I have been away (installing a system) for the past week and will belatedly
add a few opinions to this discussion.  My background is 20 years of being a
director/curator, 15 years of which was spent using my own collection
management system(s).  I now do this work full time for others.

1. Too often I still hear the question "What software are you using?" rather
than "How are you using it?"  With today's technology, it really doesn't
make any difference what you use as long as the system is flexible, the data
is under your control, and the information is exportable.

2. The real purpose of any system should be to enable and facilitate
comprehensive documentation by collection experts and users.  In other
words, to create a consistent, comprehensive and cumulative data set.  This
is more a function of the interface than the particular software being used.
The interface needs to be tuned to the discipline, the individuals using it,
and the particular institutional context.  And although keeping it simple
has great advantages, a flat file is too simple.  Museum collections are by
nature multi-relational.

3. There was an excellent article in Museum News (July 1994) dealing with
this issue.  Briefly, for automation to work optimally, a museum and its
staff must collectively accept responsibility for documentation.  An outside
expert with a laptop and a software package will not solve your automation
problems if you don't want to learn anything about information or be
involved in the process.

4. I think museums should try to develop capability, not buy a product, and
I am leery of approaches which involve ongoing support and proprietary
software.  Whose data is it, anyway?

5. The above comments derive from my experience designing custom systems,
using off-the-shelf software, for a variety of museums and disciplines.
This experience has convinced me that automation works best in museums when
the information develops and flows from the bottom up (neural network model)
rather than the top down (information processing model).  The closer
collection users are to the documentation process (e.g. hour-to-hour), the
better the resulting information is.

These points are best emphasized by a demo, but that's one thing the List
isn't good for !



Joe Nagel (KUSTOS Inc.)
2961 Semiahmoo Trail
Surrey, B.C.  V4P 1H4
604-531-6879, 604-594-2628 (FAX)