Content Management for All Media?

[Caitlin Bumford]

I just started work as a lone arranger at a small nonprofit archives/library/museum. Their collections are made up of about 40% archives, 40% artifacts, and 20% books. My predecessor, in concert with the higher-ups in the organization, purchased Inmagic Library Suite for cataloging. My bosses are sure that this software will serve the purposes of all media within the collection, but I'm less confident.

The organization, of course, is particularly gung ho about digitizing the entire collection, so digital content management and online access are high priorities. We also need to be able to manage artifacts, A/V materials (particularly audio cassettes), and archival finding aids. At this point, I'm particularly worried about being observant of archival practice and respecting context while those above me, unfamiliar with archival practice, are hoping for item-level treatment, description, and access.

Has anybody had experience with Inmagic and its capabilities for use with archives and museum collections? Or can anybody recommend a software (preferably open source, as the organization has already dropped a ton of money on Inmagic) that can handle archives, books, and artifacts (for purposes of cataloging and online access)? Am I doomed to getting mixed up with several different software platforms to fulfill all of my organization's needs? I've been looking into Archivist's Toolkit and Archon, but am finding it difficult to comprehend their full range of features.

Any insight would be greatly appreciated!

[Michelle Ganz]

We use Past Perfect software at the museum/archive/library I work at; so I am unfamiliar with the product you are using. I would contact the Archivist Toolkit people they are really nice. The only thing I would be worried about is having to maintain multiple catalogs. If you can convince someone that having multiple cataolgs will make things extremely difficult in terms of serachability and accessability you might be able to switch to a different system. Since the higher ups have already paid a bundle for the software I suspect they may not want you to use an open source product. Have you tried calling the software company? When I first encountered Past Perfect I had a ton of questions about how it worked and their tech support folks were extremely helpful. I really like Past Perfect. It lets me catalog in 4 different modules: library, archives, photographs and objects. But it has it's own particular quirks (as do all of the products that I have heard of).

I'm not sure if this helps or not. If you want more information just let me know.

Good luck!
Michelle

[Christina Zamon]

Hi Caitlin,
At my last organization someone had purchased InMagic for the same reasons you cite. It was never used and when I looked through the manuals and such (this would have been an earlier version of what you have now) it didn't seem to give me the flexibility that I needed for my particular situation and institution. I looked at PastPerfect, Re:discovery, and a few other systems and ultimately went with Re:discovery even though it meant purchasing different software and not using InMagic. I believe my successor is still using Re:discovery for archives (although I see that the librarian ditched Re:discovery for the library catalog, probably b/c the institution refused to pay the extra$$ to put it online).

at the time that I purchased Re:discovery Archon did not exist and AT was in its infancy.

In my current institution I was told that our IT won't support the backend for AT and Archon doesn't seem to be the right fit for me. I'm still struggling here to get some sort of system in place. I may be going in with some members of our library consortium for some sort of software. We also just got "free" as part of our OCLC subscription, a limited account for ContentDM. I'm going to dabble with it because it is "free" but I don't think it will serve all of my purposes.

I don't know if that helps at all...