Data Mapping Project Report

The report and methodology for the Data Mapping Project has been published on the SCA website. We are still experiementing with the best way to make the dataset of 6120 collections available online.

At the moment we have a draft Google fusion table which allows us to display parts of the data in different ways. For example, there is a map view of the collections by business location and also repository location.


Or this view which shows the connections between industry sectors and companies.
Many thanks to the Archives and Records Association for funding the first stage of this project.

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Part 1: Data Mapping Project Update

For the last six weeks as part of the Data Mapping Project I have been working to update and enhance an extracted dataset of Scottish business archive collections held by the National Register of Archives. The project funded by the Archives and Records Association is part of a wider project by the National Strategy for Business Archives in Scotland.

As you may have seen from my previous post, the aim of the project is to provide a new online resource which presents the enhanced dataset in visually new ways. The finished resource will enable interpretation and analysis of the business collections by industry, geographical location and by repository sector.

This will provide a resource for archivists and researchers to explore business history by viewing business archives differently, encouraging fresh interpretation on the subject area.

One of the surprise findings of the project was Manufacturing only contributes to 1% of the total Scottish business archives with businesses involved in Shops, Merchants and Distributors representing 13%.

The project methodology and report outlining the findings and recommendations will be posted here shortly. Future stages of the Data Mapping Project will also be posted on this page.

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Data Mapping Project Begins

After successfully obtaining funding from the Archives and Records Association research and advocacy fund,  the National Strategy for Business Archives in Scotland is pleased to announce the start of a six week Data Mapping Project with Cheryl Brown as Data Mapping Project Officer.

The Data Mapping Project will review and enhance existing information about business archive collections in Scotland, with the objective of creating a single improved master dataset. Using this dataset the project will present information about business collections online in a flexible and interactive format.

This will allow collections for a particular industry or geographic area to be viewed in map or timeline format. This improved accessibility will provide a fresh way to look at business archives collections in Scotland as well as enabling other means of interpretation and will benefit creators, custodians and users of business archives.

To ensure that an accurate and up to date snapshot of Scottish business archive collections in 2011 is captured, any individuals or organisations holding business archive collections not included in the National Register of Archives or other online sources are invited to contact the project at businessarchivesscotland@gmail.com.

If you have collections to include, please email Cheryl Brown by Monday 30th January 2012 with the following details (where known) for each collection:
• Reference
• Title
• Date
• Description
• Extent

We are interested in unprocessed collections so please include any collections that have yet to be catalogued.

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Data Mapping Project

The NSBAS Implementation Group are pleased to announce that the Archives and Records Association have approved a grant from their research and advocacy fund for a Data Mapping Project in Scotland.

The data mapping project aims to create a single consistent and clarified dataset for business archive collections in Scotland that will provide improved and flexible information for creators, custodians and users of business archives.

It will do this by locating and mapping business archive collections and collecting policies in Scotland. The focus will be the verification of data about known business archive collections to inform the National Strategy for Business Archives in Scotland. Analysis of the results of this data collation will provide information that will inform many other areas of the strategy and create a project methodology that can be shared with partner organisations in the rest of the UK.

The project will:

• Gather and disseminate information on business archives for use by heritage professionals, researchers and businesses to improve management of and access to collections. 
• Develop and share a methodology for carrying out a survey of collections. 
• Add value to existing data and share this enhanced data with owners.

We will have a project officer working on this in December and have been very fortunate this week to receive extracted data from the National Register of Archives.  This contains information about over 6,000 business archive collections which we plan to check, update and map so that users will be able to search the data by geographic area, time period and industry sector.  This ability will in turn help to identify collecting strengths and weaknesses and reveal gaps in the collections across Scotland to inform surveying policies and other work.

We will be posting about the project here on the blog as we get started and it progresses.  If you have any questions then please email Kiara or businessarchivesscotland@gmail.com.

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