|
| 1 | +# News |
| 2 | + |
| 3 | +## Version 1.0 of the Oxford Common File Layout (OCFL) Released |
| 4 | + |
| 5 | +**07 July 2020** |
| 6 | + |
| 7 | +The OCFL Editors are pleased to announce version 1.0 of the Oxford Common File Layout, reflecting over 24 months of |
| 8 | +work by the OCFL Editors and the digital preservation and technology communities. |
| 9 | + |
| 10 | +The initiative originated in September 2017 from informal discussions at a Fedora/Samvera camp in Oxford, UK. These |
| 11 | +discussions identified the need for a simple, non-proprietary, specified, open-standards approach to the layout of |
| 12 | +files for the purpose of preservation persistence. Subsequently, a kickoff community meeting attracted 47 attendees |
| 13 | +from 32 institutions, confirming the need and resulting in the establishment of the OCFL Editors team. |
| 14 | + |
| 15 | +### What is OCFL? |
| 16 | + |
| 17 | +The OCFL describes an application-independent approach to the storage of digital information in a structured, |
| 18 | +transparent, and predictable manner. It is designed to promote long-term object management best practices within |
| 19 | +digital repositories. In addition, the OCFL's standardized approach facilitates the migration or transfer of content |
| 20 | +between applications that utilize the specification. |
| 21 | + |
| 22 | +The key design goals and benefits of using the OCFL are: |
| 23 | + |
| 24 | + - Completeness - A repository can be rebuilt purely from the files it stores. |
| 25 | + - Parsability - By humans and machines, to ensure content can be understood in the absence of the original software. |
| 26 | + - Robustness - Against errors, corruption (accidental or deliberate), and migration between storage technologies. |
| 27 | + - Versioning - Repositories can make changes to objects but their history persists - to allow referential integrity |
| 28 | +and recoverability. |
| 29 | + - Storage diversity - Content can be stored on diverse storage infrastructures including cloud object stores. |
| 30 | + - Efficiency - Many design decisions are made with a view to computational, bandwidth and storage efficiency in the |
| 31 | +light of real world experience. |
| 32 | + |
| 33 | +### What information is available? |
| 34 | + |
| 35 | +The OCFL website at https://ocfl.io, includes the most up to date version of the specification and the implementation |
| 36 | +notes as well as the latest editors draft. |
| 37 | + |
| 38 | +The [OCFL Specification](https://ocfl.io/1.0/spec/) defines both OCFL Objects, a simple structure for content and a JSON document (inventory.json) |
| 39 | +which provides a straightforward but comprehensive register for the object and versions of its content, and an OCFL |
| 40 | +Storage Root, an arrangement for how OCFL Objects are laid out on physical storage. It also contains examples |
| 41 | +illustrating the use of the OCFL, and explanations that ground decisions in prior experience. |
| 42 | + |
| 43 | +The companion [OCFL Implementation Notes](https://ocfl.io/1.0/implementation-notes/) contains advice for implementing |
| 44 | +the specification including recommendations for digital preservation, storage handling, client behaviors, and best |
| 45 | +practices for dealing with OCFL Objects in motion. |
| 46 | + |
| 47 | +The OCFL Editors are also releasing [validation rules](https://ocfl.io/validation/validation-codes.html) and |
| 48 | +[fixture objects](https://github.com/OCFL/fixtures) for testing OCFL implementations against the specification. We |
| 49 | +welcome your feedback, questions, use cases, and especially details of any implementations or experimentation with OCFL. |
| 50 | + |
| 51 | +### How can we get involved? |
| 52 | + |
| 53 | +The OCFL is managed through Github at https://github.com/OCFL and it is open for anyone to raise issues or add use |
| 54 | +cases. The OCFL Editors meet twice monthly with Community Meetings once a month detailing progress and giving the |
| 55 | +opportunity to discuss issues verbally. Details can be found on the OCFL wiki, https://github.com/OCFL/spec/wiki, |
| 56 | +which also contains links to the Slack channel and mailing lists. |
| 57 | + |
| 58 | +### The OCFL Editors |
| 59 | + |
| 60 | +Andrew Hankinson (Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford) |
| 61 | +Neil Jefferies (Bodleian Libraries, University of Oxford) |
| 62 | +Rosalyn Metz (Emory University) |
| 63 | +Julian Morley (Stanford University) |
| 64 | +Simeon Warner (Cornell University) |
| 65 | +Andrew Woods (LYRASIS) |
0 commit comments