Report of the @Risk North 3 Digital Preservation Summit

The Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL), along with other partner organizations, hosted a summit on Canadian digital preservation at the Library and Archives Canada location in Gatineau, Québec on November 21-22, 2024.

The full report of the event is now available:

"The @Risk North 3 summit (Gatineau, November 2024), organized by the CARL Digital Preservation Working Group (DPWG) and partners, addressed current challenges in the digital preservation arena through presentations by key stakeholders, guided discussions and lightning talks. Areas under discussion included broad themes such as education and training, people strategy, funding and resource allocation, and more focused ones like web archiving, research data, benchmarking, and tools and technologies."

"Across the summit, participants emphasized the need for continued and deepened collaboration between institutions, organizations and practitioners for the purposes of advocacy, knowledge-sharing and skills development. Identifying sustainable solutions, shared infrastructure among them, addressing growing storage requirements and budgetary constraints was a priority. The community could benefit from establishing and sharing best practices, methodologies and workflows around key activities such as benchmarking, and greater mechanisms to facilitate access to resources. Varied and more extensive training, both formal and informal and at all career stages, would benefit individual practitioners and organizations."

"Moving forward, a follow-up webinar to share findings, the creation of a community of practice, and planning for future iterations of the @Risk North summit would continue the momentum and encourage the relationship-building the summit fostered."

Improved Government and Legislative Libraries Online Publications Portal (GALLOP)

GALLOP, the Government and Legislative Libraries Online Publications Portal, was launched a little more than a decade ago by the Association of Parliamentary Libraries in Canada (APLIC).

It is a portal providing access to electronic provincial government publications.

It has moved to a new platform:

"The GALLOP Portal is intended as a one-stop access point to search electronic government documents collected by Legislative libraries in Canada for their jurisdictions."

"Portal scope is based on the collection policies and practices of individual APLIC libraries. Content varies with each jurisdiction. The portal is not comprehensive or exhaustive."

Read the scope notes to see what content has been provided by individual legislative libraries.

January 2025 Issue of Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World

The Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World newsletter, published by Library and Archives Canada, highlights issues pertaining to government and recordkeeping practices in the public and private sectors around the world.

The January 2025 issue has just been published. 

It includes:

• news items from Canada and around the world
• announcements of upcoming Canadian and international events (meetings, conferences, seminars)
• project and product news in areas such as digitization, archives, open source, e-government, access to information etc.
• listings of papers and readings (white papers, presentations, reports)

@Risk North 3 Digital Preservation Conference

The Canadian Association of Research Libraries, along with other partner organizations, is hosting a summit on Canadian digital preservation at the Library and Archives Canada location in Gatineau, Québec on November21-22, 2024:

"This open event will provide an opportunity for those at Canadian institutions who have strategic or operational responsibility for long-term access and preservation of digital content to learn from each other about progress, practices and policies for digital preservation in a Canadian context. The program includes a keynote address, panel discussions, and breakout sessions that explore global and national digital preservation strategies, tools, and collaborative efforts. Networking opportunities, including a reception and an optional tour of the Library and Archives Canada’s Gatineau Preservation Centre, are also planned."

• @Risk North 3 Registration Form
• @Risk North 3 Preliminary Program

May 2023 Issue of Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World

The Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World newsletter, published by Library and Archives Canada (LAC), highlights issues pertaining to government and recordkeeping practices in the public and private sectors around the world.

The May 2023 issue has just been published. 

It includes:

• news items from Canada and around the world
• announcements of upcoming Canadian and international events (meetings, conferences, seminars)
• project and product news in areas such as digitization, archives, open source, e-government, access to information etc.
• listings of papers and readings (white papers, presentations, reports)

January 2023 Issue of Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World

The Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World newsletter, published by Library and Archives Canada (LAC), highlights issues pertaining to government and recordkeeping practices in the public and private sectors around the world.

The January 2023 issue has just been published. 

It includes:

• news items from Canada and around the world
• announcements of upcoming Canadian and international events (meetings, conferences, seminars)
• project and product news in areas such as digitization, archives, open source, e-government, access to information etc.
• listings of papers and readings (white papers, presentations, reports)

September 2022 Issue of Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World

The Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World newsletter, published by Library and Archives Canada (LAC), highlights issues pertaining to government and recordkeeping practices in the public and private sectors around the world.

The September 2022 issue has just been published. 

It includes:

• news items from Canada and around the world
• announcements of upcoming Canadian and international events (meetings, conferences, seminars)
• project and product news in areas such as digitization, archives, open source, e-government, access to information etc.
• listings of papers and readings (white papers, presentations, reports)

May 2022 Issue of Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World

The Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World newsletter, published by Library and Archives Canada (LAC), highlights issues pertaining to government and recordkeeping practices in the public and private sectors around the world.

The May 2022 issue has just been published. 

It includes:

• news items from Canada and around the world
• announcements of upcoming Canadian and international events (meetings, conferences, seminars)
• project and product news in areas such as digitization, archives, open source, e-government, access to information etc.
• listings of papers and readings (white papers, presentations, reports)

Improved Government and Legislative Libraries Online Publications Portal (GALLOP)

GALLOP, the Government and Legislative Libraries Online Publications Portal, was launched in 2013 by the Association of Parliamentary Libraries in Canada.

It is a portal providing access to often hard-to-find federal and provincial government publications.

The Association has launched a beta version of an improved GALLOP Portal. 

The beta Portal will have more up-to-date content, more filtering options, and for the first time, include records from Nunavut in addition to the ten other Provinces and Territories already included. 

Here is an overall overview of GALLOP's content.

The designers are looking for feedback.

Decolonizing Canadiana Metadata

The Canadian Research Knowledge Network (CRKN) that is responsible for the Canadiana collection of digitized documentary heritage has replaced the subject heading “Indians of North America” with “Indigenous peoples.” This will effect a little under 2,000 records.

"The content, metadata, and resource descriptions in the Canadiana collections contain language that reflects the biases, norms, and perspectives of the time in which they were created. With the guidance of CRKN’s Preservation and Access Committee (PAC), CRKN staff are replacing inappropriate language in the metadata and resource descriptions introduced during legacy cataloguing practices. The first phase of this critical three-phase project is now complete."

The next phase will involve removing the term “Indian” from subject headings indicating individual communities and updating Indigenous names.

The CKRN has worked on this initiative with:

• Indigenous community websites 
• Greater Victoria Public Library 
• Manitoba Archival Information Network 
• First Nations, Métis, and Inuit – Indigenous Ontology (FNMIIO), created by the National Indigenous Knowledge and Language Alliance (NIKLA) and the Canadian Federation of Library Associations (CFLA)
• the X̱wi7x̱wa Library

Going Digital: the Canadian Law Library Review Experience

The Canadian Law Library Review (CCLR) is the journal of the Canadian Association of Law Libraries.

Slaw.ca published an interview today with Susan Barker, the CLLR's current acting editor, about the decision to become a digital-only publication in 2015:

"One thing that made it easier was that the changes were made incrementally and so we were able to make sure one thing worked before moving on to the next. Step 1 was the redesign in 2013. Then we moved to providing a PDF version while still producing in print. Then the print was discontinued and a PDF link was provided to members on our website and we set up access via ISSUU. The next step was to discontinue the print entirely. Once digital – we were able to go open access, no longer limit our readership to members and paid subscribers (although we only had a few of those) and to adopt a Creative Commons license. Finally, our partnership with CanLII made true open access possible."

The interview ends with some considerations that are important when going digital:

"What knowledge gaps need to be filled? 

• Understanding digital publication best practices. Changes in processes, management, and training. 
• An opportunity for reinvention and innovation. 

How will the change impact readership?

• Digital publication and open licensing allows for the content to be shared more widely than ever before. 

What are the cost implications?

• Digital formats allow for more possibilities and fewer costs in design features (colours, number of pages, multimedia), linking to other resources, and gathering usage metrics, for example."

January 2022 Issue of Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World

The Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World newsletter, published by Library and Archives Canada (LAC), highlights issues pertaining to government and recordkeeping practices in the public and private sectors around the world.

The January 2022 issue has just been published.

It includes:

• news items from Canada and around the world
• announcements of upcoming Canadian and international events (meetings, conferences, seminars)
• project and product news in areas such as digitization, archives, open source, e-government, access to information etc.
• listings of papers and readings (white papers, presentations, reports)

September 2021 Issue of Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World

The Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World newsletter, published by Library and Archives Canada (LAC), highlights issues pertaining to government and recordkeeping practices in the public and private sectors around the world.

The September 2021 issue has just been published.

It includes:

• news items from Canada and around the world
• announcements of upcoming Canadian and international events (meetings, conferences, seminars)
• project and product news in areas such as digitization, archives, open source, e-government, access to information etc.
• listings of papers and readings (white papers, presentations, reports)

April 2021 Issue of Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World

The Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World newsletter, published by Library and Archives Canada (LAC), highlights issues pertaining to government and recordkeeping practices in the public and private sectors around the world.

The April 2021 issue has just been published.

It includes:

• news items from Canada and around the world
• announcements of upcoming Canadian and international events (meetings, conferences, seminars)
• project and product news in areas such as digitization, archives, open source, e-government, access to information etc.
• listings of papers and readings (white papers, presentations, reports)

Book on Government Information in Canada Wins America Library Association Award

The 2019 University of Alberta Press book entitled Government Information in Canada has won the 2021 Margaret T. Lane / Virginia F. Saunders Memorial Research Award.

There is a downloadable open access version available.

The Award is handed out every year by the Government Documents Round Table, which is part of the American Library Association:

"Canadian Government Information Systems mirror many of the federal, state, and local systems in the Unites States, yet publications dedicated to librarianship of Canadian government information are surprisingly rare.  While reviewing literature on government information reference services, it was found that the most recently published book on the subject was nearly forty years old.  Thankfully, Government Information in Canada: Access and Stewardship was published in 2019.  Wakaruk and Li have brought together chapters from various sources and authors to fill this gap."

The editors are Amanda Wakaruk (University of Alberta) and Sam-chin Li (University of Toronto).

They explain that the book:

• bridges a decade-long literature gap for Canadian government information since the publication of Olga Bishop’s Canadian Official Publications,
• aims to document both the current state of government information in Canada and the 'state of the discipline' of government information librarianship from a practitioner’s perspective,
• provides both an overview of what has changed in the government information ecosystem and highlights evolving strategies for continued access to these important resources.

Table of contents:

I Historical Overviews
1 Government Publication Deposit Programs: The Canadian Federal, Provincial, and Territorial Landscapes
Graeme Campbell, Michelle Lake, and Catherine McGoveran
2 Official Publications and Select Digital Library Collections at Library and Archives Canada, 1923 to the Present
Tom J. Smyth
3 Parliamentary Information in Canada: Form and Function
Talia Chung and Maureen Martyn
4 Commissions and Tribunals
Caron Rollins

II Provincial Landscape
5 Alberta Government Publishing
Dani J. Pahulje
6 Saskatchewan Government Publications Deposit in the Legislative Library
Gregory Salmers
7 Inside Track: Challenges of Collecting, Accessing, and Preserving Ontario Government Publications
Sandra Craig and Martha Murphy
8 Digitization of Government Publications: A Review of the Ontario Digitization Initiative
Carol Perry, Brian Tobin, and Sam-chin Li

III Looking Forward: Collaborative Stewardship
9 GALLOP Portal: Making Government Publications in Legislative Libraries Findable
Peter Ellinger
10 The Canadian Government Information Digital Preservation Network: A Collective Response to a National Crisis
Amanda Wakaruk and Steve Marks
11 Web Harvesting and Reporting Fugitive Government Materials: Collaborative Stewardship of At-Risk Documents
Susan Paterson, Nicholas Worby, and Darlene Fichter 

January 2021 Issue of Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World

The Governance and Recordkeeping Around the World newsletter, published by Library and Archives Canada (LAC), highlights issues pertaining to government and recordkeeping practices in the public and private sectors around the world.

The January 2021 issue has just been published.

It includes:

• news items from Canada and around the world
• announcements of upcoming Canadian and international events (meetings, conferences, seminars)
• project and product news in areas such as digitization, archives, open source, e-government, access to information etc.
• listings of papers and readings (white papers, presentations, reports)

Webinar Tomorrow About Digital Lending in Canada During COVID-19

The Canadian Association of Research Libraries, the Council of Atlantic University Libraries and the Canadian Federation of Library Associations are presenting a panel discussion on Zoom tomorrow on Emergency Access and the Prospect of Controlled Digital Lending in Canada:

"[the webinar] will explore the concept of controlled digital lending (CDL) as well as the current context of providing limited access to digitized print collections during the COVID-19 pandemic."

The speakers are:

• Chris Freeland, Director of Open Libraries, Internet Archive 
• Amanda Wakaruk, Copyright Librarian, University of Alberta 
• Christina de Castell, Chief Librarian, Vancouver Public Library

Law Library of Congress Interview With Metadata Intern Tori Stanek

In Custodia Legis, the blog of the Law Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., has posted an interview with Tori Stanek, Remote Metadata Intern. It is part of an ongoing series of interviews:

"How would you describe your job to other people?
As an intern for the Law Library of Congress, I create and edit indices for newly digitized historical and legal materials. I append appropriate keywords to document records and derive my own search terms to ensure users can both collocate and differentiate among documents. A big part of my job is ensuring that there is consistency between indexing depth, vocabulary, and formatting. While I’ve worked with a number of document types, I was particularly excited to help provide access to a special volume of the United States Statutes at Large collection that contained Native American treaties (...)"

"Why did you want to work in the Library of Congress?
My incredible graduate cataloging course made me appreciate the ethical responsibilities of accurate document representation. I had enough of a background in law to know this was an area of interest for me, and I applied for an internship because it provided a way for me to promote equity at the access point of information. I firmly believe that one can make a difference through provision of legal information, and this internship was my jumping off point."

The Law Library of Congress is the world’s largest law library, with a collection of almost 3 million volumes from all ages of history and virtually every jurisdiction in the world.

Annual Statutes of Alberta Added to CanLII

The CanLII website (Canadian Legal Information Institute) has been rapidly expanding its digital collections of Canadian legislation.

Today, it announced that it has added the annual statutes for the Province of Alberta from 1906 to today:

"This latest digitization project builds on similar initiatives on CanLII.org to increase access to important troves of legal history and decision-making. The Saskatchewan annual statutes dating to 1978 were scanned and added to CanLII last year with funding from the Saskatchewan Law Foundation. Last year we also added the New Brunswick annual statutes back to 2000 with funding from the New Brunswick Law Foundation, with more coming. These joined the Federal annual statutes to 2001 and Quebec annual statutes to 1996, which were added in 2016 with funding from CAIJ."

"Annual statutes – laws as passed by Canada’s parliamentary bodies – are an important addition to CanLII’s primary law collections. Without access to these documents, it can be difficult to navigate legislation over time."

CanLII is a portal funded by Canada’s provincial and territorial law societies to make legal information content (court judgments, tribunal decisions, statutes and regulations, commentary) available to Canadians free of charge.

New Collection on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women In Canada

The Bora Laskin Law Library at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law recently announced a new collection of documents about the crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls in Canada:

"This collection was developed by the Canadian Feminist Alliance for International Action and has been subsequently expanded on by the Bora Laskin Law Library...

I.  Civil Society Reports
II. Government Reports
III. Secondary Resources
IV. United Nations Documents
V.  Inter-American Commission on Human Rights Documents"