Data Vault project kickoff meeting

Posted On April 17, 2015 by Robin Rice

Last week, members of the Data Vault project got together for the kickoff meeting. Hosted at the University of Manchester Library, we were able to discuss the project plan, milestones for the three month project, agreed terminology for parts of the system, and started to assign tasks to project members for the first month.

Being only three months long, the project is being run in three one-month chunks. These are defined as follows:

Month 1: Define and Investigate: This phase will allow us to agree what the Data Vault should do, and how it does it, Specifically it will look at:
1. What are the use cases for the Data Vault
2. How do we describe the system (create overview diagrams)
3. How should the data be packed (metadata + data) for long term archival storage
4. Develop example workflows for how the Data Vault could be used in the research process
5. Examine the capabilities of archival storage systems to ensure they can support the proposed Data Vault
Month 2: Requirements and Design: This phase will create the requirements specification and initial design of the system:
1. Define the requirements specification
2. Use the requirement specification to design the Data Vault system
Month 3: Develop a Proof of Concept: This phase will seek to develop a minimal proof of concept that demonstrates the concept of the Data Vault:
1. Deliver a working proof of concept that can describe and archive some data, and then retrieve it

At the end of month three, we will prepare for the second Jisc Data Spring sandpit workshop where we will seek to extend the project to take the prototype and develop it into a full system.

All of this is being documented in the project plan, which is a ‘living document’ that is constantly evolving as the project progresses. The plan is online as a Google Document:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1k2XHlNBGR7sM6XBfyICIeGguoJc5uP3JJwJhrtgRvhI/edit?usp=sharing

Look out for further blog posts during the month as we undertake the definitions and investigations!

Kickoff meeting

Originally posted on the Jisc Data Vault blog, April 7, 2015 by Stuart Lewis, Deputy Director, Library & University Collections.

Posted in Uncategorized | Comments Off

Keyboards Prestissimo!

Posted On April 17, 2015 by Norman

As previously reported, the instruments have all been removed from St Cecilia’s Hall to allow building work to start. The keyboards were one of the last group of instruments to leave and their removal was caught on my film by the Library’s Digital Imaging Unit using time lapse photography.

You can see the results here – https://vimeo.com/125235362

Posted in Collections, Featured, St Cecilia's Hall | Comments Off

Bluetooth beacons at …Something Blue

Posted On April 15, 2015 by Gavin Willshaw

Images courtesy of Stewart Cromar (@stubot)

On Friday we trialled the use of Bluetooth beacons in our exhibition space, using Google Glass and the Guidigo app to provide an immersive tour of the Something Blue exhibition. Beacons work by emitting a small Bluetooth signal which activates content installed on visitors’ mobile devices. Four of these were placed at locations throughout the exhibition and, when users came within range, music, videos and voice recordings relating to specific exhibits were activated on the Glass headsets.

Users standing near the Blob 05 (Blue) exhibit, for example, were able to access an interview with Art Curator Neil Lebeter talking about the painting, while those in close proximity to the Vienna Horn could watch a video of Curator Sarah Deters playing the instrument.

There was a strong novelty factor as many people had not tried out Google Glass before, but on the whole it was felt that using the technology with the beacons in this way was an effective way of delivering content. The exhibition room is a relatively narrow space and because of space restrictions, some of the beacons were situated very close together. As a result, the signals from different beacons often interfered with each other, meaning content delivery was sometimes quite erratic. On more than one occasion someone standing next to one beacon received content from another one located several metres away on the other side of the room. As well as this, when too many people were standing close to a beacon the signal could be blocked or dulled.

In order to combat this for future sessions, it would be more effective to spread the beacons evenly throughout the space and have specific signs on the floor or walls saying something like “stand here to hear an interview with the curator”. Aside from these issues, the Google Glass worked really well: the Guidigo app overcame many of the well-known problems associated with the technology (poor battery life, overheating, and headaches) by putting Glass into sleep mode whenever the user was outside the beacons’ range. On the whole, it was an interesting experiment to take part in and we hope to have a more public trial of the technology at our next exhibition, so please do get in touch if you would like to be involved!

We are also exploring further ways of using beacons with other mobile devices to provide self-guided library tours: watch this space for further updates.

Gavin Willshaw | Digital Curator

Posted in Exhibitions, Projects | Comments Off

Research visits to MIMEd

Posted On April 15, 2015 by dmartin

Although St Cecilia’s Hall is closed to the public, it does not mean that the objects are placed in storage and left until they are reinstalled. Collection business still goes on with teaching and with visits from scholars who are researching instruments in the collection. This semester sees postgraduate teaching for the MMus Musical Instrument Research programme, which will concentrate on Keyboard Organology. For this class the appropriate instruments are removed from the storage shelves and made available for students to examine in detail.
As a leading international collection, with many iconic instruments, we have requests from visiting scholars to carry out research. Such visits are always informative for collection staff as well as the visitor. There is discourse in which aspects of research are discussed and often various theories are passed backwards and forwards in an attempt to get a fuller understanding of the object.
Although we need to respond in a different manner to research requests when the objects are stored in a location away from the staff, it is still an important part of the Collection’s work to further the creation and dissemination of knowledge.
We recently had a visit from the Belgian harpsichord maker and researcher Ellen Denolf, who wished to examine the knee lever mechanism of our Goermans/Taskin harpsichord. Certainly one of the best known instruments in the collection, it was built by Jean Goermans in 1764, and altered in 1783/4 by Pascal Taskin – the most important maker in late-eighteenth century Paris.
Taskin made a number of changes to the instrument. He added an extra register of jacks which were used to pluck the string with soft leather, providing a contrast to the harder bird quill. He also strengthened the framing inside the case – something the visitor never normally sees – had the instrument redecorated with chinoiserie on the exterior and lid interior and added knee levers in place of handstops. Players could then use the knees to get different sounds while continuing to play. One knee lever even allowed a diminuendo effect by reducing the sound from all of the quill registers to just the soft leather (known as peau de buffle).
The images show Ellen and MIMEd Conservator Jonathan Santa Maria Bouquet examining and discussing aspects of the knee lever mechanism at the instrument’s spine and the back of the keyboard.

It should be mentioned that Taskin perhaps didn’t do everything quite above board. Other work on the instrument included removing Goerman’s name from the soundboard, staining the whole soundboard and cutting the serif from the lead rose in the soundboard which normally displays the maker’s initials – in this case “IG”. By changing it to “IC” Taskin could perhaps pass the instrument off as being by Ioannes Couchet – a member of the famous Ruckers family whose instruments went for many times what a recent French example might sell for!

Posted in Collections | Comments Off

Auden, Dame Edna and Bletchley Park

Posted On April 15, 2015 by fwest

**Welcome to the first Rare Books & Manuscripts blog of the University of Edinburgh’s Centre for Research Collections. And what better way to start than a post on W.H. Auden’s Poems (1928) …**

One of the University of Edinburgh Library’s rarest 20^th-century printed items is W.H. Auden’s Poems (1928). This item was part of the Archibald Hunter Campbell collection which was presented to the Library in 1984. Campbell studied at Oxford and was a contemporary and friend of Stephen Spender, Christopher Isherwood and W.H Auden. During the Second World War he served at Bletchley Park as a codebreaker and, on returning to Edinburgh, he held the post of the University’s Regius Chair of Public Law and the Law of Nature and the Nations from 1945 to 1972.

Printed by Auden’s fellow undergraduate at Oxford, Stephen Spender, Poems purports to be number 11 of “about 45 copies” subsequently Spender admitted that the actual number of copies was nearer 30.

Although a large part of the book was printed by Spender in his parents’ house on an Adana label printer, it would seem that either the printer or Spender (or possibly both!) weren’t up to the task and the book was finished and bound in its strong reddish orange wrapper by the Holywell Press. Evidence of the handover from Spender to Holywell is apparent in the immediate improvement in printing quality from page 23 onwards.

Some of the poems were never republished and Auden himself excluded most of the contents from the canon establishing Collected Shorter Poems, 1927-1957 (Faber, 1966).

The University of Edinburgh’s copy has few annotated corrections but has been signed by both Auden and Spender on the title page and is in remarkably good condition.

It truly is one of the University’s finest rare books and a fitting subject for the first Rare Books blog.

The library has a collection of W.H. Auden material, which we have recently completed cataloguing. This was purchased in 1982 from Barry Bloomfield (co-editor with Edward Mendelson of W.H. Auden: A Bibliography, 1924-1969), and has been added to by generous donations from Mendelson and others as well as purchases from book sales. Although Poems is not part of that collection we have taken the opportunity to improve the cataloguing of Auden material elsewhere in the collections.

Oh, and Dame Edna? Stephen Spender’s daughter married Barry Humphries!

Finlay West: Rare Book Cataloguer

Posted in 20th Century, Collections, Rare Books | Comments Off

You’ve Been Unframed!

Posted On April 14, 2015 by conservation

At the start of April, I started conservation work on the Edinburgh University Art Collections. I had previously been working at the Lothian Health Services Archive on a 12-month project to conserve their HIV/AIDS collections. When this came to an end, I was delighted to be offered the chance to work on a new collection at the University.

I started off by unframing a selection of works of art on paper. These items has been previously framed using low quality mountboard. This can be damaging to the artwork as this board can become acidic over time, which can migrate to the artwork and cause staining.

Acidic migration from mount causing brown staining on artwork

Unframing artworks is great fun as you never know what you will find underneath. Sometimes, you can find interesting inscriptions or hidden sketches, however, often you find more conservation problems! In this collection, I found that many artworks had been adhered into frames using pressure sensitive tapes, such as masking tape and sticky tape. Tapes such as this can become stuck on to the paper and be very difficult to remove. To remove these tapes, I used the gentle application of heat which softens the adhesive and makes it easier to peel off using tweezers and a spatula.

Removal of masking tape using heat

As these tapes age, it becomes even harder to get them off and the adhesive can soak into the paper causing staining. To remove these aged tapes, solvents can be applied using a poultice. However this can be time consuming, and has health and safety issues due to the exposure to solvents.

Staining of verso of artwork due to aged pressure sensitive tape

Another problem I encountered was that some artworks were adhered overall to a piece of mountboard. This can be problematic if the mountboard is acidic as this acid can migrate to the paper and cause weakening and discolouration of the sheet. Also, if the artwork is stored in high or low humidity, the mountboard and paper will react differently to moisture, and potentially cause cockling (paper conservation term for rippling of the sheet) and tearing. Boards such as this can be removed in small pieces by using a scalpel with a number 22 blade. The layers closest to the artwork can then be removed using a poultice such as the one described in Samantha Cawson’s blog.

When an artwork is unframed, it can give you clues to it’s original condition. For example, when I unframed this artwork by Anne Redpath, I found that there was a clear difference between the areas that could be seen and the areas underneath the window mount. The paint that was white in the exposed area, is pink in the hidden areas; the blue in the visible area is red underneath the mount! The difference in colours could be caused by the effect of light on the exposed areas of the artwork, which has caused the pigment to fade. Equally, the pigments may have changed colour due to contact with an acidic window mount. More research is needed to find out the exact cause. As you can see this discolouration has completely changed the look of this painting and it is hard to imagine how it could of looked originally.

Painting by Anne Redpath, before (left) and after (right) unframing. Note the difference in colour between the areas hidden and exposed to light

Sometimes during unframing you can also discover things that are completely new. For example, after I had unframed this watercolour by Alan Davie, I found another watercolour painted on the other side! This watercolour has been protected from the light, and so the colours have remained very bright and vibrant.

Alan Davie Watercolour before (left) and after (right) unframing. New watercolour found on verso

Here is another sketch I found underneath a mount. The card mount had been adhered to the back of the artwork with multiple dots of glue. I removed the card mount using a scalpel which revealed another sketch of a similar model on the recto, and then removed the adhesive residue using a CMC poultice. This reuse of the sheet is common among artists as a way of making the most of expensive art materials!

Recto of Houston, before removing mount

Verso of Houston, after removing mount. Another sketch found beneath

Good framing is essential to the longevity of an artwork. When framing works of art on paper, always use good quality inert materials, such as 100% cotton rag mountboard, and use reversible adhesives such as wheat starch paste. Never adhere artworks directly to a secondary support, instead use hinges made from Japanese paper. And please do us paper conservators a favour, never use pressure sensitive tapes on paper artworks!

If you would like any advice on framing artworks, please do get in contact or check out this website: http://www.conservationregister.com/PIcon-Mounting.asp

Emily Hick

Paper Conservator

Emily.hick@ed.ac.uk

Posted in Conservation, Featured, Library & University Collections | Tagged conservation, Edinburgh University Art Collections, framing, mounting | Comments Off

Fairbairn as Student

Posted On April 13, 2015 by Grant Buttars

In the academic year 1907/8, the 17 year old WRD Fairbairn matriculated to study in the Arts Faculty at the University of Edinburgh. This followed 11 years schooling at Merchiston Castle (6 in Preparatory and 5 in the Upper School), gaining a leaving certificate comprising English, Latin, Greek, French and Mathematics. He continued both Latin and Greek during his first year of study at university, and took on Zoology as a third subject. Subsequent years comprised courses in Logic, Moral Philosophy, Advanced Metaphysics, Moral Philosophy, Advanced Logic and Greek Philosophy.

In 1918, at the age of 29, Fairbairn returned to Higher Education. This time, he enrolled to study in the Faculty of Medicine. Part of the intervening period had included war service. The Roll of Honour records that he had served in the Merchiston Castle Officer Training Corps while a pupil there and that he had served in the OTC Engineers between May and November 1915 as a cadet. From November 1915, he was 2nd Lieutenant in the Royal Garrison Artillery (Territorial), achieving Lieutenant the following year.

He graduated MBChB in 1923. His marks show strengths in some areas and perhaps a lower ability in others.

View Fairbairn’s full graduation record (pdf)

He continued his studies and achieved his MD in 1926, his thesis being Relationship of dissociation and repression considered from the point of view of medical psychology.

View his MD Thesis (external link)

Posted in Library, Projects, Student records | Tagged Archives, University of Edinburgh, William Ronald Dodds Fairbairn | Comments Off

Trials – New E-Resources on trial

Posted On April 10, 2015 by eresources

Acland’s video atlas of human anatomy – until 14th April

This newer version of Acland’s video atlas provides an online platform for accessing more than 300 narrated videos of real cadaver specimens. The detailed table of contents for each video allows you to go directly to specific points of relevance inside each video. PDF transcripts for each video can be downloaded. Videos can be bookmarked for teaching a learning activities. Self-test quizzes are available for revision and exam preparation, with revision links in the answer for each question.

Church Missionary Society Periodicals Collection – until 30th April

From its roots as an Anglican evangelical movement driven by lay persons, this resource encompasses publications from the CMS and the latterly integrated South American Missionary Society. Documenting missionary work from the 19th to the 21st century, the periodicals include news, journals and reports offering a unique perspective on global history and cultural encounter. *Please note that PDF download options are not available during trials.

Enhanced Electronic Grammars – An Advanced Research Tool for Linguistics- until 19th May

Enhanced Electronic Grammars (EEG) features comprehensive descriptions of languages from around the world. Through this unique online resource, full grammars are made available together in an interlinked and semantically-annotated format, allowing granular access to the grammatical data and enabling cross-language research of several grammars at the same time. In addition to cross-linguistic queries, each grammar can also be read and researched individually. The electronic format allows for multimodal enhancement of language descriptions, such as audio and video supplements.

Japan Times Archive 1897-2013 – until 31st May

The Japan Times is the oldest English-language newspaper in Japan, founded in March 1897 (Meiji 30). It has been published to promote mutual understandings between Japan and other countries. This newspaper Includes unique articles which cannot be read in Japanese-language newspapers. The Japan Times Archives Online includes articles from 1897-2013. A trial for the Japan Times Online, which includes articles from 1999-Present, will also be available very soon.

Political Science Complete – until 24th April

Political Science Complete provides extensive coverage of global political topics with a worldwide focus, reflecting the globalisation of contemporary political discourse. The database gives you access to nearly 340 full-text reference books and monographs and more than 44,000 full-text conference papers, which includes those from the International Political Science Association. Subjects covered include comparative politics, humanitarian issues, international relations, law and legislation, non-governmental organizations and political theory.

Prosopographie der mittelbyzantinischen Zeit – until 30th April

The Prosopographie der mittelbyzantinischen Zeit Online/Prosopography of the Middle Byzantine Period Online (PMBZ Online) is a comprehensive biographical dictionary for the Byzantine Empire in the early Medieval Period (641-1025 AD) documenting more than 21,000 persons. PMBZ Online is based on the print edition of the Prosopographie der mittelbyzantinischen Zeit which appeared in two parts 1998 and 2013. PMBZ Online documents all persons mentioned either by name or anonymously in the relevant Byzantine and non-Byzantine sources, and secondly all persons mentioned in the Byzantine sources both from Western Europe and from the Arabic and Slavonic areas, together with those from the Christian East.

SIPRI Yearbook Online – until 30th April

The SIPRI Yearbook, written by authors who are experts in their field, is known worldwide as an essential and independent source for issues on armaments and arms control, conflicts and resolutions, security arrangements and disarmament, as well as longer-term trends in international security. SIPRI Yearbook Online offers access to the SIPRI Yearbooks published from 2010 and onwards, all available on one, easy-to-use and fully cross-searchable resource.

Feedback and further info

We are interested to know what you think of these e-resources as your comments influence purchase decisions so please fill out our feedback form.

A list of all trials currently available to University of Edinburgh staff and students can be found on our trials webpage.

Posted in Library, Online library resources | Tagged Acland’s video atlas of human anatomy, Church Missionary Society Periodicals Collection, Enhanced Electronic Grammars - An Advanced Research Tool for Linguistics, Japan Times Archive 1897-2013, Political Science Complete, Prosopographie der mittelbyzantinischen Zeit, SIPRI Yearbook Online | Comments Off

Financial Times access issue

Posted On April 10, 2015 by eresources

Our access to Financial Times via http://www.ft.com/home/uk is currently unavailable due to a renewal issue which is under investigation. Alternate access to the Financial Times via Factiva remains unaffected.

Update: How we access Financial Times has changed, our A-Z lists and catalogue have been updated with the new link which uses EASE login followed by individual user registration. The new access also allows you to set up the FT app on your mobile device. The new link is https://sso.ft.com/sso/auth?entityID=https%3A%2F%2Fidp.ed.ac.uk%2Fshibboleth.

Posted in Access issues | Tagged access issue, e-journal, Financial Times, FT.com | Comments Off

Wireless access to e-resources

Posted On April 10, 2015 by eresources

We are receiving a number of reports about loss of access to e-resources via the wifi network (Eduroam). If affected please use the library links which are set up to pass through our EZProxy server or the VPN rather than accessing the e-resource directly.

Access the e-journals A-Z, e-books A-Z, databases A-Z, catalogue or searcher webpages here: http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/information-services/library-museum-gallery/finding-resources

VPN info at: http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/information-services/computing/desktop-personal/vpn/vpn-service-summary

We will post further updates to this issue here.

Update 23/4/15: Most e-resource providers have now been updated with the new Eduroam IP addresses.

Posted in Access issues | Tagged access issue, databases, e-books IP Access, e-journals, eduroam, VPN, wireless | Comments Off

Data Vault project kickoff meeting

Keyboards Prestissimo!

Bluetooth beacons at …Something Blue

Research visits to MIMEd

Auden, Dame Edna and Bletchley Park

**Welcome to the first Rare Books & Manuscripts blog of the University of Edinburgh’s Centre for Research Collections. And what better way to start than a post on W.H. Auden’s Poems (1928) …**

You’ve Been Unframed!

Fairbairn as Student

Trials – New E-Resources on trial

Financial Times access issue

Wireless access to e-resources

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Welcome to the first Rare Books & Manuscripts blog of the University of Edinburgh’s Centre for Research Collections. And what better way to start than a post on W.H. Auden’s Poems (1928) …

Recent Posts

Follow @EdUniLibraries on Twitter

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**Welcome to the first Rare Books & Manuscripts blog of the University of Edinburgh’s Centre for Research Collections. And what better way to start than a post on W.H. Auden’s Poems (1928) …**