Digital meets Culture

Brussels, 30-31 January 2016

FOSDEM 2016 Conference

FOSDEM is a free event for software developers to meet, share ideas and collaborate.

Every year, thousands of developers of free and open source software from all over the world gather at the event in Brussels.

FOSDEM offers open source and free software developers a place to meet, share ideas and collaborate. Renowned for being highly developer-oriented, the event brings together some 5000+ geeks from all over the world.

The sixteenth edition will take place on Saturday 30th and Sunday 31st January 2016 at the usual location: ULB Campus Solbosch in Brussels.

Jérôme Martinez from MediaArea.net will present the PREFORMA project and more specifically MediaConch, the conformance checker for audiovisual file developed in PREFORMA. Download here the presentation (PDF).

Previous editions have featured main tracks centered around security, operating system development, community building, and many other topics.

For more information and to submit proposals for main track presentations, developer rooms, stands and lightning talks visit the Conference website.

Florence, 4-5 February 2016

PREFORMA @ IRCDL 2016

Since 2005 the Italian Research Conference on Digital Libraries (IRCDL) provides a great opportunity for Italian researchers in the field of Digital Libraries to present and discuss their current research activities and to envision together further developments.

IRCDL 2016 edition is committed to preserve the traditional emphasis on the multidisciplinary nature of the research on digital libraries which has been characterizing the conference over the years. This multidisciplinary nature ranges from computer science to humanities in the broader sense, including research areas such as archival and library information sciences, information management systems, semantic technoologies, information retrieval, new knowledge environments. This is a continued challenge for the DL field and there is the need to continue to contribute to improve the cooperation between the many communities that share common objectives.

The aim of IRCDL 2016 is once more to provide the opportunity to explore new ideas, techniques, and tools, and to exchange experiences also from on-going projects. The IRCDL conferences have been launched and initially sponsored by DELOS, an EU FP6 Network of Excellence on digital libraries, together with the Department of Information Engineering of the University of Padua. Over the years IRCDL has become a self sustainable event that is supported by the Italian Digital Libraries Community.

A paper about PREFORMA has been submitted by the Department of Information Engineering of the University of Padua. The title is “Proposal for an Evaluation Framework for Compliance Checkers for Long-term Digital Preservation”.

For further information visit the Conference website.

Amsterdam, 22-25 February 2016

11th International Digital Curation Conference

The 11th International Digital Curation Conference (IDCC16), “Visible data, invisible infrastructure”, will be held in Amsterdam at the Mövenpick Hotel Amsterdam City Centre. There will be a programme of workshops on Monday 22 February and Thursday 25 February and the main conference will run from Tuesday 23 to Wednesday 24 February 2016.

Erwin Verbruggen from the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision, Dave Rice and Jérôme Martinez from MediaArea, Bert Lemmens from PACKED and Claudio Prandoni from Promoter Srl submitted a paper entitled “Open Source Preservation Tools for Audiovisual Collections: PREFORMA and the MediaConch project“.

For more information visit the Conference website.

The International Digital Curation Conference (IDCC) is an established annual event with a unique place in the digital curation community, reaching out to individuals, organisations and institutions across all disciplines and domains involved in curating data and providing an opportunity to get together with like-minded data practitioners to discuss policy and practice.

The last edition of IDCC took place in London, 9-12 February 2015. If you were not able to attend you can now access all the presentations, videos and photos online, and much more!

Singapore, 7-9 March 2016

JTS Joint Technical Symposium

JTS Joint Technical Symposium “Sustainable audiovisual collections through collaboration”, Singapore, National Museum of Singapore, Gallery Theatre, Basement, 7-9 March 2016

The Joint Technical Symposium (JTS) explores the technical issues affecting the long term survival and accessibility of audiovisual collections. JTS is an international symposium and brings together the world’s foremost research and thinking regarding the preservation and accessibility of moving image and recorded sound collections, from 19th century endeavours to the most recent digital technologies.

Since the last JTS in 2010 the audiovisual archiving world has seen many dramatic changes and advancements in the technologies that enable preservation. The rate and magnitude of these changes requires a collaborative approach to enable all archives to make sense of the best way to keep collections alive for future generations.

The theme of JTS 2016 “Sustainable Audiovisual Collections Through Collaboration” addresses this dynamic landscape. The papers presented at JTS 2016 will cover the ongoing technological viability of audiovisual collections both as individual items and holistically, as well as every aspect of audiovisual media preservation and access such as conservation and restoration, harvesting and accessing collection information – including metadata and intellectual property.

JTS 2016 is organised under the auspices of UNESCO by the Co-ordinating Council of Audiovisual Archives Associations (CCAAA) and its members’ Technical Committees. The event is hosted by the South East Asia Pacific Audio Visual Archive Association (SEAPAVAA) and the National Archives of Singapore (NAS).

A paper about PREFORMA and the MediaConch project (“PREFORMA and the MediaConch project: Open Source Tools for Open Standards“) has been accepted and will be presented by The Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision and MediaArea.

For further information, please visit the Conference website at http://www.jts2016.org/ or contact:

Mick Newnham: mick.newnhamATnfsa.gov.au
Irene Lim: Irene_LL_LIMATnlb.gov.sg

Brussels, 10 March 2016

Concertation Meeting for PCP projects

PREFORMA has been invited to the third concertation meeting for all on-going PCP projects in DG Connect, organised by the European Commission in Brussels on 10 March 2015.

During this event the EC wants to give the opportunity to the attendees to network and share experiences on common issues that they face while implementing PCPs.

Antonella Fresa, Technical Coordinator of PREFORMA, will present the methodology and approach to evaluate and improve the software prototypes, i.e. how set up a framework and an infractucture that allows to “train” the tools during the prototyping phase and to evaluate them during the testing phase.

Download here the agenda of the meeting.

Prague, 9-11 March 2016

PASIG 2016 Conference

Registration is open for the next PASIG (Preservation and Archiving Special Interest Group) conference in Prague: http://pasig.schk.sk/wordpress/registration.

Please note that the early bird rate of 200€ is available until the end of January. The cost from the 1st February onwards will be 250€.

This is a great opportunity for organisations setting up preservation repositories to collaborate and work directly with leaders in the field. The PASIG is focused on:

addressing practical preservation questions;
hearing about best practices and new technologies from global experts;
investigating the convergence of on-premise architectures and the Cloud;
how to set up, initiate, and audit the metrics of a preservation project;
key global project updates; and
solution provider and end customer collaboration.

PASIG is a highly collaborative and interactive forum and generally attracts a large contingent of new participants.

A veraPDF workshop will be organised in the morning of the first day and the PREFORMA project will be presented on the second day the conference by Emanuel Lorrain from PACKED vzw.

Session Overviews include:

Digital Preservation Bootcamp
- Training in concepts, issues, tools, strategies & approaches for Digital Preservation and Archiving.
Open Preservation Foundation Workshop: veraPDF – definitive, open source PDF/A validation for digital preservationists
PKX / Practitioners Knowledge Exchange: Case Studies in Preservation & Archiving Architectures and Operations
Lightning Talks
The Frontiers of Preservation
- Discussions on the recent developments and challenges facing those who are tackling digital preservation.
Industry Collaboration and Solution Vendor Presentations
Project Updates and Digital Preservation Community Developments
Hardening Existing Systems with Preservation Capabilities

Agenda

The full agenda is published on the PASIG 2016 website: http://pasig.schk.sk/wordpress/agenda. A list of local hotels is also available.

Sponsors

We would like to thank the sponsors: Arkivum, Cray, The Digital Preservation Network, Ex Libris, Oracle, Preservica, P&A Consult, and T-Systems.

A list of participating organisations is published on the website: http://pasig.schk.sk/wordpress/participating-organisations.

We look forward to seeing you in Prague!

Jasná, Slovakia, 14-16 March 2016

Innovative Libraries In a Digital Environment

For the 19th time, the beautiful surroundings of Low Tatras will create a scenery for the ILIDE 2016 Conference where as usually the digital preservation, digital collections access and digital processing experts from around the world will gather.

The conference is the continuation of well-known and prestigious Digital Library Conference. The organisers felt that the name should reflect the broader area of topics the conference has recently presented and ilide: Innovative Library in Digital Era fully represents the conference’s broader scope. However, the ilide2016conference is not losing its attractive atmosphere and remains a unique opportunity to connect with library professionals, who work in a variety of government, academic and private sectors.

The presentations will be given by leading representatives of the most important institutions dedicated to librarianship, archiving, information technology, cultural and collecting activities.

Antonella Fresa, Technical Coordinator of PREFORMA, will present the project, focusing in particular on the open source approach and on the forthcoming testing phase, showing how the conformance checkers can be used and integrated in other systems.

For further information please visit the Conference website.

London, 12-13 April 2016

Cloud Expo Europe 2016

Cloud Expo Europe returns on 12-13 April 2016 with the biggest and best instalment to date. This year’s event will bring you an unrivalled line up of world-class suppliers to the cloud technology sector, thousands of hours of free content from over 500 of the industry’s leading international practitioners and first class peer networking opportunities.

Building on the success of 2015, which saw 15,286 attendees flood the ExCeL Centre for Cloud Expo Europe and the co-located Data Centre World, new events Cloud Security Expo and Smart IoT London are being added to the event stack, which now boasts four industry leading events in one location.

PREFORMA has been invited to deliver a presentation in a special track coordinated by OW2 in the Park conference program: the Open Cloud Forum by OW2.

Join us at Cloud Expo Europe on 12-13 April 2016 at ExCeL London to:

Be inspired by over 500 top experts, including number 1 rated CIOs, Acclaimed Global Cloud Leaders, Cloud Gurus, all speaking in a compelling conference and seminar programme, which covers all the major technology and business issues.
Learn from dozens of real practitioners from blue chip companies, service providers and leading organisations.
Source the latest products and solutions from record 500 cutting-edge suppliers.
Network with thousands of your peers, with a projected attendance of over 20,000 there is has never been a better opportunity to meet industry visionaries, business leaders and people who have faced – and overcome – the same challenges as you.
Benefit from our brand new Software Architecture Theatre and FinTech stream in partnership with FINTECH Circle.

Find out more at the Conference website!

Washington, DC, 19-22 April 2016

IS&T Archiving Conference 2016

The IS&T Archiving Conference brings together an international community of imaging experts and technicians as well as curators, managers, and researchers from libraries, archives, museums, records management repositories, information technology institutions, and commercial enterprises to explore and discuss the field of digitization of cultural heritage and archiving.

The conference presents the latest research results on digitization and curation, provides a forum to explore new strategies and policies, and reports on successful projects that can serve as benchmarks in the field.

Archiving 2016 is a blend of short courses, invited focal papers, keynote talks, and peer-reviewed oral and interactive display presentations, offering attendees a unique opportunity for gaining and exchanging knowledge and building networks among professionals.

Easy Innova submitted an article about the TI/A initiative and a proposal to organise a workshop. The title of the paper is: “Long-term Preservation and Archival File Formats: Concepts and solutions”.

For further information visit the Conference website.

Barcelona, 31 May 2016

Workshop for Public Procurers in General Administration and e-Government

The European Commission invited PREFORMA to a workshop organised by eafip which targets public procurement authorities in general public services like public administration, and economic and financial affairs (ministries, regional and local authorities, public utility companies, etc.). A special focus will be on eGovernment solutions.

The workshop will be held in Barcelona (Spain) on 31^st May 2016. The aim of the event is to highlight the benefits of innovation procurement of ICT solutions through the Pre-Commercial Procurement (PCP) and Public Procurement of Innovative Solutions (PPI) approaches across Europe.

The workshop is free of charge and will feature:

Presentation / networking discussion on the EU funding opportunities for PCP and PPI (in the framework of the Horizon 2020 calls).
Presentation of case examples and lessons learned.
Presentation / networking discussion on the eafip Toolkit (aimed to support you in preparing your innovation procurement).

The workshop is only open to public contracting authorities who will have a unique chance to openly discuss unmet procurement needs, innovation concepts, project ideas, and much more. All procurers will have an opportunity to briefly present their ideas / plan / projects in the parallel sessions. You can already start thinking of concrete examples that you would like to implement!

Download here the agenda of the workshop.

For futher information visit the workshop webpage.