous profession I am at the stage that nothing can SHOCK me as I may not have seen the entirety of these wonderfully bad RIM disasters but I have experienced enough to know that most, if not all are avoidable.

The application of Uncommon Sense would have worked wonders in most of these situations. If your need to reinforce your understanding of what can, or does go wrong in the real world my Australian business associates keep a record of known situations on their website at Lest We Forget in an attempt to keep alive the memory of significant records management incidents or situations.

I do not need to detail what I believe to be the main game to achieve success in the implementation & ongoing operation of a successful RIM program as I have documented my thoughts many times & those thoughts are available for FREE & online at my website located at this website @ The DME Blog

I will detail some dot points for your consideration:

1. Records & Information Managers & Archivists should be involved in the design, selection & planning for any proposed RIM solution in addition to the Information Technology & Business Application users plus Legal [and possibly others]. These parties should sit at the board room table level as equal partners to start building the foundation blocks on which to create a successful RIM application. Yes! A motherhood statement.

2. Before we get moving [ usually in the wrong direction ] it is essential, NO CRITICAL that we first have a documented Controlled Vocabulary – CV [ sometimes referred to as a Dictionary or Thesaurus ] for the organisation.

NOTE: If we do not speak the same language we can never succeed.

3. Again before we get to the main game we need to address the Business Process requirements by creating a Business Classification Scheme – BCS. NOTE: If we do not mandate the language & the functions & activities of the Business Processes we can never succeed.

4. Technology is not a solution, it is only an enabler.

NOTE: The sooner this fact is imprinted into the brains of all concerned the better off we will be at applying an effective, capable & workable RIM solution.

This list could continue on & on, but so as not to bore the audience into a stupor, suffice to say that in the current century we have become used to instant gratification. We are a – I want it now generation – & the same goes for our corporate masters who want a solution today to fix all ills, past, present & future at the least cost & the lowest possible time frame. Press a button & out comes the solution. The IT vendors have made a fortune catering to this psyche.

As they say at the gym, or on the sporting field, NO PAIN = NO GAIN!

The same goes for RIM applications & implementations.

The analogy is: I want to run 100 yards in 10 seconds but I do not wish to train.

Or I want all my personnel to be records management savvy but I do not wish to provide them with policies, procedures & practices or allow them to be trained [ or to provide ongoing training for all & I mean ALL personnel ] to provide that outcome.

The overwhelming attitude is that, we gave them the technology so let them get on with the job. OH!

If RIM solutions were so easy to make happen!

The vendors are very happy to promote to us that that all that is required is the MAGIC WAND & that just happens to be, you guessed it – their particular TECHNOLOGY.

The reality is that there are up front & ongoing costs plus ground rules & preparation involved but vendors do not know the extent or the process involved & secondly they do not wish to expose the real Total Cost of Ownership – TCO to prospective clients.

TCO can be many times the cost of the software. In a recent situation that I was personally involved the ratio of software cost to the TCO was a staggering 31:1 as against the $ outlay for the software the client had decided upon. No wonder the vendors of RIM solutions are not exactly outgoing with the disclosure of these sorts of figures.

RIM is not just about disposing of those records that may come back to bite us or any other records for that matter if we do not legally have a process to dispose of them implemented into our day to day disposition procedures before the corporate Armageddon where we get dragged into a legal quagmire where our past misdemeanors come to light due to a discovery action.

If we did the crime, we must pay the time and no attempt to redress the situation [ within a veil of legality ] can be achieved by making records disappear when in fact they prove our complicity in some previous misdemeanor.

This is not what quality RIM is about, nor should it be.

RIM is about good business processes without which no business can succeed. Disposition is a logical outcome of the implementation of good RIM not the main aim, or at least that is what should be set out in the guidelines for the application & implementation of an effective quality RIM program. If the organisation has no system in place to properly classify their records via a Business Classification Scheme –BCS it is thus neigh impossible to know what groupings of records to apply the disposition rules applicable let alone to do it auto magically via some of the often touted Information Life-Cycle Management – ILM systems.

Change Management:

What is the possibility of success in designing, documenting, purchasing & then implementing a RIM system if we do not set the organisations needs criteria correctly?

Everyone is in a hurry to get a solution in place so shortcuts are made that almost guarantees the failure of the application no matter how much money is thrown at the program.

From time to time there appear statistics in relationship to the non performance or under performance in respect to the implementation of an RIM application and these situations are not assistive in respect to the image of RIM as a PROFESSION.

The identification of the underlying reasons for non performance or under performance need careful attention.

All projects [not just the successful ones] should be put under the microscope after implementation to assess their effectiveness.

An organisation will learn more about how to succeed the next time around from these documented assessments.

Usually we learn more from our documented failures [ if someone has the gumption to accept that a failure did in fact occur ] than from the heady heights, trumpeting & self gratification related to our successful projects.

In Australasia research has shown that where the business process and classification / thesaurus or dictionary is NOT mature at the time of system implementation ( technology ) that 75% of all calls to RIM Help desks are about “other than the technology”.

Questions like “where do I put this document?, what do I call this document?, how long will it be kept?, will it be secure? If 75% of the questions relate to these issue this fact should indicate where 75% of the budget should be applied i.e. to RIM foundation type development, which can be applied to all system including the way information is managed without a technology solution. (Source: SMC )

Change management is often highlighted as an issue & one that if not addressed will certainly kill the potential success of an RIM implementation. Things as basic as the tree structure offered by Microsoft in their Windows offerings now for many years is the concept of My Documents e.g. On Microsoft Windows operating systems, My Documents is the name of a special folder on the computer’s hard drive that is commonly used to store a user’s documents, music, pictures, downloads, and other files. The My Documents folder was first introduced in Windows 95 OEM Service Release 2, as a standard location for storing user-created files. Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. NOTE: In Windows Vista the terminology has been changed to Documents.

The concept of My Documents utilized by Microsoft is one that still survives today. In a recent article published in January 2008 promoting a Web based solution the creators of the software proudly promote the concept that the end user be given the rights to allow access to HIS or HER Documents in respect to 1. Access [Read Only], to Update, or to Delete the documents [which in the majority of cases would be records]. WOW has this supplier ever read ISO 15489-1&2 or understood the concept the information captured or created by an individual in their work process is a CORPORATE or ORGANISATIONAL document & or record and needs to comply with the corporate set of rules as espoused by ISO 15489-1&2. NOTE: The situation supports the increasingly held view for training in RIM for creators and supplier of RIM solutions.

I am a strong believer in the adherence to the principles & practices as set down in ISO 15489-1&2. Is ISO 15489-1&2 perfect? I think not, as in my personal & not so humble view my interpretation of the Standard is that some of the guidelines stated as could or should are things that if one does not implement in an RIM environment then the overall concept espoused by ISO 15489-1&2 are not, nor cannot be fulfilled.

Summation:

RIM is not only about disposition as RIM is about good business strategies, policies plus processes & practices. The issue of indexability & also findability should be high on the agenda for any RIM implementation which is achieved by the creation of a Controlled Vocabulary for the organisation which then allows for the creation of a Business Classification Scheme – BCS [ via integration with & input from all parties with a need to be involved ] which provides a foundation for doing some of the desirable automation with the linking of records to Records General Retention & Disposition Schedules.

With a Business Classification Scheme – BSC in place an organisation could possibly address the latest & greatest buzz phrase, Information Life-Cycle Management – ILM & make it a reality rather than hype or blue sky stuff as it currently stands. Maybe the clams of nirvana or utopia via the use of ILM could be realised IF, & only IF a workable controlled vocabulary – CV – Thesaurus which enables a BCS to be created and put in place before ILM was implemented. Having a BCS in place is good, NO essential RIM practice.

Happy RIMing,

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 40 years.

Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU.

You can contact Laurie Varendorff @ email @ Laurie Varendorff ARMA; or Phone: Australia @ 0417 094 147 – International @ +61 417 094 147 at Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME.

The author, Laurie Varendorff gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and non-profit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

Since the introduction of the IBM compatible PC and DOS in 1981 it is claimed by many in the Records Management, Archive and History field that the history records of the past twenty five years has or will be lost due to the Digital Amnesia brought on by the introduction of the IBM compatible PC and the DOS operating system.

Have times changed?

Back in April 2003 I wrote an article entitled – Is records management to be the next new buzzword? available @ Is records management to be the next new buzzword? in which I stated – If you searched Gartner Inc’s Research WWW site using the term records management in March 2003 you would have received 200 hits.

In May 2006 and carrying out the same search I located 3100 Gartner Research documents ( Includes Archived Documents ) using Records Management as the search term. Has Records and Information Management – RIM increased in importance by this degree or 15.5 times in three (3) years?

It would appear so, and the person leading the Cavalry charge is none other than Colonel William Henry [ Bill ] Gates III.

WHY!

Does this mean that the world of Records and Information Management is about to hit the BIG TIME?

I believe so!

Is Microsoft – MS attempting to right the wrongs of the past TWENTY FIVE – 25 years of Digital Amnesia?

Maybe, but more likely the reason is the forecast growth of RIM or more specifically what the IT industry refers to as Enterprise Content Management – ECM of between 10.7 to 12.8% compound annual growth rate from 2005 through 2010.

The report states – Organizations are increasing investments to manage content as an enterprise asset that can be used across multiple business units or segments.

Another reason is – If you read all the postings on the MS Blog on RIM NOW SHUT DOWN one of the things they highlight is DOLLARS and I mean big $ numbers e.g. $2.8 Billion US Dollars!

The MS blog states:

No, I’m not quoting the Austin Power’s villain Dr. Evil… I’m sharing a pretty surprising figure: This is the 2007 projected budget for electronic discovery services within the USA.

You might think I’m joking, but this is real data from the 2005 Socha-Gelbmann Electronic Discovery Survey. “How the heck can it cost that much?” you might ask.

There are a lot of reasons, but fundamentally it’s related to one simple problem: we keep too much stuff!

MS Blog on RIM

To obtain an understanding of where MS are going with ECM have a look at the 2005 White Paper located @ NOW SHUT DOWN  and keep an eye on their blog site as more is to be unveiled.

Reading this document will assure you that MS is deadly serious in making RIM or is that ECM a money spinner with the release of Office 2007.

The four areas that MS are addressing in the ECM area of the new product Office 2007 are:

1. Document Management

2. Records Management

3. Web Content Management

4. Forms Management

MS is not alone in their charge for the RIM – ECM installations around the world. Other organisations from the big end of town have also joined and they include IBM, Xerox, and Xerox plus may others.

Watch the RIM & ECM space out there in corporate and government land as many more organisations in the IT area are corralling their horses and getting ready to also join the charge.

As I have said before and I quote – Today is the most exciting time to be involved in this the most critical of resources the FOURTH Factor in the Factors of production – INFORMATION.

Why not join the MS wave along with Colonel William Henry (Bill) Gates III, hang five and get relaxed as this new phase for RIM will consume all of us, for good or evil!

Happy RIMing,

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 40 years.

Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU.

You can contact Laurie Varendorff @ email @ Laurie Varendorff ARMA; or Phone: Australia @ 0417 094 147 – International @ +61 417 094 147 at Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME.

The author, Laurie Varendorff gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and non-profit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

Misconceptions in the records management fraternity in respect to the intellectual creation, management and maintenance of Controlled Vocabularies – CV’s, Thesauri and Business Classification Schemes – BCS’s

As a person with an interest in this subject area as a consultant specialising in the creation of Controlled Vocabularies – CV’s, Thesauri, Business Classification Schemes – BCS’s and Retention and Disposal – R&D or Disposition schedules it is in my interest to provide my clients and by way of that business relationship, myself with the most efficient tools to carry out these tasks.

Since carrying out a consultancy for a major government agency in Western Australia in this environment in the mid 2002, I found the then required use of Microsoft Excel spreadsheets and to a lesser extent Microsoft Word to be less than desirable as tools to carry out this process.

What is the answer?

For one I can tell you that it is a misconception that these processes can be created, managed and maintained in the operational records management software being used by organisations in their Records and Information Management – RIM Systems e.g. Records Management Systems – RMS, Electronic Document Management Systems – EDMS, Electronic Document and Records Management Systems – EDRMS or Electronic Records and Document Management Systems – ERDMS.

These products have never been designed for this purpose and using them for the creation and management of Controlled Vocabularies – CV’s, Thesauri and Business Classification Schemes – BCS’s is fraught with danger.

A specialised tool to carry out this process is required for the work to be done external to the RIM, RMS, EDMS, EDRMS or ERDMS environment and in a controlled Quality Assurance situation separate and external to the day to day operating Records and Information Management – RIM system.

This separation of design and application allows for the sanctity of the day to day operation of the installed RIM, RMS, EDMS, EDRMS or ERDMS environment to proceed without interruption or alteration by this intellectual process.

All work on updating or revising the Controlled Vocabularies – CV’s, Thesauri and Business Classification Schemes – BCS’s can be carried out, verified and tested in a non impacting stand alone environment by input by the end user (the client) and the service provider, the RIM division.

A NOTE of caution: 

Some RIM divisions truly and erroneously believe that they own the corporate records.

This is as far from the truth as any misconception.

The organisation, the end user and possibly even the public own the records and the RIM division is the trusted service provider and possibly custodian of this precious resource.

Why?

Unfortunately there is a widely held misconception that the creation, management and maintenance of Controlled Vocabularies – CV’s, Thesauri and Business Classification Schemes =BCS’s can be done on the fly in the day to day working environment in which the RMS, EDMS, EDRMS or ERDMS is operating.

I personally have observed level one [ low end ] clerical staff changing and adding terminology to an approved Thesaurus and Business Classification Scheme – BCS’s in a live working environment on the fly and in the day to day working environment in which the RMS, EDMS, EDRMS or ERDMS is operating without an understanding to the consequences of their actions.

To my horror this person had been carrying out this process for several years.

There was no consultation with the end users, no capture of or documentation as to what had been altered, updated or added.

The only concept in the view of the perpetrator ( and with the approval of their supervisor ) was that the terminology was incorrect and needed to be corrected.

No wonder when the end user went to search for information entered into the RMS, EDMS, EDRMS or ERDMS system in the past they cannot locate the information and understandably revert back to saving their born digital documents on their own or shared network drives or again HORROR, their C: drive.

Please tell me I am dreaming!

No, sorry, it was not a dream, it was real and I was exposed to this environment in the light of day.

This situation is real and unfortunately is occurring day in and day out across numerous environments, and it should be stopped, and now.

Where is the versioning control of these critically important aspects of an RMS, EDMS, EDRMS or ERDMS system environments?

If the concept that we should manage documents, records, websites and webpages in a controlled versioning environment as quality records management practice is a truism, would it not also hold true that the foundation stone on which the RIM and the use of RMS, EDMS, EDRMS or ERDMS systems is based should also be versioned and that each update or change to the foundation stone consisting of Controlled Vocabularies – CV’s, Thesauri and Business Classification Schemes (BCS’s) be captured and maintained and approved by a relevant Quality Assurance process prior to any update or changes going live at the work-face.

If this is not the case I obviously have lost the plot as to what this profession stands for and has been promoting and heading towards for some time.

I personally use a software creation, management and maintenance tool for the creation of Controlled Vocabularies – CV’s, Business Classification Schemes – BCS’s and also Retention and Disposition = R&D schedules that provides me with all of the things I am advocating above and which I feel so strongly about that I have accepted the opportunity to market the product in Western Australia.

That being said I may be deemed to be biased in regard to this subject if that is so then i will accept that perception.

I urge all persons involved in this wonderful profession to take a good hard look at their current operating environment and the implications of not utilising an appropriate tool external to their day to day operating RM environment for the creation of Controlled Vocabularies – CV’s, Thesauri, Business Classification Schemes – BCS’s plus Retention and Disposal – R&D or Disposition schedules.

If records management professionals can hold their hands over their hearts and honestly state that my position regarding this concept is flawed then I will be happy to discuss our differing positions on this extremely important, NO CRITICAL matter with the hope that enlightenment may prevail.

May truth win over rhetoric and that common (or is that uncommon) sense prevails.

Happy classifying!

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 40 years.

Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU.

You can contact Laurie Varendorff @ email @ Laurie Varendorff ARMA; or Phone: Australia @ 0417 094 147 – International @ +61 417 094 147; Fax : Australia @ 08 9417 5981 – International @ +618 9417 5981 at Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME.

The author, Laurie Varendorff gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and non-profit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

A new evolutionary Digital Data & IT Information Storage Process and Media for Long Term – LE Preservation for ONE – 1 Hundred to up to FIVE – 5 Hundred Years!

 

Historically and even today there is little in the way of digital recording media which will stand the test of time for archiving.

The term archiving has many variant meanings to different sectors involved with data storage:

For the IT industry / profession the following is, or may be the general understanding of archiving:

Archiving is the intelligent back-up of selected objects ( data-sets, items etc. ) that no longer need to be accessed on a regular basis within the computing system.

These files are removed from the Online Disk Storage to a lower cost media such as Tape or Optical disk.

Archiving to the Archiving Profession could mean maintaining data FOREVER or for Long Term – LE preservation be that 100, 200, 300, 400, 500 or 1,000 or more years.

The IT industry have had a major issue in coming to terms with this definition of archiving and the technology and to date the IT industry and profession has not had a good track record for addressing these long term preservation requirement.

How is it possible to combine these two competing archival processes to accommodate for the genuine requirement to maintain data created electronically for the ongoing business process an then for the long term legal, moral and historical requirements of society, government and history?

Migration and emulation have been the process most commonly identified and used by the IT profession to date to address long term preservation requirement.

Why?

Because most magnetic and other types of data storage devices have come and gone ( not to mention the software obsolescence issues ) leaving us without the ability to even try to retrieve our data stores be they held on 8, 5.25 or 3.5 inch floppy media, hard drives and or magnetic tape plus Optical Discs at 5.25, 12 and 14 inch formats, removable or non-removal rigid disk packs from a multitude of data storage suppliers.

Last but not least is magnetic tape be it ½ inch 9 track way back in computing time or the recent versions of today’s Digital Linear Tape DLT or various versions capable of holing up to PetaBytes of data in automated devices CD and then DVD were touted as the media of choice for long term storage of lower volume digital data but they too have fallen from grace due to their identified inherent short term deterioration characteristics.

Where are we today?

Some of the current requirements to maintain data over time are:

Digital information, like all information has a records retention requirement as defined by government, regulatory agencies and specific regulatory organisations. The reasons we keep digital information are for the same reasons we keep paper files, and now, digitally born files.

Legal requirements:

These have expanded greatly in the past few years with the addition of new laws and regulations especially in the USA e.g. the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 – HIPPA, U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission – SEC, etc. – and relevant legislation in the Australian region and the enforcement of numerous others.

Litigation defense: The need to defend the company or to protect its intellectual property is increasing each year. Trustworthy and complete documentation is needed or the defense is vulnerable and losses could be in the millions of dollars.

Corporate Governance:

Additional requirements beyond the above may be dictated by your company, and mostly driven by self-protection.

Accountability:

Certainly the Federal, State and Local Governments require the long-term retention of numerous document types: personnel records, land titles, and Occupational Safety & Health OS&H to name a few.

Societal and Historical:

This is wide ranging from historical files and religious record to today’s digitally born art and music…

Personal Valuabes:

The family album is undergoing its greatest transition today. Preservation is important or how will your great grandchildren be able to view the pictures of you and your children taken today?

Backup in today’s technical environment:

Backup is used for quick recovery from spinning media, near-line media of fixed content…

Retention is defined by the laws, regulations, common practices, or by the owner of the information or IT policies and practices.

Preservation for keeping files over an extended period of time requires the highest level of certainty and accuracy as the files may not be used or viewed frequently enough to assure no inaccuracies are evident. These files need to have the added assurance of being unalterable. As the time period from creation to discovery of an error increases, the lower the probability of being able to detect and correct it or numerous errors in the applicable files, while still retaining their trustworthiness.

Risks:

The risks for preservation are singularly influenced by the long time horizon associated with the retention of the files. Preservation over short time frames provides many options for retention to overcome issues. It is not so easy when preservation requirements are in the 30+ year horizon. If we extend the time period for the retention of digital data out to 100 or up to 500 or more years = permanent FOREVER digital data has a permanence issue of major proportions.

Technology Obsolescence if the most widely discussed and still has nearly all the same attributes of the past several decades. The major gains have been the reduced cost of the storage media and the storage capacity per unit. However, the Life Expectancy – LE of the magnetic tape tops out at 30 years. How many organizations are really planning on that horizon? The practical limit for the maintenance of digital data is still 3 – 5 years.

From a technological obsolescence challenge, there still remains the same major issues that existed since the introduction of computing to the masses in the 1980 and 1990’s and before that for large mainframe installations… frequent advancements, new elements introduced to the technology chain, and product discontinuances. Hardware is still highly proprietary… and for economic factors, it will remain so in the future. Vendors do come and go…

Software has a similar problem, and many new programs enter the user market each day. Formats for files in applications continue to advance, often with little regard for their predecessors.

Media stability is the most risky… look at the warranty of the media, and if it fails, the manufacturer will give you a new one, absent your precious information of course…

Managerial Risk:

Managerial obsolescence has been with us all along, yet only recently has it been elevated for scrutiny and is now being discussed at the executive level.

Essentially management changes about the same as the technology. In hindsight, many digital losses were preventable had management been better.

In today’s business world, there are frequent changes in the management ranks, and continuous pressure on budgets.

Will the company make the financial commitment to keep the files viable as they age?

As management changes, do some things drop between the cracks on policy for refresh, emulation or migration?

Think about the files you left behind the last time you upgraded your PC!

Are resources consumed for more pressing business needs than preservation?

If I as a manager do the things I should to preserve this year, I will miss my budget and my compensation is reduced ….. Hmmm…. and maybe I will have a new job next year…. or who would know if I wait until next year?

A missed cycle for the retention of digital information could be unrecoverable later. Thus, management risk is significant.

The solution?

At least to the technological issues identified as we will leave the managerial risk and obsolescence for others to address.

A recent paper presented at the Society for Imaging Science and Technology – IS&T Archiving Conference 2005 – 26th April 2005 in Washington DC titled – Ending Digital Obsolescence – plus a second paper delivered at the Association for Information and Image Management International – AIIM 2005 Conference and Exposition titled Datasurance® – Patent Pending – Preservation Archive for Digital Files may provide the answer to this long term process and media issue.

The papers were presented by Ken Quick and Mike Maxwell of Affiliated Computer Services – ACS of Dallas, TX and Mike Maxwell Consultant, Representing ACS respectively.

What is Datasurance®?

The Datasurance® product offers to maintain digital data in any format be it music or voice-mail, X-rays, MRI’s, emails, databases, applications, Operating Systems – OS, charts and excel spreadsheets, word documents, PowerPoint presentations, .TIFF and other image files plus black and white and colour digital images and videos onto a long term, fail safe – copy of last resort media, MICROFILM!

How does the process work? Well ACS give us a glimpse at how they create this miracle and that is by the application of 2-D Barcode technology and the Datasurance® product media ( black & white ) microfilm. ACS refers to the output media as analogue / digital tape.

There are thousands of different file types and formats, with more coming each year. Yet, there is one thing they have in common… At the base level, they are a sequence of 0’s and 1’s (zeros and one) that the program transforms into a colour spot, a program, a sound, a character, and a command. Files are written to media and transmitted over networks as binary information, 0’s and 1’s. Whether stored on disk, tape or optical media, the files are pulses or spots of 0’s or 1’s. This attribute becomes the key to Datasurance® preservation concept.

2-D Data Matrix Barcodes with information available @ The Barcode Software Center – Barcode Basics – DataMatrix or @IDAutomation.com, Inc. – Free Online DataMatrix Barcode Image Generator ECC200 or @ Inlite Research Inc. – ClearImage DataMatrix or @ ISO/IEC 16022:2000 : Information technology – International symbology specification – Data Matrix information available @ Standards Australia – SAI Global – Standards On-Line Select – ISO/IEC 16022:2000 : Information technology – International symbology specification – Data Matrix are non-proprietary with the specifications in the public domain and readily available.

Further, this 2-D barcode has built-in error correction code and two different cyclic redundancy codes to assure the information in the 2-D barcode can be extracted even if there is significant damage to the 2-D barcode, to assure the information is read as written.

The error correction code assures accuracy even if 25 – 40% of the 2-D barcode is unreadable. The correct data can still be rendered.

Datasurance® uses this format to store the 0’s and 1’s as a 2-D barcode. The process creates as many 2-D barcodes as needed to represent a file. Each is sequentially encoded for proper decode and re-assembly. Now any file can be represented as a series of 2-D Barcode “pictures.”

Very simply, the Datasurance® process takes the sequence of 0’s and 1’s in the file and converts them into a sequence of 2-D Data Matrix barcodes – as many as needed based on the size of the file. For example, a PowerPoint presentation that includes colour, text, sound, video, spreadsheet and animation, is still at the base level of 0’s and 1’s.

The process assembles the 2-D barcodes into groups, and prints them to film. Each 2-D barcode is sequentially numbered to assure its correct place in the writing. There are several writers available today…The 2-D barcodes are printed on silver halide microfilm 16 or 35 mm and processed to AIIM / ANSI standards for archival storage for Long Term LE >100 years.

How do we interpret or retrieve the data from the Datasurance® product?

The process for creating a file from the 2-D barcode is accomplished by scanning the 2-D barcode and decoding it to get the 0’s and 1’s sequence. The process then converts the 0’s and 1’s into the appropriate file. The resultant file will be an exact copy of the original file that was used for input. This is what happens when a file comes over the internet or modem to your computer – a series of 0’s and 1’s – then a program on your computer converts the series of 0’s and 1’s to the file that is a picture, or a message or a web page, etc.

Because of the error correction code included in the 2-D barcode, the copy file is identical to the original. And the Error correction code assures accuracy even if 25 – 40% of the 2-D barcode is unreadable. The correct data can still be rendered. The process for creating a file from the 2-D barcode is accomplished by scanning the 2-D barcode and decoding to get the 0’s and 1’s sequence. The process then converts the 0’s and 1’s into the appropriate file.

To summarize:

This process can be used to encode any digital file to be stored in this form. One process is universal for the thousands of file formats, programs and operating systems.

Now everything digital can be preserved with this one approach, sound, colour pictures, voice mail, art, Operating Systems – OS and valuable documents and objects.

Does this mean that microfilm has found a new life after numerous years of decline in volume due to increasing digital storage capacities in ever decreasing physical size of storage devices e.g. Thumb Drives @ up to 4 GB and increasing plus numerous other hard dives @ 1-inch e.g. Seagate announces 8 GB 1-inch hard drive or @ 2.5-inch e.g. 2.5-inch Portable Hard Disk Drive with Capacity of 20 GB – 40 GB and Blu-Ray currently 50 GB but getting discs up to 100 GB and beyond – 200 GB which appears to be the limit of this technology – was always part of the Blu-ray plan.

Only time will tell if the Datasurance® product cuts the mustard and becomes a winning and commercially viable product for the trustworthy retention of all things digital to the delight of archivists, records and information managers, preservationist and historians.

We have seen the holy grail of long term digital data storage trumpeted on a number of occasions e.g. as early as 1998 with the statement that Norsam saves archives from obsolescence – View high-density, HD-Rosetta data with microscope, not computer – HD-Rosetta-which allows approximately 90,000 – A 4 = 210 x 297 mm size analogue images to be stored on 2″ discs-created from microfilm, original documents or other physically scanned images to media microscopic reproductions of images that are readable with the human eye.

Details on the Norsam HD-Rosetta™ Nickel Archive System are available online @ The Norsam HD-Rosetta™ Nickel Archive System  

These reproductions are put on corrosion-proof, nonmagnetic master discs, called Pancake Discs that are available in nickel, gold, titanium, glass, stainless steel, silicon or some other media. See the 1998 report @ This report is no longer available online

Happy digital data storing on microfilm with the Datasurance® product and then sleep easy each night knowing that your data is safe now and into the future long after you retire.

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 40 years.

Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU.

You can contact Laurie Varendorff @ email @ Laurie Varendorff ARMA; or Phone: Australia @ 0417 094 147 – International @ +61 417 094 147; Fax : Australia @ 08 9417 5981 – International @ +618 9417 5981 at Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME.

The author, Laurie Varendorff gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and non-profit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

A hypothetical question:

Do we need to Quality Assure – QA every document scanned in a scanning / imaging process?

And the answer is –it depends!

 

It depends on what? Quality Assurance – QA of the process but not necessarily the individual document!

As an internal or external scanning/imaging provider, do we carry out the Standards for the Quality Assurance – QA of our scanners as defined in Recommended Practice for Quality Control of Image Scanners Document Number: ANSI/AIIM MS44-1988 ( Revised in 1993 )?

If we follow this standard to the word then the QA required for the checking of each and every document scanned may be minimised to 50% of documents or 10% or 5% or 1% or event less.

Why?

Because the standard provides us with a degree of a blanket QA process for all documents scanned.

The USA Standard ANSI/AIIM MS44-1988 titled “Recommended Practice for Quality Control of Image Scanners” states the following, along with many other important criteria in nine sections. 4.2;

Why do we need Quality Control?

In the typical digital image management system, all incoming documents are scanned, indexing information is entered, and the original paper documents are eventually destroyed. In some systems the scanned image of the document may never be examined until it is needed. Strict quality control is required to assure that the images stored are of acceptable quality and are locatable by way of the index.

If a scanner is not operating properly, a large number of useless images may be stored on the system. When the problem is discovered and corrected, the original documents will have to be scanned again ( if in fact they still exist ). Procedures should be established so that any problems are discovered while the original documents are still available.

The quality control procedures described in this document ( USA Standard ANSI/AIIM MS44-1988 ) allow the user to make sure that the system is performing today as well as it was when originally adjusted by the manufacturer. Used on a regular basis, these procedures can assure the user that the scanner will produce digital images of sufficient quality for their intended use.

Enough said:

I cannot, for ethical and copyright reasons provide you with the whole of the Standard. Full details on the ANSI-AIIM Standard MS44-1988 [ REVISED 1993 ] is available online and available for purchase to download @ Recommended Practice for Quality Control of Image Scanners Document Number: ANSI/AIIM MS44-1988 ( R1993 ) titled – Recommended Practice for Quality Control of Image Scanners for $39.00 USD.

An Australian case study:

In the early 1990’s a large engineering organisation in Australia needed to digitize all of its hundreds of thousands of engineering drawings dating back to the turn of the century to a .TIFF file format due to a reorganisation of its operations and the need to have the data available online. The only full holding of the drawings were held in 35 mm microfilm aperture cards.

Solution:

To scan the total holding of drawings held in 35 mm format to digital images in a .TIFF file format and to make the data available online 24 / 7 – ( 24 hours per day – 7 days per week ).

Major Issues:

Due to the variable nature of the hand drawn ( most drawings were produced manually prior to the introduction of CAD – Computer Aided Drafting) engineering drawings ( and you think that the scanning/imaging and QA process involved with general hand written documentation is a challenge ) a 100% Quality Assurance – QA process was implemented.

Process:

Initially FIVE HUNDRED – 500 aperture cards were scanned ( without operator involvement ) overnight. In the morning FIVE 5 QA personnel loaded the resultant .TIFF file images onto their fully featured CAD stations and viewed each drawing for clarity and ease of use by the end user. Over a period of time it was found that the number of rejected images requiring re-scanning was less that half of one 1% or less than FIVE – 5 drawings per 500 scanned each night.

Outcome or Result:

The team of five QA personnel were disbanded and the five fully featured CAD stations were reallocated to other duties. The scanning/imaging group then advised its online clients that if they found a drawing image that was less then the quality they required then the scanning/imaging group would rescan the offending 35 mm aperture card on a one off basis ( with that ability to try various settings of Dots Per Inch – DPI, contrast and brightness etc ) and to provide the highest possible quality digital image from what was usually a poor quality original paper copy rather than a fault of the 35 mm aperture card filming or scanning/imaging process.

It depends:

In this particular situation they applied the exception rule and as all aperture cards were retained in that format and with a number of copies available for rescanning on an as needed basis this solution was a desirable, acceptable and a highly cost saving process. Five personnel were allocated other related duties and five high cost CAD workstations were made available for other drafting tasks.

A WIN – WIN situation for all!

Could this QA environment as detailed above be replicated in a general A4 = A and A3 = B size USA general document scanning/imaging environment?

Well. IT DEPENDS!

As they SAY: It is a matter of horses for courses.

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 40 years.

Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU.

You can contact Laurie Varendorff @ email @ Laurie Varendorff ARMA; or Phone: Australia @ 0417 094 147 – International @ +61 417 094 147; Fax : Australia @ 08 9417 5981 – International @ +618 9417 5981 at Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME.

The author, Laurie Varendorff gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and non-profit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

The scenario’s listed below may, or may not be the current activity of the organisation in question.

I have been made aware of, or experienced first hand the situations outlined.

I am not brave enough to return to the scene of the crime / crimes to check on the current activities and practices.

Over time [ remember I have been associated with Records And Information Management – RIM for over 30 years ] I have come across some interesting “HORROR” methods of operation in the area of Records And Information Management – RIM and Retention & Disposal [Disposition] and other activities in this fine country of Australia and I wish to share some of these gems with you.

There are in 2005 numerous examples of the latest and greatest STAR WARS types of solutions in the marketplace in comparison to the actuality on the ground here in Australia in respect to the state of the art of Records And Information Management – RIM as practiced in isolated pockets of our real life working environment.

Here are some of these GEMS.

I can assure you that these are isolate exceptions and not the general rule for Records And Information Management – RIM practice in the land of the Australian Records Management Standard – AS4390 which was the basis of the International Records Management Standard – ISO15489.

Real life situations are in many instances more hilarious than fiction.

1. THE FOUR CORNERS, RETENTION AND DISPOSAL – DISPOSITION POLICY:

I am advised that this is a true real life situation with a large and profitable commercial operation with a senior manager of the organisation. You start by piling all incoming and outgoing correspondence in one corner of a room. When the pile of documents in corner one – 1 reaches a height where it has the tendency to fall over, you then move to the second corner. I am uncertain as to which of the four corners you start the process. It may be the North, South, East and or West corner, [I am making the assumption, possibly erroneously that the room has four corners]. I doubt that it matters but there may be some religious or cultural significance as to which corner of the compass that one should, or could start the process. Once the second corner commences to indicate the falling over tendency as in corner one [1], you move to the third and then subsequently to the fourth or more corners and repeat the exercise. Once you return to the first corner of the room it is time for the disposal for all documents located at that position. The process then starts once again.

I am advised that the above is not a JOKE; this is the real life situation practiced in a real life organisation.

2. THE WHITE ANT – termite, RETENTION AND DISPOSAL – DISPOSITION POLICY:

Again I am advised that this is also a true life situation.

All inactive material is stored in cardboard boxes in the basement. The building has been constructed at some time in the past over the top of a disused timber sawmill.

All documents transferred to the basement are placed in cardboard boxes with all of the latest boxes being placed at the top level near the ceiling. The documents in the basement have never been culled over some SEVENTY – 70 years.

The reason for this inactivity of culling is that the unpaid workers, “white ants” keep destroying the lower level cartons on a consistent basis so that space never becomes a problem.

Try and beat this system on cost, or with the latest technology.

3. THE PYRAMID STORAGE SYSTEM:

I know this one to be real as I have seen it in operation, personally. Documentation from the organisation is transferred to the lowest cost centre.

This low cost centre is the basement where the existence of overhead pipes causes one to crouch when entering, and where sump pumps toil continuously, 24 hours a day to keep the water level at least six inches below the records.

Unused or unwanted or maybe even unloved documents are piled onto a hand trolley in the operational area and the documents are then transported to the basement where they are offloaded direct from the hand trolley into piles, sorry PYRAMIDS of paper.

Once a pyramid reaches the point of spread where it flows outward uncontrollably, a new pyramid is created. I am unsure of the sophistication of the removal of old pyramids or how a decision is made to remove old pyramids from the system, but this is a real life scenario in a government agency.

This forth situation is a little different from the three above.

This situation is a non written, non spoken but real life procedure applied in the operational process and culture of a government agency.

4. LOW COST OUTSOURCING IN THE MANAGEMENT OF OUTGOING CORRESPONDENCE:

When a request is made to the organisation, lets call them [ organisation A ] either verbally or in writing in response to a letter or correspondence outgoing from the organisation [ organisation A ], a request is made to [ the sending person or organisation B ] from which the verbal inquiry, letter or correspondence is received to supply a copy of the letter or correspondence sent to them in the first instance by the [ organisation A ].

Due to the fact that the [ organisation A ] has no method of knowing what letters or correspondence it has initiated or to whom the correspondence was sent they require the responding party [ the sending person or organisation B ] to provide a copy of their original outgoing correspondence from [ organisation A ] to enable them to know why the person or organisation [ the sending person or organisation B ] is making contact with them.

This is a deliberate policy of [ organisation A ] to overcome their inability to know what letters or correspondence is being sent out.

The process seems to work for this [ organisation A ] but I doubt that it could be claimed that it is a successful Public Relations exercise.

The person who advised me of this situation was in a senior position and thought the situation to be hilarious.

MANAGEMENT COSTS FOR CORRESPONDENCE CONTROL IS BORNE BY THE RECIPIENT or this is how it is perceived by some individuals in [ organisation A ].

I trust that by now you are CRYING professionally and not laughing.

Happy RIMing!

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 40 years.

Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU.

You can contact Laurie Varendorff @ email @ Laurie Varendorff ARMA; or Phone: Australia @ 0417 094 147 – International @ +61 417 094 147 at Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME.

The author, Laurie Varendorff gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and non-profit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

Please tell me why!

They tell me some organisations have banned the use of e-mails in their organisations!

They tell me that e-mails are Evil and should not be something we need to endure!

Well, I can tell you that if you banned me from using e-mails my business, professional and social life would come to an abrupt end.

When I get up in the morning and my PC is out of action I get a PANIC ATTACK. I do not know who I am, or what I need to do, or who my business and professional contacts are, or how to make contact either via phone, or the internet via e-mail. I do not know what the weather is unless its raining outside my window or the sun is shining on my face and waking me up from my dreamtime.

Even when the PC is working my first action is to see who, [if anyone] has been so kind to make contact with me overnight from some far off place in a different time zone and has been thoughtful enough to make contact with me while I was sleeping. If there are no e-mails I suspect that nobody loves me and I am unwanted or that I do not owe money to them or they do not need my assistance with something Records & Information Management – RIM or Micrographiclly related and would like my input.

In other words I LOVE e-MAILS! Without e-mails and or the Internet I could not operate and it is my personal assessment that e-mails are not the evil enemy but that we the users and management or a lack of good management or management process are the EVIL we need to address.

Please tell me why e-mails are this horrendous issue that we cannot get our minds around and such a monster that it cannot be tamed.

What is an e-mail anyhow but just another inward or outward piece of correspondence but in an electronic form?

YES! I know we get too many, but why?

Is it because we or the organisation has signed up with too many list serves or mail centres or newspapers or knowledge providers or whatever? They only do what we asked for and keep us up to date as we requested. OK, we get some we never asked for, I agree.

Is it the fact that the organisation has no policies and procedures for e-mail circulars. Yes! Many internal e-mails are just that, internal circulars gone made without a policy, procedure or process to manage same. In the paper days one had to be in the inner management circle or beg, cajole or take the bosses secretary to lunch to get on the circulation list to receive circulars. It was a power thing. Today we just CC.. or BCC.. everyone we know in the organisation irrespective of need. Guess what, we [more like the whole organisation minus someone lucky enough to have started yesterday or who has been omitted by IT from getting an e-mail address – the Lucky Souls] get inundated with stuff we have no need to know, or care about but we read it anyhow just in case and probably save a copy intentionally or unintentionally.

If we banned e-mails containing JOKES [ha ha!] or the distribution of corporate data, however important or unimportant the information, without the authority to circulate to a specified & controlled e-mail list of persons with a genuine need to know maybe our workload and good management practices could improve.

If I receive an e-mail, what do I do with it [remember e-mails are pieces of correspondence] and if it is a circular I read it and delete it unless it requires me to take some action or I have a need to respond to the correspondence. Do I need to make a copy and store it, or print it and put it on file? Hell NO! The content is in the corporate memory which was placed there by the initiator or sender in the Corporate RIM – ERDMS system. The system did the management of ONE only original e-mail and not hundreds or thousands of copies. Remember it isn’t Records Management – PLURAL, it is Record Management – SINGULAR.

Now please don’t tell me there is no electronic capability to capture e-mails into a Records & Document Management System – ERDMS! Because if there is none, well guess what, the problem is not our friend the evil e-mail but the lack of effective management processes or evil management inefficiency.

E-mails like any record or document should pass the test of being of sufficient value to be a part of the business process and need to be incorporated into the organisations record management system.

I recommend the following procedure involving five criteria for your assessment:

The criteria are:

1. Does the document or object, [physical or electronic] convey information considered essential or relevant in making a decision?
2. Does the document or object, [physical or electronic] convey information upon which others (including the organisation) will be, or are likely to be, making decisions affecting their business operations, or rights and obligations under legislation?
3. Does the document or object, [physical or electronic] commit the organisation or its officers to certain courses of action or the commitment of resources or provision of services?
4. Does the document or object, [physical or electronic] convey information about matters of public safety or public interest, or involve information upon which contractual undertakings are entered into?
5. Is the information likely to be needed for future use, or is it of historical value or interest?

It is therefore essential that great care is exercised to ensure the decision-making trail, which includes any of the documents or objects, [physical or electronic], e-mail or electronic transaction which meet any of the above five criteria, is recorded and placed on the relevant corporate file in the RIM – ERDMS system.

As in all business processes that humans manage or input to, we receive information in the way of incoming correspondence, be that hardcopy or electronic. We read the information and make a decision as to the validity of the information and if it should, or should not go into the corporate RIM – ERDMS system and act accordingly. The same goes for outgoing correspondence. It just happens that in our current dilemma with the supposed evil, this correspondence is in an e-mail format.

Nothing more and nothing less!

Happy e-mailing! You can’t live without it!

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 37 years. Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU. Phone: +618 9286 3705; mobile: +61 417 094 147; email @ Laurie Varendorff

The author, Laurie Varendorff of the Varendorff Records Management Consultancy – TVC – Helping clients manage their e-World gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and non profit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

Where is the synergy between these business operations?

The synergy is, or should be complete with total cooperation and collaboration between these parties!

Neither area cannot survive, one without the other.

In times past, in the paper environment Records Management (RM) stood alone with its ledgers and card systems controlling the recording of incoming and outgoing correspondence at a file level with each additional transaction recorded by hand. Each document was folioed (to number consecutively or sequentially the pages or leaves of a file or book with the latest entry in the case of a correspondence file being the top document) for each document (incoming originals and copies of outgoing correspondence) added to the physical paper file by the records persons located in the Records Registry System. This at least occurred in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and many other areas of the world where the British Empire stamped its authority, but I am reliably advised, not in the USA.

Today, the thought of having a register or a file system in a physical manner would in most, if not all organisations be looked upon as being a part of the early to mid and possibly late 1900’s and before and not a part of the new millennium, and so it should be.

Today, most, if not all records and information management systems are managed at the computer level irrespective of how limited, expansive or simple that computer system involvement may be.

The modern e-Records and Information Management personnel would, if not computer literate and proficient be destined to be a part of this history and delegated to the lasting vestiges along with PAPER, the TYRANT.

Today, paper is something we print out, take to meetings, and feel comfort in handling, reading and dispose of unless it is our favourite book, magazine or possibly a comic.

In today’s business world paper is scanned at the point of entry to an organisation (or if it isn’t, it should be) and converted to an electronic image. Outgoing correspondence is captured in its native born electronic format (or if it isn’t, it should be) and managed electronically by an RM or RIM in an RM, RIM, Electronic Document Management System (EDMS) or an Electronic Records and Document Management System (ERDMS).

Do the RM or RIM managers manage these systems? The answer is a strong, YES! Are these same persons able to support and manage the underlying structure of these systems? This time the answer is a big, NO!

Where is the support for the underlying IT & T or IT & C for the RM or RIM environment? It is usually and almost certainly not part of the RM or RIM manager’s area of responsibility but under the management and control of the IT & T or IT & C manager’s area of influence and control.

Do we as RM and RIM managers need to form a strategic alliance with the IT & T or IT & C division and its team? YES, we do and without this cooperation and or collaboration the RM or RIM process will fail.

Do the IT & T or IT & C and their personnel and management need the cooperation and collaboration of the RM or RIM team and management? And the answer is, YES!

Why? In this era of increasing corporate governance, both in the private and public sector the technocrats need the assistance of the RM or RIM team to know how to safeguard the organisation from the increasing legislative and legal precedent requirements in the day to day operation and maintenance of the corporate and government business processes. This input along with interaction, with and from legal council and the business process owner plus any other relevant parties, the organisation should be able to find the happy ground where technology supports the business process while at the same time keeping the data required (and also disposing of that information which is no longer required by law or business requirements via a controlled and authorised Retention & Disposal or Disposition process) by legislative, legal precedents, business operational needs. The process must also address the ethical, legal, moral and environmental concerns of the organisation, the law and society at large plus providing evidence of its history and at the same time providing a safe and secure return on investment for stakeholders and or investors.

Cooperation and collaboration are the name of the game while internal conflict in these areas is a recipe for institutional or corporate collapse.

Happy collaboration!

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 37 years. Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU. Phone: +618 9286 3705; mobile: +61 417 094 147; email @ Laurie Varendorff

This article was republished by the ARMA International, Gaithersburg MD chapter in their Volume 18, Number 4 – February – March 2007 Newsletter – New Images as the introductory article entitled – The Interdependency of RIM and IT By Laurie Varendorff.

For full details on the publication go to The ARMA International, Gaithersburg MD chapter Newsletter Volume 18, Number 4 – February – March 2007 – New Images located @ The Interdependency of RIM and IT By Laurie Varendorff

The author, Laurie Varendorff of the Varendorff Records Management Consultancy – TVC – Helping clients manage their e-World gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and non profit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

Does scanning/imaging improve efficiency?

Scanning/imaging in itself does not improve efficiency but the resultant ease of access, distribution and reduction in the mass of paper that has been scanned, plus access to the same data at the same time by multiple users locally or around the world gives this process power. Once scanned/imaged and appropriately indexed the information can be access by many of one or multiple images for a multitude of applications at the same time.

How long has scanning/imaging been with us?

Scanning/imaging is based on the principles used in the facsimile (FAX) machine.

Is this a new concept?

No! Not really, Alexander Bain patented the first fax design in 1843 though it took until 1865 for an Italian, Giovanni Caselli to make the concept work.

In 1902 Dr Arthur Korn developed a fax machine with an optical scanner that allowed plain paper images to be sent. Not really the latest thing on the block.

Anyhow, fast forward to 2005 and we now have high speed scanning/imaging devices with a scan speed of up to 230 sheets (460 pages duplex) of A4 = approximately US – A SIZE 8.5 X 11 inches per minute. Not bad throughput without paper jams or misfeeds, or so it is claimed by ScaMax with full details available @ SCAMAX® Document Scanners

Enough for GRUNT, how would I get 230 sheets of paper ready for scanning/imaging so I can get the throughput of 13,800 sheets of paper per hour out of the scanner? And herein lies the dilemma. The actual scanning/imaging is the easy part. The hard part is preparation e.g. getting the documents ready to scan, unfolding, removing staples etc and then sorting it in some limited way so as to gain the greatest degree of efficiency possible. Some of the tricks are to use barcodes before scanning, and or separation sheets to separate each document, file or batch of files. There are other smarts to obtaining the maximum efficiency available. Once we get the scanning/imaging completed we need to index the digital images created, be they .TIFF, .PDF or some other file format. Indexing is a big overhead and the smarter we can do the job the greater efficiency we can obtain. This is not the place to go into details but a number of options are available.

Now that we have the incoming, outgoing or backlog of paper documents be they 3 X 5 inch index cards up to A0 DIN @ 841 x 1189 mm or US – E @ 34 x 44 inch size drawings scanned/imaged, what next?

Now comes the best part where we reap the benefit of our toil.

As far back as 2000 I have been told that I was controversial by making the following statement – If an organisation is not scanning/imaging incoming documentation at the point of entry to the organisation they are derelict in their duty. This statement really gets people going, but I do believe it to be a truism in that the efficiency of multiple access, reduction in space, and access irrespective of the tyranny of distance and the potential to apply workflow (if appropriate) is something organisations should take by the horns and run with as a matter of duty and an almost life and death scenario in these days of increased competitiveness and need to get the most bang for the buck or do more with less at every level of an organisation.

If you have not considered scanning/imaging as offering potential areas of improved efficiency and cost savings please take another look. You may be surprised and hopefully you may find more dollars in your pocket after implementation of a scanning/imaging application than before the implementation of the system.

Happy scanning/imaging!

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 37 years. Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU. Phone: +618 9286 3705; mobile: +61 417 094 147; email @ Laurie Varendorff

The author, Laurie Varendorff of the Varendorff Records Management Consultancy – TVC – Helping clients manage their e-World gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and non profit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

Can Corporate and Government organisations scan and destroy their physical documents and files in todays technological and legislative environment?

With one or two Caveats they are doing exactly that and today.

In to-days business (I mean business in its broadest definition) environment where doing more with less is the day to day battle cry does an organisation need to keep its physical documents or files once they have been scanned into a reliable and trustworthy Electronic Record and Document Management System (ERDMS)?

The answer is MAYBE!

One may need to ask; is the scanned document critical to the business process, or does it have legal or mandated requirement to be kept in the original paper format, and or has it the potential to be worthy of preservation over time as a unique physical object for historical or other purposes?

The additional caveats are:

1. Has the document been captured in a scanning/imaging process that meets international or national quality standards as defined in e.g. ANSI-AIIM MS44-1988 – Recommended Practice for Quality Control of Image Scanners or possibly ISO/TR 15801:2004 – Electronic imaging — Information stored electronically — Recommendations for trustworthiness and reliability.

2. That the resultant images are entered into an appropriate reliable and trustworthy ERDMS and indexed (either automatically via the application of barcode or RFID tag scanning or manually by operator intervention) at the point of capture and linked to the applicable organisations approved Retention and Disposal – R&D or Disposition Schedule in that process and in this same timeframe as the meta-data capture.

3. That these images and other electronic data as identified by the ERDMS as having a medium to long term (I would recommend a minimum of 5 to 7 years or as required by local regulations as the medium to long term start point for movement to an archival media e.g. microfilm with an Life Expectancy – LE of up to 500 years) retention period to be converted to 16 or 35 mm microfilm in a roll film format with an index of the meta-data also written to the microfilm.

If the above criterion has been implemented and met, do we then proceed with the destruction of the paper documents in question?

I would suggest that the above detailed situation occurs today in full, or in part across numerous corporate and government organisations internationally today with or without approval of the relevant archival authority.

Were does this leave the corporations and persons operating Outsource Providers e.g. Records Centres – Offsite Document Storage Providers?

This scenario of a less paper environment offers different but potentially new and hopefully viable business opportunities for Outsource Providers e.g. Records Centres – Offsite Document Storage Providers.

Let’s paint a potential situation for consideration.

An organisation makes a decision to go as digital as possible with its documented business process and operational environment. First it needs to ask itself a number of questions which may include;

1. Is it feasible to implement?

2. If it is feasible, is there driving operational and financial improvement reasons for doing so?

3. Does it want to do the job internally?

4. Does it want to open all incoming mail and then transfer all paper documents to a digital format internally?

5. Is opening and scanning incoming mail its core business?

6. Does it make sense to outsource this activity to an external party?

7. Who is best suited to handling this type of operation?

The answer, possibly Outsource Providers e.g. Records Centers – Offsite Document Storage Providers!

Can an Outsource Providers e.g. Records Centers – Offsite Document Storage Providers pick up the mail at midnight or early morning from an organisations mail handling facility, open and sort that mail and then scan all of it into an imaging system? Can they then suitably index each document (either automatically via barcode or RFID tag scanning or manually by operator intervention) have all of the images sent electronically (in a secure encrypted package) to your clients ERDMS system ready for to be worked upon at the clients relevant PC terminals at the start of business for the day whatever time that ma be?

Technically and operationally the answer is a resounding, YES!

Who else is better suited to provide this service than those parties currently intimately involved and conversant with the management of paper documentation, Records Centers – Offsite Document Storage Providers!

The additional service of converting all identified medium with long term retention requirements including meta-data, information and records to 16/35 mm roll microfilm and to store that microfilm at 10 Degrees Centigrade with a 30-40% humidity environment suitable for microfilms longevity e.g. a Life Expectancy – LE of up to 500 years is an additional service offering worthy of consideration.

What wonderful opportunities for outsource providers to consider!

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 37 years. Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU. Phone: +618 9286 3705; mobile: +61 417 094 147; email @ Laurie Varendorff

The author, Laurie Varendorff of the Varendorff Records Management Consultancy – TVC – Helping clients manage their e-World gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and non profit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

It appears that the first use of e-mail was at MIT in 1961.

Heaven take pity on the poor person who inflicted this bounty, or curse upon the business world.

I actually love and cannot operate effectively without the use of emails be they incoming or outgoing correspondence.

Today, we are advised, or was that yesterday, the following statistics: Worldwide there are now 45 billion e-mails created each day, and 22 billion or 49% of these are business related. In addition 60% of critical business data is contained in e-mails. E-mail storage needs are growing at 40% per year, and that printing volumes increase by 40% in an office after e-mail is introduced. Sources: PWC and Osterman Research.

How are we handling this avalanche of incoming and outgoing e-correspondence which we are advised is business related?

Throw technology at it, and that will solve the problem!

I often hear quoted that there are too many e-mails for humans to be able to address the issue.

HEY, wait a minute, do not humans create and receive these e-mail messages and decide if they are business oriented or non records?

I get lost with this concept that the machines will do all of the work for us and that we as the human interface with our clients and the organisation are something to be bypassed and replaced by some software, technology or machine!

We do the work, and the software, technology and the machines are our assistants to minimise our workload or to speed up the process. Do I want my IT system to weed out all of the e-mail spam? Heck YES! And in caps! And do I want the IT processes to filter our all of the viruses, Trojan horses and the rest of the garbage? Again, a big YES!

Do I want the IT system and the software, technology and machines to interpret the 22 billion e-mails that have business relevance and require individual, executive or corporate decisions to be made? Hell NO! That’s my job, that’s my responsibility, and that’s my intellect.

Are there some e-mails that I request to be replied to as a response to some process or sales campaign, or community input that I organised to be performed via some automated process to be managed by the IT System and software of a machine? I have to answer, YES!

But this is not the majority of business e-mails that the IT industry is promising to grab for me and take the responsibility of managing. What the IT industry claims to be able to do is WHAT! Automate my intellectual working process so I can become a zombie from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM. Please, give me a break.

E-mail worthy of capture is a business document which, in the majority of cases requires the attention of a real live person. That person decides how to address the content of the e-mail, & that person desirably has an Electronic Records & Document Management System (ERDMS) with appropriate facilities that allows the real live person to index the incoming or outgoing e-mail (e-correspondence) & place it into an electronic file (an e-record) so that it has content & context in the business process. This is what Records Management (RM) or Records & Information Management (RIM) is all about, & all I ask is please, have the IT industry treat me some respect & not to insult my intelligence with the promise to do away with me & make it all happen without any human input.

As they say at the gym, or on the sporting field, NO PAIN NO GAIN! The same goes for the Records & Information Management (RIM); if the correspondence has to be read by a human or created by a human that human should take on the responsibility of indexing that data with the appropriate fields so that we, let alone anyone else can find it again.

It is called good business process & practice & the issue of findability should be high on the agenda along with a Business Classification Scheme (BCS) which is the foundation for doing some of the desirable automation with the linking of records to Records General Retention & Disposition Schedules. A BSC in place could possibly address the latest & greatest buzz phrase, Information Life-Cycle Management – ILM & make it a reality rather than hype or blue sky stuff as it currently stands. Maybe the clams of nirvana or utopia via the use of ILM could be realised IF, & only IF a workable BCS happened to be in place before ILM was implemented. Having a BCS in place is good, NO essential RIM practice.

Go e-mail! I love you!

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 37 years. Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU. Phone: +618 9286 3705; mobile: +61 417 094 147; email @ Laurie Varendorff

The author, Laurie Varendorff of the Varendorff Records Management Consultancy – TVC – Helping clients manage their e-World gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and non profit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

The presentation – Why the Americans are beating the Australians at Records Management! – of the 26th November 2004 is based on Laurie’s attendance at the ARMA 2004 Conference in Long Beach, California from the 2nd to the 6th October 2004 and subsequent travel across the US. Laurie spent numerous hours with senior records management practitioners from across North America discussing the current state of play in the US environment. The presentation is now available for viewing or to download at the following online location Why the Americans are beating the Australians at Records Management!

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 37 years. Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU. Phone: +618 9286 3705; mobile: +61 417 094 147; email @ Laurie Varendorff

The author, Laurie Varendorff gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and non profit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

When we look at how RFID technology has made an impact in certain areas it is curious that it has not yet had an impact in the Records and Information Management Profession and its related and supporting industries.

With the US DoD – Department of Defense, The Gillette Company, Wal*Mart Stores, Inc., The Procter & Gamble Company, Johnson & Johnson, DHL Solutions, and many others embracing, or investigating the potential for the use of, and the potential efficiencies offered by RFID why have we, the Information Management Industry not been one of the parties included in the every expanding list of users above?

Let’s get back to basics.

What is Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)?

The EPCglobal Network website @ EPCglobal Network website states the following: RFID stands for radio frequency identification. It is a technology that has existed for decades. At a simple level, it is a technology that involves tags that emit radio signals and devices called readers that pick up the signal. RFID technology is a fundamental element of the EPCglobal Network. Once you have read this article, then hopefully (if I have done my job correctly) you will need to research additional information related to RFID technology and the EPCglobal Network website @ EPCglobal Network website is just the place to start your research.

What is the EPCglobal Network?

EPCglobal Inc. is a joint venture between EAN International and the Uniform Code Council (UCC) and is governed by the EPCglobal Board of Governors.

The stated aims of EPCglobal Inc. are:

The Board of Governors of EPC Global will guide the organization towards achieving worldwide adoption and standardization of EPC technology in an ethical and responsible way. The Board will have between 15 and 21 members with an emphasis on end-users of the technology who are early adopters. The composition of the board will reflect the diversity of industries and geographies that EPC technology will span in the coming decades. Members of the board will be selected not only for their organizational affiliations, but also for individual expertise, their personal commitment and their leadership in global commerce.

Enough of the basics and who the driving forces are, and down to “What’s In It For Me (WIIFM)”!

I recently visited the US and my daughter had just moved to Oklahoma City. To get from point to point we needed to use the Turnpike/Expressway. Having the right change in coins and knowing when and where to pull off to pay the Tool Fee was an inconvenience.

Solution: Purchase a Toll Pass. What is the toll pass device but a RFID Unit (I say Unit rather than Tag) because this device has a power source and is not a Passive Unpowered reflector type RFID device. It has an aerial inbuilt which does not require the identification of the Tag to rely on an external source for its energy as it is a self powered, stand alone unit as against [the mobile reading wand or a static sensor at the point of entry and exit to a store or library which use Passive Unpowered Tags ] so as to be able to reflect or transmit a signal back from the Passive Unpowered Tag to the powered sensor. The Toll Pass RFID unit can both transmit and receive data in its own right due to it being powered.

The RFID signal unit is mounted on the front windscreen of the vehicle and as one speeds along the Turnpike/Expressway at 50 or 60 MPH when one approaches the toll station a fixed RFID signal transmitter mounted above or below the roadway sends out a continuous signal and the RFID unit mounted in the vehicle has the ability to turn itself on or off based on this external trigger and then it sends out a signal in response (as it has its own power source) with its own ID and if you have paid your account you receive a visual indicator beside the roadway which advises you that all is well and that you have paid your toll fee. A message is provide which states e.g. Thank you for using the XX Turnpike/Expressway or Have a wonderful day, etc.

If by chance you are getting low on the funds you have paid into your Toll Pass account the display on the Turnpike/Expressway will advise you e.g. you have XX miles left on your account or if you have an automatic top up to your Toll Pass account the message may advise that they will be taking funds from your account based on some predefined arrangements. If no arrangements are in place the display will advise you to transfer some funds to your Toll Pass account. If none of the above is actioned they take a photo of your vehicle number plate and send you a reminder notice or if all else fails send you a demand notice for non payment for using the Turnpike/Expressway.

OK you already knew about the Turnpike/Expressway system! But wait a minute what is involved here and can we do something of the same in our Records Center environment.

Let’s think out of the BOX (pun) ? here!

Let’s say we do the following:

When we sell/supply storage boxes to our clients we also incorporate a Passive Unpowered Tag built into the fabric of each box (or if we really get serious with each file cover) and we charge the client as we do now for the boxes and or (FILE COVERS) which incorporates the RFID Passive Unpowered Tag. If we sell the RFID Passive Unpowered Tag as a separate item then the cost is a visible component for the client to see on his or her invoice. If on the other hand we have successfully promoted the concept of being able to provide improved efficiency and e.g. faster turn around times or some other improvement as an updated service being provided and the cost of that improved service is by virtue of its desirability accounted for in slightly increased charges for the storage boxes provided. This concept also locks the client into possibly using only our boxes (or even file covers or some other relevant product) supplied by your organisation which enables the client and ourselves to reap the benefit of this improved efficiency. The WIN – WIN situation we are all striving to achieve.

What about the RFID enabled FILE COVERS? Is the supply of file covers a revenue stream that you currently enjoy, (if so, CONGRATULATIONS!) or are the file covers being supplied by other parties? If you were able to have all, or even some of your clients purchase file covers with embedded RFID Passive Unpowered Tag included, would your revenue stream increase, and also Improve your profit margin?

Where could, or should you use RFID technology in your organisation?

Sorry, but I am not a Specialist involved in the day to day operation of a Records Center within the Commercial Information Management Industry so I will attempt to give you some ideas based on my limited perspective that you may wish to consider.

Maybe the following statement from the US Department of Defense will convince you of the potential breadth of applications that they believe that RFID technology will encompass.

[DoD/USA, 23.10.2003] The US Department of Defense announced the establishment of a RFID Policy. All items shall be tagged, except sand, gravel and liquids.

WOW, except sand, gravel and liquids. Now that leaves one or two (million or is that billion, or trillion) items available to be provided with RFID tags as a part of this DoD directive.

The new DoD policy will require suppliers to put passive RFID tags on the lowest possible piece part/case/pallet packaging by January 2005.

Pretty inclusive!

Do you, or does this industry in general wish to join this revolution? Early adopters will gain the most benefit and no doubt may register some pain if they get it wrong at this relatively early stage in the widespread implementation of RFID applications.

When I do my shopping at the local supermarket I have a chat with the check out operators and one young operator I meet from time to time (he dropped six bottles of my wine some years ago so we remember each other) I keep pointing out to him the potential of him not having a job at some future time (I believe sooner that some people think) when all of the items in the store have an RFID Tag and not a Barcode. When this process is in place no more CHECK OUT PERSONS as I will fill my trolley with products and I will pass a static RFID device which will read all RFID TAGS and give me a total cost for my trolley for me to accept and pay, or to query the account. At the same time my shopping trolley will be weighed and the contents listed on my charge slip will be calculated against the known weight of the goods registered via the RFID process and I will be allowed to proceed, or if there is a discrepancy between the two, a real live human will intervene and address the situation. Maybe I had my grand-daughter sitting in the trolley and as she does not have an RFID Tag so she upsets the status quo of the weight checking process.

I know, I know, what has this got to do with your business and the Commercial Information Management Industry?

My answer, EVERYTHING!

It shows us what might, or will be possible.

If e.g. we did not have to place barcode labels on boxes manually (hopefully currently your storage boxes are provided with barcodes when they are manufactured for you and also printed with your organisations details), but I digress. We will assume that for the sake of this exercise that the manual addition of barcodes is provided either by your staff, or that of your clients is the current state of play.

What other manual task are we required to perform in the process of:

1. filling a box with files at the client’s location;

2. picking up the box from the client and recording it for transport to your facility;

3. recording the arrival of the box at your facility;

4. transporting the box to the stack/shelving and recording the position for maintenance and retrieval.

If we had an arrangement with the client for the Records Center to identify and record each file in a box for future retrieval there would be more manual and chargeable work to be carried out on the boxes received from the client at their point of entry to the Records Center.

As an alternative if we now move to an operational RFID environment what would, or could change?

1. The client would wand each file containing a RFID Passive Unpowered Tag (as they do currently with a file cover that is bar-coded) but this time instead of wanding each file cover individually the client would fill each box with a grouping of files (in sequence or at random) and then pass the RFID wand over, or by the box in one sweep and all file covers located in that box along with the box RFID would be sensed and the resultant intelligent data file registered into the clients system (maybe you have another revenue stream opportunity here in supplying the RFID hardware and software to the client?). When the number of boxes in question has being completed for that grouping of files this data would, or could be transmitted from the clients database to your Records Center and or pickup vehicle and a hard copy or electronic copy of the shipment details being kept with the shipment.

2. On receipt by the pickup vehicle from the clients site of the shipment if the shipment details had been transmitted to the pickup vehicle the pickup person would have a copy of the data file in the vehicle and also in a hand held device. On arriving at the pickup point the pickup person would wand the shipment and verify it correctness or identify any missing boxes and or files and take appropriate action.

3. On transfer of the boxes to the vehicle the process of cross checking would, or may be repeated as the vehicle would have an RFID sensor at its entry point and a match, or mismatch of the shipment loaded would be verified or an exception report generated.

4. On arrival at the Records Center the process would reoccur with the shipment passing a static sensor of some capability with a length of field of signal response suitable for the application whatever that distance is e.g. one or fifty feet or one or fifty yards.

5. The boxes would then be loaded onto the stack/shelving either in sequence or at random and the location identified by the stacker RFID sensor noting the stack/shelving location and the box being placed in that location (plus the file ID if we had included RFID Passive Unpowered Tag on each file cover). An ongoing audit of the storage facility could be carried our by the stacker unit sensing all RFID Passive Unpowered Tags on the physical stack/shelving locations as it went about its daily routine of the loading and unloading of boxes from the stack/shelving. This process would eliminate the need to carry out daily, weekly or monthly (or some other time frame) audits of the actual location of boxes or files. (I am making an assumption here that some sort of audit process is carried out from time to time to verify box and file locations within the Records Center so that any misfiles, errors and or exceptions can be identified and rectified.)

Does this hypothetical RFID application detailed above have, or provide the opportunity for improvements in efficiency and the possibility of reductions in overheads and improved profit margins?

NOTE: The RFID Passive Unpowered Tag type and the fixed sensor requirements and distance reading capabilities would have been assessed and decided upon way back in the preparation of a Request for Proposal (RFP) or an Expression of Interest (EOI) which would have been a part of an in-depth evaluation at the start of the investigation on the merits, or otherwise of moving to a RFID environment.

The big question – DO I WISH TO JOIN?

And if so DO I DO IT NOW, OR WAIT AWHILE and see what others do?

As with any improvements in technology the early adopters may be the ones to gain the most benefit.

E.g. When transportation changed to the motor vehicle (horseless carriage) from the horse and cart who gained the most benefit?

When the telephone was introduced did the persons who had the ability to pick up a handset and talk across the road, city, state or country and later across the oceans derive any benefit over those who had to walk across the road or city or send a letter by hand or via the telegraph?

Yes, it is your call. I can only attempt to postulate as to what benefit, if any is available in you’re making the move, be it NOW, SOON or LATER. It is up to you to decide.

Some information on RFID Tags:

RFID Passive tags have read ranges limited to a few feet. ActiveWave RFID tags have a read range of up to 85 meters (~279 feet).

Passive tags have limited data storage capacity compared to the ActiveWave RFID active tags.

Passive tags send data only when they are in close proximity to the RFID reader. Because of the large read range, ActiveWave RFID tags can send data at pre-designated intervals or at certain locations.

There are differing types of RFID Tags:

Read Only Tags: The transponders generally provide a fixed factory-set identification code, which is tamperproof, and are known as Read Only (R/O). The unique code, known as a License Plate, enables the tag to be cross-referenced with a database, thereby allowing the tagged item to be closely followed and monitored.

Read/Write Tags: The customer can modify the tag’s data. This offers advantages in many applications where the identification code needs to be changed, or where variable data is more important than a unique identity.

There are differing features available in RFID Systems:

Multi-Tag True Anti-Collision Capability: One of the outstanding features of the ActiveWave RFID system is its true anti-collision capability. This feature ensures data integrity, when several RFID tags are read simultaneously.

Case studies in the application of RFID Technology:

You may care to visit the following sites to check on what is happening in RFID applications across the globe. The RFID Knowledgebase for 1,159 case studies from 1,321 companies @ The RFID Knowledgebase for 1,159 case studies from 1,321 companies, Application of RFID Technology in managing documents: Document Tracking Applications from Texas Instrument RFID division @ Document Tracking Applications from Texas Instrument RFID division, Express Parcel ID @ Express Parcel ID

Want to know more?

The following web sites should answer your queries.

EPCglobal Inc™ @ EPCglobal Inc™

AIM Global, the Association for Automatic Identification and Mobility @ AIM Global, the Association for Automatic Identification and Mobility

Have we got you interested?

Want to give RFID a go?

Ready to test the water and check on the possibilities available to you?

Well here is your chance. Go to the Texas Instruments website @ Texas Instruments website and check on the test kits available. This may be one way of getting involved and seeing if some of the applications I suggested previously in this article are viable or just pipe dreams which will provide a very soft entry point with a limited potential to inflict pain if you believe this to be the BLEEDING EDGE OF THIS TECHNOLOGY.

I trust that this information on RFID technology gives you an insight on what is, or what may be an opportunity for this industry to be more efficient, and hopefully more profitable.

Happy RIMing, Laurie Varendorff ARMA

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 37 years. Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU. Phone: +618 9286 3705; mobile: +61 417 094 147; email @ Laurie Varendorff

Please Note: This article was first produced in the publication – InFOCUS Magazine – The Quarterly Journal of PRISM International – December 2004 Edition on page (16) and is now avaialable on this website as a part of our agreement.

The author, Laurie Varendorff gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and non profit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

In 2003 the National Archives of Australia (NAA) established the Australian Digital Recordkeeping Initiative as part of an ongoing program which commenced back in the early 1990’s with the release of the culmination of effort by numerous parties including the NAA, the State Records Authority of New South Wales (SRANSW) plus many other government agencies, private industry, professional associations and Standards Australia in the release of the then revolutionary Records Management Standards, AS4390.

Prior to the 1990’s here had been increasing unease in the archive profession and its governing responsible bodies located in State and Nation Archive institutions and professional associations nationally and internationally with the apparent inability to capture and preserve born electronic information in an electronic archive environment. This realisation became a cry for help and a call for action in the early 1990’s and possibly before this time by historians and those persons responsible for preserving the history of nations and lesser entities which go to make up the history of the nation.

With the introduction of very primitive personal computers [PC’s] with the release of the Apple 1 back in 1976 and probably of more importance the introduction of the IBM Personal PC in 1981 a vacuum in the capture and preservation of government, corporate and personal data, information, and records created electronically occurred as the information was retained within these devices and died with them as they were recycled or sent to the tip.

Dr Andrew Wilson – Project Manager – Managing Digital Records for Access (MADIRA) of the NAA (also known as the Archives) advises that the long-term preservation of electronic information is, of course, only one component of a comprehensive approach to managing digital records, but nevertheless it is one of the central issues faced by institutions responsible for preserving access to digital objects over time. Dr Wilson believes that it is important to remember that preservation fits within a broader framework of recordkeeping. So, the Archives activities in the area of digital records preservation need to be seen in the wider context of a developing approach to managing digital records. As in any developing policy the Archives’ position has changed over time. In the mid-1990s the Archives adopted a controversial policy of distributed custody for digital records. This policy reflected the Archives’ view at the time that the best way to preserve electronic records of permanent archival value was to ensure that Australian Government agencies implemented best practice in electronic recordkeeping. The Archives’ role was to enable the adoption of best practice recordkeeping through the setting of standards and provision of high-quality advice. Throughout the mid to late 1990s the Archives’ continued to be closely and actively involved in developments in electronic recordkeeping in the Australian and international recordkeeping communities.

The initial work carried out by the Archives with AS4390 continued to provide input into the creation of the international records management standard, ISO 15489 released internationally in September 2001. By the late 1990s, beginning in 1998, the Archives embarked on an ambitious research and development program which culminated in the release, in March 2000, of the e-permanence framework. This release also signaled a change in the Archives distributed custody policy, brought about by advances in the Archives’ understanding of electronic records management issues and the increased availability of innovative technology. The new custody policy released in 2000 gave an in-principle undertaking by the Archives to accept custody of all electronic records that are appraised as having archival value. The change in custody policy initiated the development of a digital preservation program in the Archives.

The first stage of the program, which commenced in mid-2001, was the development of a conceptual understanding of electronic records using previous insights of the Archives to do with the importance of information as evidence which is significant over time, not the form of the object. This work led to the ‘essential performance’ model which is fully described in the Archives green paper: “An Approach to the Preservation of Digital Records” (2002): http://www.naa.gov.au/recordkeeping/er/digital_preservation/summary.html.

The green paper outlines the approach which has been adopted by the Archives: records are accepted into NAA custody in a variety of formats and then converted (‘normalised’) into appropriate long-term formats which can be maintained and made accessible over time. Following the publication of the green paper the Archives started work on developing tools to realise its vision and to enable it to implement the approach. The first of these, and probably the most significant, is Xena, an open-source software application for normalising and viewing digital records. The Xena source code is available from the open-source software site, SourceFORGE, at: http://sourceforge.net/projects/xena/. The digital preservation project is now in the process of being turned into an operational area within the Archives and the digital preservation process should be fully operational by the middle of 2005. Because of the very practical nature of the work being undertaken by NAA, many other archival institutions both in Australia and overseas have looked to the NAA products when developing their own approaches to digital recordkeeping and preservation. In recognition of this the Archives established in 2003 the Australian Digital Recordkeeping Initiative, a coalition of the Australian and New Zealand archival institutions which aims to consolidate and further develop a common approach to digital recordkeeping, including preservation.

The Archives have not been alone in their quest to provide a platform for the capture and preservation of electronic information. Other parties such as the Public Record Office Victoria (PROV) Victorian Electronic Records Strategy (VERS) within Australia and internationally in North America the National Archives & Records Administration (US) (NARA) with its interaction with the San Diego Supercomputer Centre’s National Partnership for Advanced Computational Infrastructure and in Europe the UK National Archives are all attempting to provide a viable solution for the preservation of electronic data, information and records. Dr Wilson advises that NARA does not yet have anything in the way of an explicit approach – that is what their two tenderers are in the process of developing. But there is nothing concrete that anyone can look at and say – this is the NARA approach. So, the Archives cannot make comments on the viability of their approach or otherwise, but the Archives would note, in passing, that the scale of their digital preservation problem is so much larger than ours at the NAA so what works for us might not work in the US context, and vice-versa. Nor is there any necessary reason to think that our different approaches (if indeed they do turn out to be different) should work in other jurisdictional contexts. So, the Archives want to make quite clear that they do not believe that it is appropriate for NAA to criticise other approaches. But the Archives are perfectly happy to say why they adopted their own approach in comparison with others.

As for the NAA and VERS approaches, they are remarkably similar in that they both focus on normalising records into XML – based archival formats. At the Archives they believe that their approach is preferable to the VERS approach for several reasons, but the Archives want to emphasise that they are not really that dissimilar. They think it’s important to retain various features of digital records that are not possible to keep with the VERS formats (PDF, TIFF, and plaintext). Our “essential performance” model allows us this flexibility and means that they do not specify a limited range of acceptable data formats for transferred records, as the VERS approach does. Also, the federal government environment is different from the Victorian government environment, and means that the Archives could not mandate particular acceptable formats as the PROV is able to, even if they wanted to adopt such a mechanism for limiting transfer formats. The VERS approach is still in the early days of implementation (only 2 departments are currently VERS compliant) and the Archives approach will not become operational until next year, so it is still a matter of seeing whether time proves that our approaches are viable.

The other approach the Archives might discuss is the one adopted by the UK National Archives. Their current approach is to migrate records from the proprietary formats in which they are created into new versions of the formats as the previous ones become obsolete. This is certainly an attractive solution in some regard, but the Archives do not believe that it would be a viable approach for them in the long term. When the Archives were developing their own conceptual approach, they did examine other approaches, including migration. They came to the conclusion that migration was not an approach that they wanted to use for various reasons: – some attributes of the original record are lost during the conversion process resulting in a different performance, while their aim is to maintain as closely as possible the original performance; – since the formats are proprietary ones they do not have any control over what is or isn’t lost in the conversion, unlike the case in the Archives approach; – migration requires significant resource commitments to a cyclical process of converting records from obsolete formats (NB: This is set out in fuller detail in the green paper referred to previously in this article). This does not mean that the migration approach won’t work in the UK context, or that the Archives do not approve of this approach. All the Archives can say is that for several reasons that seemed convincing to us, the Archives does not want to follow this particular approach.

In any case, the Archives want to insist that none of us claim that they have “the solution”. the Archives only say that they have what they think is a viable approach to the problem of preserving digital records for the long term. It might prove to be the case that they (archival institutions dealing with the problem of long-term preservation of digital objects) need to use all the approaches for various parts of their collections. It might eventually turn out that no one approach is enough to preserve all records for the long term.

Only time will tell.

Dr Wilson advises that the solutions being researched and implemented at this time are designed to address electronic records created today and into the future. At this point in time, it is not envisaged to go back to the 1970 or the 1980’s and attempt to capture and preserve all the electronic records created since that time.

Dr Wilson doesn’t believe that the approaches currently under development are being designed to address the issues of legacy electronic/digital records. These are quite a different matter from the digital records being created today. Custodial institutions will need to develop different strategies for dealing with such records. In his view the gap between today’s digital preservation capabilities and the ability to preserve legacy formats will always exist. There are a couple of reasons for this: the impermanence of the media used to carry and store electronic records, and the wide range of operating systems and software applications that were used. The first step that needs to happen in order to try to fill the gap is to transfer data from the legacy media onto modern media, such as CDs and DVDs. Not that either of these are archival storage media, but at least such a transfer will allow modern computers to access the legacy data. The second necessary step is to interpret the data and then to maintain this in an appropriate archival data format. A significant issue with legacy data is the disappearance of the hardware that is able to mount and read the legacy media – an urgent reason to attempt media conversion as soon as possible.

At the NAA they have been running a project to recover the legacy electronic records in their custody. This has involved working with a private sector data conversion company to firstly transfer data from the legacy media to high-quality CDs. The second step in this project is to attempt to read and interpret the data formats which have been recovered through the media conversion processes. The Archives have been pleasantly surprised by the very high success rates they have had with the first stage of the project – data recovery is in the order of 92%.

They are about to begin the second stage of the project, attempting to read and normalise the recovered data, so the Archives can’t yet comment on the overall outcomes of the project. They are hopeful, however, that a high proportion of the data will be intelligible and that they will eventually be able to normalise it. Their experience may not be typical, however.

The quantity of legacy records in the custody of the Archives is small, and the number of legacy media types they needed to convert was also small. The majority of the legacy media were various size floppy disks, and these did not present much of a problem to transfer to new media. They do not have the problem of facing several archival institutions and other collecting bodies, of having extremely large numbers (in the hundreds of thousands, if not millions) of magnetic tapes that need to be converted to modern media. In some cases, the sheer quantity of the legacy media involved may mean that the conversion task is not physically possible within the remaining life of the magnetic material.

The rather gloomy prediction that maybe the 1970’s to the present legacy data may be lost to future generations if the data was not printed to paper and preserved, may in fact be true in some jurisdictions.

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 37 years. Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU. mobile: +61 417 094 147; email @ Laurie Varendorff

Please Note: This article was first published in the publication – Image and Data Manager – January / February 2005 Edition on page (26) Records Management. Available @ Well Preserved

The author, Laurie Varendorff gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and nonprofit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he, as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

When one is attempting to locate information [no matter where it is stored or for what reason] it is said that not to be able to find the information [which is known to have been captured] is worse than never having captured the information in the first place.

What is discovery? The act of discovering something; or a productive insight; or (law) compulsory pretrial disclosure of documents relevant to a case; enables one side in a litigation to elicit information from the other side concerning the facts in the case. Source: onelook.com

What is Searchability? I was unable to locate a definition at Onelook and its 6,153,428 words in 972 dictionaries indexed but there is a website by Paula Dragutsky @ searchability.com which address the subject that is basically a methodology to help people use search engines to do research on the web.

What is Findability? Again, I was unable to locate a definition at Onelook but it referred me to –Find-Discover; or determine the existence, presence, or fact of or after a calculation, investigation, experiment, survey, or study or come upon after searching; find the location of something that was missed or lost; and again, a productive insight. There are several excellent websites dedicated to improved finding aids for use on the internet e.g. findability.org and boxesandarrows.com they are worth a visit.

I will express my preference and state that I prefer the term Findability for use with the www and RM.

After attending the ARMA 2004 Conference in Long Beach from 3rd to 5th October I was very much Records Managemented Out and especially after spending 27 hours on an aero plane on my way back to Perth. Not being one to give up easily I began reading all the session papers from the event that I had been unfortunate not to have attended.

After this exercise I began thinking what wonderful tools we have at our disposal in the RM profession for findability. With the use of tools such as e.g. Taxonomy; – thesauri, thesaurus or thesauruses; -ontology; – functional thesauri; – business classification schemes; – information architecture; – metadata; – metatags; – controlled vocabularies; naming system, etc. we have, [or should] an advantage over our non-RM colleagues in never losing the data or information received and hopefully indexed when it enters, is created within, or leaves our organisations.

Ever tried entering a misspelt word in Google [or for that matter any other of the major search engines] to see what you receive as a result? Give it a go and be prepared to be surprised at what you get back. In my example I entered the misspelt wording of “plam pilot” complete with the “ to restrict my search results and received 1,380 hits in only 0.45 seconds but Google did ask Did you mean to search for: “palm pilot, yes I did, but there were all of these misspelt results out there in www land. When I agreed with Google that plam was a misspelling and clicked on the correction I received 1,300,000 hits for palm pilot.

But which one did I want? If any. Why did I search on the term in the first place and how do I get to the one or several hits that are of interest and value to me? If you follow Paula Dragutsky advice at his Findability website, you may succeed in your quest.

But what are we doing in RM?

It is my belief and that of many in this RM profession that Functional File Classification or Functional Business Process/Activity Classification is the or at least the best answer currently to be able to capture information and to find it in the future or even tomorrow.

Functional File Classification has been in vogue in Australia [predominately in government agencies at all levels] for some time and was a concept promoted as part of the 1996 Australian Standards for Records Management AS4390 parts 1 & 2. The concept is also a part of the International Standard for Records Management ISO 15489 Parts 1 & 2 as item 4.2.2. Business Activity Classification, 4.2.3 Vocabulary incorporating 4.2.3.1 Vocabulary Controls – list of authorised headings and 4.2.3.3 Thesaurus then 4.3.4 Classification, including all its related components.

The use of a functional classification, vocabulary control “VC” and hierarchical listing of terminology consistent across an organisation provides other benefits with the potential for automatic linking of files to retention and disposition schedules. This last process is something that is driving the RM industry in the USA and elsewhere with the realisation that the appropriate disposal of records based on an approved or legislated timeframe is or could be the Saviour in addressing an organisations responsibility in THE court room or with legislative oversight bodies.

I have provided a presentation titled Why the Americans are beating us at Records Management! on the 26th November here in Perth based on my assessment of the situation on the ground in the RM arena in the USA. Copies of this presentation are available online @congresswest.com.au.

In a real-life RM environment, we have a different set of requirements to that of locating information from the internet.

When the CEO of the organisation or for that matter any supervisor or a client is on the phone requesting details from a file, we want the file and or the document in question and now while the person is on the phone and not one of 1 plus Million hits that will take us hours or event days to decipher, which sadly is the case in some organisations.

In my past life I was a distributor for an RM software product and in training sessions I demonstrated the ability of the software to find the and only the record [file] I wished to locate using a functional drill down approach.

By bringing up the Function applicable even if we are guessing as to the function and selecting the most appropriate one of twenty [20] or thirty [30] or even forty [40] or so Functions [if one has over fifty [50] Functions or in most instances then something is wrong, or possibly wrong in the process of defining functions in your organisation] then seeing the list of second level Activity Descriptors applicable for that Function and then selecting the appropriate Activity Descriptor, [usually not a massive list [sometime two [2] or three [3] and up to twenty [20] or thirty [30] or so Activity Descriptors as a maximum, we can drill down to the file we require. With this process we can then limit the selection down to the third level of the title of the file, the Subject Descriptors or as I prefer the term [Topic or Transaction] which are subsets of that selected Activity Descriptor. Once we get to this point, we have a list of the fourth level terms which in 99.9% of systems is a free text field. This is here we find the file and I mean only the file related to our requirements and query.

Trust me, IT WORKS if we have done our homework at the start and applied a Controlled Vocabulary across the organisation plus implemented a Functional Business Process/Activity Scheme from day one and before we implemented out Electronic Records Management System “ERMS”. This findability provides for improved efficiency and the provision of answers to queries in a timely manner.

What do we mean by a Controlled Vocabulary? A simple example:

If our ERMS did not have a controlled vocabulary the following may apply:

Let’s look at the following words: Petrol, Gas, Diesel, Methylated Spirits, Ethanol, Methanol Hydrogen, Petroleum, Compressed Natural Gas, Oil, Crude Oil, Fossil Fuels and possibly more terms. If we were searching for a possible fuel type and we asked for one or some of these terms in our search criteria we would find files related to certain types of fuel dependent on our breadth of query and may miss out on some important results.

If on the other hand, had, we implemented a controlled vocabulary the following would apply.

If we had listed the word Fuel as our preferred term and had advised the use of the term as the preferred term, we would then have this scenario.

Fuel: Definition or Scope Note: A material with potential energy which can be transferred into kinetic energy, or as heat or mechanical work. Non-solid fuels include oil and gas (both fuel types have myriad varieties). Solid fuels include coal, wood, and peat. All these types of fuel are combustible, they create fire and heat.

Use for: Petrol, Gas, Diesel, Methylated Spirits, Ethanol, Methanol Hydrogen, Petroleum, Compressed Natural Gas, Oil, Crude Oil, Fossil Fuels.

Alternatively, one could define Fuel as being Fuel = Petrol etc., etc. Petrol etc., etc. = Fuel.

Under this scenario no matter if one searched on Petrol, Oil, Diesel etc. one would find Fuel and alternatively if one searched on Fuel one would locate information on Petrol, Gas, Diesel, Methylated Spirits, Ethanol, Methanol Hydrogen, Petroleum, Compressed Natural Gas, Oil, Crude Oil, Fossil Fuels.

I trust that this may assist in converting any sceptics of the Functional approach to file classification and the use of controlled vocabularies.

Happy RMing!

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 37 years. Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU. Phone: +618 9286 3705; mobile: +61 417 094 147; email @ Laurie Varendorff

Please Note: This article was first published in the – The GREEN SHEET – INCORPORATING THE MICROGRAPHICS MARKET PLACE AND THE MICROGRAPHICS NEWSLETTER – in Issue No. 30 ISSN 1476-3842 November/December 2004 Edition on page (8).

The author, Laurie Varendorff of the Varendorff Records Management Consultancy – TVC – Helping clients manage their e-World gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and nonprofit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.

Is microfilm, which first came into use in the 1870’s, undergoing a rebirth some 130 years after its first application as a support media in a time of conflict?

What technology?

The analogue technology of MICROFILM!

Microfilm was first used effectively with the Pigeon Post into Paris 1870-1871. Conversely, it is as synonymous with the dashingly portrayed world of espionage as much as it is with the less glamorous environs of the local library.

The resurgence of microfilm into the mainstream of business and government activities is a grand concept, you may say. We all know that computing at all levels has taken over the day-to-day activities of government, business, and our personal lives. While this has been something of a godsend, providing a tool to improve efficiency and a bonus, it has also been a curse.

But why a curse?

A statement by Jeff Rothenberg, Senior Researcher, RAND Corporation, Santa Monica, CA, in his article in the Scientific American article of January 1995 that “Digital data lasts forever or five years, whichever comes first” has proven to be a truism and not a flight of fancy as many at the time cried in response to his proposition.

The list of lost digital information is legendary. Listed below are a few such incidents:

CD-Recordable discs unreadable in less than two years Digital Domesday Book lasts 15 years not one thousand.

A frantic search for lost data at Los Alamos Reports of NASA’s and other Government Agencies Data being lost due to poor storage conditions

Why is microfilm any better than any other media?

The reason is in its simplicity, and the fact that it is human eye as well as machine readable with low speed and low-cost devices, as is often stated with a magnifying glass and a candle. At the other end of the spectrum are the high-volume machine-readable scanners from Crowley – Wicks & Wilson, nextScan, Sunrise and Mekel which can cost up to AU$100,000.00 or more to carry out the scanning of all of the various microfilm formats of 16 and 35-mm roll film, microfiche, jackets, and aperture cards at unbelievable stated throughput speeds of up to 4,000 images per hour. Microfilm processed to International Standards has the potential, and I restate, the potential for longevity be that 100, 200 or for what has been the last and greatest claim from people e.g., Kodak that it is human eye readable for five hundred years. This potential for longevity of microfilm is not an idle, groundless boast, but the end product of a tried-and-true set of processes and procedures learned over more than one hundred years of experience.

Why now?

With new and sometimes onerous legislative requirements for both public and government organisations as a result of poor record keeping and the recent destruction of, or the lack of capture of electronic data in any manner, all sectors are now looking at how to protect themselves from a) poor publicity, b) embarrassment by being quoted as not complying or c) has legal action initiated due to a lack of the retention of information as required by legislation.

What can these organisations do to protect their most important asset, and potentially their savior in being able to prove their case in a court of law if accused of not fulfilling their legislative or moral requirements?

In theory, and I personally believe in practice, that all information entering an organisation in a physical form should be scanned and converted to a digital format with all information entering or leaving the organisation in an electronic format being captured into an appropriate Electronic Records and Document Management System (ERDMS).

No, this not reversing or negating my concept that all data requiring long-term retention be transferred to an analogue media for long-term preservation and/or access should a disaster occur, and the digital data is unavailable or has been corrupted either by intent or the lack of quality IT practices and procedures. This process supports the use of microfilm as a, or the long-term retention media of choice.

What is the answer to this short, medium, and long-term retention on a stable media?

The answer, as many have already realised is microfilm.

Leading the charge

Kodak has been the front-runner for several years, with its i9600 Series Archive Writer and its predecessor, the Model 4800, enjoying a virtual monopoly internationally. These units have converted large databases to 16 mm microfilm for such data files as the USA 2000 Census, as well as the latest census data for the United Kingdom, Australia, and Singapore. These are not inconsequential file sizes, and all are held for the long-term because some of the data cannot be released publicly for up to one hundred years into the future. How do you do that with digital data?

If these situations are justifiable, one could argue that transfer of critical, legal or historic electronic data appropriately managed to this same media could be of value to all business and government entities.

When information enters the organisation it is scanned and placed into the ERDMS and appropriately identified for its appropriate retention requirement. The same goes for electronic data incoming, created internally, or exported from the organisation. The ERDMS then on a scheduled basis (once a day, week month etc.) compiles the data into a digital file that is then dumped to 16 mm microfilm via the Archive Writer or other similar product (along with the ERDMS index of that data). The Archive Writer creates two copies of the roll of 16 mm microfilm, one the organisation retains for its internal use, appropriately stored with the second copy sent to the archives, either within the organisation or external if a Government Department to fulfil the organisations long-term retention requirements under legislation.

Will this process described above allow us to sleep soundly in the knowledge that our long-term data is safe on microfilm? No! It is not that easy.

There is more to do. Nothing lasts forever and microfilm is no exception. The oft quoted 100, 200 or 500 year’s longevity for microfilm is potentially misleading.

The fine print is very onerous in its detail. All we must do is to process the microfilm to the International Standards, never expose it to light, store it at 10 degrees centigrade at 30-40% humidity. We should have three copies; the # 1 copy held in the 10 degrees centigrade and humidity environment with no gases or atmosphere, which may affect the film emulsion, and never to be touched (the master). The # 2 copy to be stored at 20 degrees centigrade and similar humidity as # 1 (the working master from which we duplicate working copies as and when required) and # 3 the working copy which we retain in our office environment for day-to-day access and ultimate destruction due to its use in a reader or reader printer or attack by the environment.

What lies ahead?

I predict an increasing use of microfilm for the purposes outlined above and resurgence in the overall use and application for the media.

Is it a perfect solution? Probably not, but until the perfect answer arrives, I am putting my money on this nag called microfilm in a one-horse race, not bad odds.

Laurie Varendorff ARMA

The Author

Laurie Varendorff, ARMA, a former RMAA Western Australia Branch president & national director, has been involved in records management and the micrographic industry for 37 years. Laurie has his own microfilm equipment sales & support organisation – Digital Microfilm Equipment – DME – and a – records & information management – RIM – consulting & training business – The Varendorff Consultancy – TVC – located near Perth, Western Australia, & has tutored & written course material in recordkeeping & archival storage & preservation for Perth’s Edith Cowan University – ECU. Phone: +618 9286 3705; mobile: +61 417 094 147; email @ Laurie Varendorff

Please Note: This article was first published in the publication – Image and Data Manager – September/October 2004 Edition on page (14) Records Management. Available @ An ancient solution to a modern problem

This article has recently been reproduced with permission in the publication – inFocus – The Quarterly Journal of PRISM International in their September 2004 Edition on page (36).

This article has recently been reproduced with permission in the ESARBICA Journal: Journal of the Eastern and Southern Africa Regional Branch of the International Council on Archives Year 2004 Volume and issue vol 23 Pages 106 – 108. Available @ An ancient solution to a modern problem

The author, Laurie Varendorff gives permission for the redistribution or republishing of this article by individuals and nonprofit professional organisations without cost based on the condition that he as well as the URL of the article are recognised at the introduction of the article when redistributed or republished.

SPECIAL NOTE: Use of this article by publishers, commercial, government, or educational organisations requires a financial agreement to be negotiated with Laurie as the copyright holder for this work.