Transcript
Transcript: Transfer Procedures for Government Records
[00:00:00 The CSPS logo appears onscreen.]
[00:00:06 The screen fades to Natasha Dubois in a video chat panel.]
Natasha Dubois (Library and Archives Canada): Hello, my name is Natasha Dubois. Along with my colleague Martha Sellens, we wrote the new transfer procedures for government records, both physical and analog, that is, for all records that are not digital. My colleague Brian Clarke completed the same exercise with transfer procedures for digital government records. He is currently part of the team writing additional guidance tools for the Operational Standard for Digital Archival Records' Metadata. Today, we are presenting the various tools at your disposal to properly prepare records for transfer to LAC.
[00:00:47 A slide is shown with text that reads:
"Preparing Government Records for Transfer to LAC"
"Brian Clarke"
"Natasha Dubois"
"Martha Sellens"
"10 February 2025".]
We will alternate between French and English during our presentation. And as Francis has already told you, please feel free to ask your questions in the official language of your choice, regardless of which presenter they are intended for. Now, let's have a look at what happened at LAC recently regarding transfer procedures.
[00:01:08 A slide is shown with a timeline of events and text that reads:
"2019 – Transfer of Government Records Web Form"
"2023 – Operational Standard for Digital Archival Records' Metadata"
"2024 – Procedures for the Transfer of Government Records".]
The timeline you see on the next slide shows that over the past several years, some changes have taken place at LAC regarding the way government records are transferred. And some tools… We have created some tools to help you. In 2019, the online transfer request form was created, replacing requests sent to the liaison centre or directly to your archivist by email, and since then, you have received automated notifications regarding the transfer process. Then, in 2023, the Operational Standard for Digital Archival Records' Metadata was published. It presents the core categories of Metadata that must accompany digital records for their transfer to LAC. In 2023-24. We have thoroughly revised the transfer procedures, for physical, analog and digital records. These procedures dated back to 2014. This clearly allowed us to align them with our current practices and requirements, which have changed significantly over the past 10 years. There have also been other changes. The inventory template was modified in 2022 and made available online to all Government of Canada institutions.
The online transfer request form was upgraded in summer 2024 to align with the vocabulary and new instructions for procedures. Again in 2025-26, the online transfer application form is expected to be modified to better accommodate digital transfer requests as well as the digital transfer assessment form that will also be amended accordingly. The publication of the Operational Standard for Metadata and the revision of the transfer procedures were announced during the IM backstage in October 2023. Then, in November 2024, the main changes regarding the requirements for the transfer of digital records to LAC were presented. Today's presentation is obviously not a repetition of this content. Rather, we will focus on using the tools that will allow you to transfer records to LAC. All the tools we are presenting to you today are available on our website, and during our presentation, you will see how they are used to help you prepare records for transfer to LAC. Now, let's see the next slide for the structure of our presentation.
[00:03:40 A slide is shown with text that reads:
"How Do I Use These Tools?"
"1: Storage Room"
"2: Digital – Part 1"
"3: Digital – Part 2".]
We will use three separate scenarios. The first concerns physical and analog records such as those you find in your storage rooms or file rooms. The second concerns physical storage media for digital records, sometimes found with physical and analog records, and the third scenario concerns digital records that are managed in your EDRMS. Each scenario will present the main challenges you are likely to encounter as you prepare the records, as well as possible solutions or ideas for overcoming these challenges. One thing to note is that you are probably currently coping with the results of a chronic lack of IM resources. You know that the process of inventorying and describing your records must be done at some point in order to allow for their disposal. If you have not already, you will realize throughout this presentation that implementing good management practices once you create records saves you time and energy when you dispose of records. We cannot go back in time but if you implement good IM practices now, it will be much easier in the future when your institution disposes of records. Now, let's look at the first scenario that Martha will present to you.
[00:05:09 A slide is shown with the title "Scenario 1 – Storage Room" above an image of a storage room.]
[00:05:12 Natasha Dubois appears in a separate video chat panel.]
Martha Sellens (Library and Archives Canada): Thank you. As Natasha mentioned, in the first scenario, we are talking about physical and analog records in this storage room. So, we have this storage room here that needs to be cleared out and you're not quite sure what is in the room. Maybe you need to clear it out because you're moving buildings or you're renovating. The institution is being reorganized and so programs and therefore the records related to them are being switched between teams or maybe you've just finally gotten to this item on your endless to-do list, in which case, congratulations. That's amazing. But whatever the reason, our goal here is to make sure that you are disposing of the records appropriately and as efficiently as possible. Over the next few slides, I'm going to go over the information about the records that you need to provide to Library and Archives Canada, the types of records that you might find, and some tips and tricks for how to identify them and pack them correctly for transfer to LAC. And then, Natasha will do a run through of the tools available on our website, which you will be using as part of the transfer process to get us all of the required information. So, in this slide, I'm actually on the previous slide. Sorry, team. So, in our… in our… our storage room here, where should we start? Our primary question is what are they? Neither of us can make informed decisions about these records if we don't know what they are. So, and we also want to use our limited resource as efficiently as possible. So, the first step is what are the records? Before proposing records for transfer, you need enough information to determine whether you, the institution, still need to keep the records for some reason. So, have they met their retention? Have you satisfied your own disposition process or do you have all of the information that you need in order to do so? Are there any legal restraints like a litigation hold or a regulatory requirement that might prevent you or any other government policies or procedures from Treasury Board or other authorities which would prevent you from transferring records to LAC?
And then, on the other side, you also need to know whether the records are archival and should be transferred. This is where LAC archivists come in and like you, we also need enough information to assess the archival value of these records in this room. As you know, LAC uses disposition authorizations and application guides to identify which records are archival. These are generally created specifically for your institution, so always start by reading through the application guides as that have been provided to you, as they may provide you with the information you need to determine the records' archival value. If anything is unclear, talk to your assigned archivist and they'll be able to help you get figured that out. On our side, we also use the same tools at point of transfer to confirm that the records are archival before we approve your transfer request in the system. So, these conversations can also be useful for us since we also have to have that mapping between the specific records you are proposing and the identification of archival records that we've already done. So, I've mentioned… what enough information is what we need at this stage. Well, what is enough? It depends. Always start with the basics here. So, who, what and when? And try to be as specific as you can. And then, in your conversation with your archivist, the archivist will let you know whether you need a bit more information. And we may also be able to provide some suggestions on how to find that information, if you don't already have it. So, for the who, in the worst-case scenario, who will be the institution? yourself, your institution. But you may also have more specific information, the team, the division or a program area that has created these records themselves. Check the boxes, see what's on the labels on the outside, see if there's anything on the file jackets themselves, and if there are acronyms. Try to look them up to see what they might be. But if you only have the acronym, also provide that to us, we might be able to figure it out.
What type of records are these? Are they scientific reports? Are they application files, meeting minutes? Is it just a mix of a whole bunch of different kinds of records that are all from the same business area? Sometimes, you won't be able to tell, and that's all right. But tell us what you can and if you know the business area, at least try to give us an idea of what they were responsible for so we can get a sense of what the records might be. And for when? You may need to sample a few of the files in the individual boxes in order to get a sense of the date range that we're dealing with here. But in this case, an estimate is all right. It's better than nothing. So, if, for example, you know that this is a storage room that was in active use from 1960 to 1980 and that no one has added any records to it since that time, then you can provide the date as before 1980 and explain to us how you came to that conclusion. At this stage, even if you're lucky enough to have a full inventory of the records in the storage room, you may not have this sort of aggregate level summary of who, what and when, available as part of that of that listing. So, and this is... that summary is actually what's most important for us to determine the context of the records and their potential archival value. So, it's useful to gather that even if you do have an inventory at this stage. Once you've determined that your institution doesn't still need to keep the records and that they are archival and LAC would like you to transfer them, now, it's time to take to… go to the next step and make sure that you're meeting all of LAC's transfer requirements and get ready to submit a request to LAC. Next slide.
[00:11:50 A slide is shown with text that reads:
"Gather the Need for Information"
"Needed information: Consult section 6.2.2 of the Transfer procedures"
"Why do you need to gather all this information?".]
The transfer requirements are of course listed in the procedures that we recently renewed, but as Natasha will demonstrate in a few minutes, the transfer web form and the inventory template are designed to allow you to provide us with all of this information and even in the case of our sort of mystery boxes in the storage room, you may find that you have already gathered quite a bit of this information and that is required as part of confirming that the records are in fact, ready to be transferred both on your end and on ours. In the interest of time, I won't go through the list of information in detail, but you can find that required information listed in section 6.2.2 of the transfer procedures. Of course, for our storage room example, we are referring to the physical and analog transfer procedures, but you should be aware that it's the exact same number as what's… as the requirements in the… in the digital procedures as well. And the only differences between the two are based off of this format specific requirements that we have for the information. So, we, at LAC, need this information in order to continue managing these records and to ensure that we can provide access to them, to Canadians now and in the future. Broadly speaking, the information that we're… that we're asking for, this required information falls into two main categories. The first one would be the intellectual management of the records, and this is that what are they piece with a few extra levels of detail compared to what we were doing in the initial stages here. For example, it's extremely important that you provide the security classification information or anything else that might affect the appropriate access or use of the records.
And it's equally important as well to let us know if the records that you are transferring have already been made available to the public, since that takes a big burden… burden off of our staff. And that is something we very much appreciate. Another example of appropriate access and use of records is that if you have records where the copyright is not held by the crown or even just anything with a very high monetary value, it's especially important to let us know in those cases because that's not typical of most government records. And we want to make sure that we're managing them appropriately. The second category of information that we require is about the physical management of the records. So, this is most often related to preservation of the actual physical objects themselves that are being transferred to us to reduce any long-term harms that might come to them. But it's also part of sort of the practical necessity of managing the records themselves. How many boxes are there? How big are they? Things that we need to know in order to arrange the logistics of a pick up and also to plan our storage space within our own facilities. For both types of information, some of which you will be able to include it directly into the transfer web form. But the inventory itself is the most important piece of supporting documentation for the records, both for the intellectual and the physical management, because it explains what the records are and which specific records, which files or items are in which specific container, so we can adequately do both types of management over the course of the records lifecycle. And as you're creating an inventory, it by necessity goes hand in hand with that sort of packing and repacking of material in preparation for transfer. Since if you find something new, you'll have to let us know about it and then you'll have to update the container numbers or the titles of the files.
And it's a bit circular and goes back and forth, but that's still a very important key part of the process. LAC's these packaging, packing and labeling requirements are available in Appendix C of the physical and analog transfer procedures. And we can also provide training to you upon request. So, when you take a look at that section of the transfer procedures, you'll notice up at the top, there's a… there's a note letting you know that LAC may require different packaging required… have different requirements depending on the records proposed for transfer. Don't worry about this. This is just to account for the breadth of variables that can go into determining the best course of action for long-term preservation. So, as always, talk to your archivist and we'll be able to have a discussion about the specific needs of the records in question. In our storage room, for example, there might be a few areas that could use some special instructions. Even without looking inside any of the boxes, you may have noticed that there were a few oversize containers. So, the first step there when we're deciding whether or not anything needs to be done, is to look inside and consult with your archivist about what you find. A few different options of how we would have to proceed. You may find that the records inside these oversize boxes will fit safely inside of a more standard sized container like a B30, in which case that is what we will instruct you to do. You might need to use a different type or size of container, in which case, we will advise you on what that is and where you might be able to purchase it. Or finally, the existing container might be good enough and either that's good enough for the long-term preservation of the records or it's just good enough for that transfer of those records to LAC where staff, myself or one of my colleagues will be making a specialized container for the long-term storage of those records. We're not in the business of getting you to do extra work if we're just going to redo it ourselves.
And for the other boxes, you'll notice that they are all in… Most of them are all in these banker's box style boxes with a lid. These are… that is not an accepted box for transfer to LAC. So, they will all need to be rehoused into likely the standard B30 that we describe in Appendix C. But as you're repacking all of these… these boxes, watch out for any different kind of media mixed in with your regular paper files. Appendix C is a table of the common media types you may encounter with some considerations and requirements from LAC for those media types but the basics of it is any time you encounter another media type, you must contact your archivists, especially when it's mixed in with other paper files so that we can determine whether those media need to be segregated from your paper files. And the reason why we might segregate media is for preservation needs. Different media have different requirements. Some need to be stored in different temperatures or different humidity levels or even just in a different type of container so that are not rubbing up against the paper that's in the standard file, and that's just to prevent damage. So, as you're going through creating an inventory or repackaging boxes of any kind, you don't need to check every single file or page. But there are a few things to look out for. And if you notice them, you can look a little bit closer and then talk to us about what you find. One thing to look out for are accordion files, especially those with a flap over the top. We may know them as wallets or pockets. They don't always have other types of media inside them, but they do often enough that it's worth taking a look inside those pockets to see what you have. And then also, you may just be able to tell based off of look, feel, smell, just anything that's a little bit different from a standard letter or legal-size piece of paper and get color, texture, all sorts of different things. So, just keep your eye out for that.
[00:20:31 A slide is shown with the title "Photographic Material / Materiel photographique" above an image of a child being aided by a medic, an image of a group of people standing by a lake, and an image of photo prints which all precede the text "Source: PA-135956 / e010975945-v8 / LAC/BAC".]
And on the next slide, I'm going to quickly go through a few of the different media types and some media specific advice for what to look out for in case you might have it in in your records. So, with photographs, you might see plastic or paper sleeves over top of prints or negatives or even envelopes that aren't the same size as, again, standard paper. And we also may be able to smell them. Photographs are made with a variety of different chemical processes, and sometimes that comes across as a smell that remains in them. With photographs, especially if you smell vinegar, that's especially important to note because it likely means that the negatives or the prints are deteriorating and will need to do a damage assessment to see what is going on with those records as part of the transfer process. Some formats are fragile or flammable when it comes to the photographs, especially some types of negatives. So, always make sure to check with us and also always wear nitrile gloves and handle any prints or negatives from the edges of the image. Next slide.
[00:21:43 A slide is shown with the title "Maps, Plans and Architectural Drawings" above a drawing of a building, a drawing of a map, and an image of a pile of paper which all precede the text "Source: n0078499-v8 / e011086592-v8 / LAC/BAC".]
Maps, plans and technical drawings, architectural plans are often printed on oversize sheets. So, for these types of records, definitely keep an eye out for oversized containers or items that are folded or rolled to fit inside a smaller container. If you do encounter anything that's folded or rolled, be very careful as you are handling those items, especially once they get… when they get older, they can become quite brittle and it becomes very easy to tear or damage the records as you're handling them. So, if you notice any damage occurring as you are trying to open records to view what they are, don't just stop, don't force anything and contact LAC and we'll let you know what the appropriate course of action is to handle those records. And… some of these records are also created with chemical processes, especially blueprints or printed on a different type of material like, like vellum or Mylar, both of which can occasionally off gas and have a bit of a smell. So, that's another thing to look or I guess, smell out for as you are going, looking for records of this type. Next slide.
[00:23:03 A slide is shown with the title "Documentary Art and Objects" above a drawing of a fruit, a sketch of a woman and multiple articles of clothing, and an image of a coin which all precede the text "Source: e010782493-v8 / e011160037-v8 / Acc. No. 1970-27-7M / LAC/BAC".]
It's very, very difficult to make any general statements about art and objects because they are so varied in how they need to be handled. So, a watercolor, a metal seal and a pencil sketch should not be treated in the same way. So, if you find any art within the files that you were going through, always, always, always, contact your assigned archivists and we'll make sure to get the right information from our specialists at LAC to give you the correct instructions for your specific type of art. Art can be very fragile. So, again, always wear nitrile gloves and handle from the edges to avoid any damage to the image. Next slide.
[00:23:48 A slide is shown with the title "Audiovisual Material" above images of cassette tapes and film.]
For AV records, they come in a very wide variety of formats and sizes. So, some will be immediately obvious when you open a box, like a… one of these film reels, whereas others might hide more easily within a paper file or one of the wallets I mentioned earlier. So, pay attention as you're going through to see what you can find. Again, it will be the sort of plastic feel of the… of a carrier or metal in some cases. And again, especially with film, you may have that smell that I mentioned earlier with other format, media as well. I will also note some AV formats are obsolete or endangered, and since they are not human-readable, there's a lot more work that goes into preserving the content of these of these records. So, it's essential that we identify them at point of transfer since what is readable now may no longer be readable in the next year or in the next five, never mind in 50 or 100. So, always, always, always let us know when you have AV records. Next slide.
[00:25:04 A slide is shown with the title "Physical Carriers of Digital Records" above images of floppy disks and a CD.]
And the last type of format that I will briefly discuss are digital carriers, especially anything small like floppy disks or CD-Rs, CD-ROMs. They are very easy to miss when tucked inside a regular paper file of records. Like with AV, these formats can deteriorate quite quickly. So, you need to take action to protect the contents before they are lost, when it may already be too late. But we'll see what we can do. Brian will talk more about these digital records in scenario 2. So, stay tuned on that one. Next slide.
[00:25:42 A slide is shown with text that reads:
"Next Step"
"Talk to your information management (IM) team"
"You are the IM team of your institution?"
"Talk to your LAC archivist".]
Okay, so that may have been a lot of information. It was a lot of information. And next, Natasha will show you LAC's website and tools which will lead you through providing all of the required information we just discussed as part of that transfer. But before she does that, I just want to emphasize the most important point for you to take from our presentation here, which is talk to your archivist. We're only part of the way through the presentation today. And already I have said, talk to your archivist at least nine times and you will hear it again many times before we are done today. So, feel free to play along at home and keep a tally, if you like. The reality of records and information management in the GC is very complex and as a result, there often aren't simple standard solutions that we can provide. So, we've tried to give you as much as we can in terms of basic answers to everything. But at the end of the day, sometimes the decisions we make or the answers we provide will be as unique as the records you are discussing.
I will add another minor nuance here as well, since I know we have a very large audience today. If you're not part of your institution's IMT, please talk to them as well before contacting LAC. It's important not to circumvent your IM colleagues because as I mentioned briefly earlier, there are important parts of your internal disposition process that we can't advise you on. And they may also already have the answers to your questions. Your IM team has expertise and knowledge that is useful for you, which I don't have, in the same way as I have expertise and knowledge on archival records that they don't. So, for those of you who are not IM professionals, talk to your IM is just as equally important as talk to your archivist. If you're ever in any doubt, whether you are a member of IM staff or not, please do reach out to your assigned archivist or to the liaison center if you don't know who is the assigned archivist. But just keep in mind that we may redirect you to your IM team first or for a large IM team to the main contacts that we speak with on a regular basis as an essential source of information for you to consult first before discussing further with us. And now, I will hand it over to Natasha, who will show you the tools on LAC's website that will help you meet the all the requirements for transferring records to LAC. Natasha, over to you.
Natasha Dubois: Thank you, Martha. So, we're going to... You have some records to transfer. You spoke to the archivist at LAC. It has now been ten times. You have gathered all the required information about the records. You are now at the stage of creating the inventory which must meet LAC requirements. Now we'll go to our website, where we find this famous inventory that was well hidden and that we have improved access to.
[00:29:07 The Government of Canada webpage titled « Bibliothèque et Archives Canada » is scrolled through.]
Then, from our website you have to go down to the website's home page.
[00:29:27 A webpage link titled « Tour sur nos services » is clicked on.]
You need to scroll down to All our services, then Services for the Government of Canada.
[00:29:34 A webpage link titled « Services pour le gouvernement du Canada » is clicked on.]
Next, Information management and disposition of government records.
[00:29:41 A webpage link titled « Gestion de l'information et disposition des documents gouvernementaux » is clicked on.]
There are different things here on this page. Brian's going to tell you a little bit more about that later, but it's a good page to go to if you work in information management or if you would like to... get more information about that.
[00:29:58 A webpage link titled « Demande de transfert de documents fédéraux » is clicked on.]
We will go to the request to transfer government records.
[00:29:59 The Government of Canada webpage titled « Soumettre une demande de transfert de documents fédéraux » is scrolled through.]
So, at the top of this page, you now know... these are the... among the changes we made this summer, you have a series of hyperlinks to the various tools we're talking about today. Both transfer procedures for physical and analog records and for digital records. The inventory template I'll tell you about in a minute and the transfer form. Sorry... the Digital Transfer Assessment Form and the Operational Standard for Metadata that Brian is going to tell you about after this little demonstration I'm doing here. So, here we are in the form, the famous online transfer application form that we have been talking about since before. We will start by going to see the inventory itself. So, this is a nice Excel file.
[00:30:46 The page changes to an Excel spreadsheet which is then scrolled through.]
So, inventory template. It's a template. You can use this template directly to create your list of files, records or items that you want to transfer to LAC. You are absolutely not required to use this model, this template itself. However, the information you provide to LAC must match the minimum requirements that you have in that record. For example, if you have a system that can, that is capable of extracting a series of file titles, numbers, dates in Excel, it will work very well. You just have to make sure everything works. You don't have to use this file. Also, just as Martha was talking about packaging records in specialized boxes, it's possible that your archivist will give you information and instructions that are different from what you'll find here. Sometimes you will be asked for more information when it is available. Sometimes we'll ask you for different information because what you're sending us doesn't quite fit into one of the categories we have here. So, first, the Instructions tab. If you have never used the template, I invite you to read it. It's not very long. A few lines of reading here, it is very easy. Next, you will see that there is a tab for each of the visual media types. Sorry… the support of… each of the types of media.
[00:32:22 A new tab titled « Documents textuels » is opened on the Excel spreadsheet, showing a series of headings.]
For example, text documents are still the most common. Sorry for bombarding you. There are columns with blue headers.
[00:32:34 A new tab titled « Art documentaire » is opened on the Excel spreadsheet, showing a series of headings.]
If I go to the next one, you will see that there are columns with white headers. The blue headings are mandatory information that you must provide.
[00:32:40 The « Documents textuels » tab is returned to.]
So, in what container, in what box you packed the record, if there is a file number, a volume number, file title, the dates, and so on. One of the very important pieces of information is the security category for each line.
[00:33:01 In the « Documents textuels » tab, the heading titled « Catégorie de sécurité » opens a drop-down menu.]
So, for each file or each item that you transfer, you must indicate its classification level, its security category level. So, this is very important. What you are going to complete, let's say you have some textual records, you have, for example, found some photographs and you have found two videotapes. You must complete all three tabs and this must also be repeated with the online transfer form. So, we're going back. Let's say you've completed inventory. Everything is ready. You have completed the Excel file. You are now ready to go and make your official records transfer request.
[00:33:36 The Government of Canada webpage titled « Soumettre une demande de transfert de documents fédéraux » is returned to and scrolled through.]
So, in the form, like in most of these online forms that you all know, a little red asterisk means that it's a required field, and there are a lot of them. Also, there will be question marks in some places that give you a little more detail about what we expect as answers or criteria on how you should answer the question or what you should enter in the field. This is very, very important and it is also indicated at the top, it is not possible to save the form in order to complete it later. That's why it's important to have all the information Martha asked you to gather. Have all this information, and your inventory must be ready. So, it's that you can't save this and come back to it. It has to be done all at once. So, the first part, contact information, I won't spend any time on this. This is something you know. You know how to answer that. The section, details regarding the records proposed for transfer. In the case of the creator's name, it is only... you are only asked for it in the event that you have, you would like to transfer records that will be, that were given to you by another institution. You inherited records from a predecessor or a defunct institution but you are transferring on their behalf. You must indicate who it comes from, who created the records. The disposition authorization number. It is mandatory. This is the one in effect for your institution and which justifies the transfer request. This allows us to make the connection and confirm that it is indeed archival. Intellectual context of the records... All the information you gathered earlier that cannot really appear in the inventory, you put it there. Creator, inclusive dates, all the information you can find about the context of the records. Here, please specify the quantity of containers of each size even if the quantity is zero. It is very important to indicate a number on each line, even if it is zero because the calculation is done automatically.
[00:35:56 The number 20 is entered in an empty box next to the text « Quantité de contenants B30 ». The number 1 is entered in an empty box next to the text « Quantité de contenants non-standard ». The number 0 is entered in an empty box next to the text « Quantité de contenants B20 ». The number 0 is entered in an empty box next to the text « Quantité de contenants B15 ». The number 0 is entered in an empty box next to the text « Quantité de contenants B10 ». The number 21 appears in an empty box next to the text « Quantité totale de contenants ».]
Let's say you have 20 here, then you have one there... you still have to put zero everywhere, otherwise the form won't save. Here we tell you specifically what a B30 is. We've been talking about it since earlier. These are the maximum dimensions you see there. The reason we are so demanding about the size of the B30s is that, among other things, our new storage building in Gatineau, Le Cube, has fixed racks that contain shelves… Nothing moves. It's… it's stationary. We cannot modify the spaces we have. And there are a number of B30s that fit on each shelf. If your B30s end up being B31s because they're just a little bit larger, well, we can no longer fit six of them. You can only fit five of them and then you lose space. So, pay close attention to the dimensions of the boxes that you… that you order and that you send to us. B10, B15, B20 are other types of boxes, they are specialized containers. Your archivist will talk to you about this if necessary. Anything that is not one of these four is not a standard container. A little bigger, a little smaller, very long, very wide, very high, is not standard. If you specify that it is not standard, you must provide us with the dimensions. Of course, this way we know when we're going to pick them up and what they look like. And for storage. Next, are some of the records that will be transferred digital? If you click "yes," there are fields that will appear. Brian will tell you about it later. We'll keep that at "no" for now. We'll just stick to the physical records here. Next, specify the container numbers for each media type. When we said we had 21 boxes.
[00:37:49 The value "1-20" is entered in an empty box next to the text « Textuel ». The number 5 is entered in an empty box next to the text « Photographies ». The number 21 is entered in an empty box next to the text « Enregistrements audio ».]
So, I know that boxes 1 through 20 had textual records in them because that's what I wrote in my inventory. I have pictures in box 15. I have three photos, my archivist told me to leave them there. No problem, but I have box 21 that contains movies or VHS tapes. So, it's important to put numbers that correspond to what is written in your inventory. Archival reference numbers and the number of volumes. If this doesn't mean anything to you, it's because your archivist hasn't told you about it. If your archivist tells you about it, they will tell you exactly what to write in there.
[00:38:28 A drop-down menu is opened next to the text « Quelle est la plus haute catégorie de sécurité de ces documents?» and the option « Très secret » is selected.]
Let's go back to the security category. This time you are asked for the highest [security] for the entire transfer. So, it can be Protected B. It can be unclassified. It can be secret.
[00:38:40 A new text box appears that reads « Les documents de catégorie « Très secret » doivent être places dans des contenants distincts des documents des autres catégories de sécurité ».]
If by chance it is very secret, you will have a little note telling you that very secret records must be segregated, must be separated from other records because we... we store them elsewhere. They are not in our regular vaults.
[00:38:54 A drop-down menu is opened next to the text « Est-ce que certains de ces documents ont été ouverts par l'AIPRP? » and the option « Oui » is selected.]
The inventory of the material proposed for transfer. Have any of these records been opened by ATIP?
[00:39:01 A new text box appears that reads « Veuillez s.v.p. préciser dans l'inventaire les contenants ou dossiers qui ont été examinés et ouverts par l'AIPRP ».]
If yes, you are asked in the inventory to indicate which ones are open. What specific files, which entire container. You can add a column in the inventory without any problems to indicate... This is not a case that is necessarily planned every time. So we didn't put a column for that.
[00:39:19 A drop-down menu is opened next to the text « Pouvez-vous soumettre l'inventaire avec cette demande? » and the option « Oui » is selected.]
Can you submit the inventory with this request? The answer should be yes at this stage.
[00:39:22 A new text box appears that reads « S.v.p., préparez un inventaire qui respecte les instructions présentées dans le gabarit d'inventaire de BAC et joignez-le à cette demande. Joignez le document. Choisir un fichier. Si un ou plusieurs fichiers d'inventaires ont été envoyés à l'archiviste par courriel ou par une autre méthode, veuillez l'indiquer dans le champ ci-dessous ».]
You still have the... the hyperlink to the inventory template, but it's already done. You attach the file. Only one file can be attached. If for some reason you have multiple inventory files, please let us know. You can send them to us by email and you will have to indicate in the field below that you have sent us one, two, three files by email in addition to the one that is there. It's possible that the file cannot be added to the website because the system only accepts Protected B records or lower. And it happens that in some inventories, you even have just in terms of the name of the file, of the folder or the title or the number, it can be information that is categorized, classified or that is Protected C. So, you cannot attach the record. At that point, there are other ways to send it to your archivist through secure channels. And that's where the answer here would be "no".
[00:40:23 The option « Non » is instead selected and a new text box appears that reads « Si l'inventaire ne peut pas être soumis par voie électronique, veuillez en expliquer les raisons. (Aucun transfert ne sera accepté sans un inventaire détaillé respectant les exigences de BAC.) ».]
This cannot be submitted for security reasons, it has been sent to the archivist. Otherwise, the only answer we don't want to have here is that the inventory doesn't exist. That's an answer we don't want since you're supposed to have made one. And finally, we are at the end. The last three boxes must be checked to confirm that the records are ready to be transferred, that you can transfer them and that LAC will now have control of them and you submit the request. So, we've explored this. We talked about physical and analog records, but earlier, I spoke to you [about this]. We found diskettes in your boxes. And what are we going to do with that? Well, now Brian is going to present all this to you, everything we do with digital. Brian?
[00:41:23 Brian Clarke appears in a separate video chat panel.]
Brian Clarke (Library and Archives Canada): Thank you. Thank you, Natasha. So, as Natasha mentioned, I will be speaking to you about two more scenarios that involve digital records from two different perspectives. So, as we've mentioned, you've gone through your physical and analog records. You find one of these. After taking some time to revel in nostalgia, you are left wondering what to do about this floppy disk. First things first, we should see if we can glean any information from the disk itself. Does it have any identification information on the label?
[00:41:56 A slide is shown with the title "Scenario 2: Digital – Part 1" above images of file folders and a floppy disk.]
Did it come out of a paper file? Getting a sense of all the physical context in which you found the floppy or other physical carrier is an important first bit of information to provide your archivist? In some cases, this may be enough for your archivists to determine if the digital records on this carrier are archival. Let's assume, for example, that the disk came out of a paper file that was previously identified as archival. The digital records on that disk are likely also archival and should be brought into a modern digital environment prior to transfer to LAC. But what does this mean?
First, it is department's responsibilities to extract the data from the disk and either into a modern recordkeeping system, or in such a case where the records are being prepared for transfer immediately, migrated over on to one of LAC's approved storage media listed in the transfer procedures, namely a USB key or an external hard drive. Some of you may have the hardware on site to do this, but I imagine many of you may need to explore contracting a third party to extract the data from a legacy carrier and transfer it over onto one of these approved storage media for transfer. Keep in mind that this migration is not a simple copy paste. It needs to be done using appropriate migration tools to ensure that all the embedded metadata such as created dates, is preserved. So, once you've done this, you've migrated the records and you open them up and you see what is on the disk, you realize that the records are related to a short lived but important project in your department from the early 1990s. Your archivist will need as much contextual information as you can gather about this project. The same who, when and what information that Martha was talking about earlier. So, for such a project may be its mandate, its scope, some important dates and in this case, you can also add a snapshot of what you found on the disk, whether that's a high-level folder structure or list of the records on the disk. Next slide.
[00:44:13 A slide is shown with text that reads:
"Challenges and Strategies"
"Archival value? "
"Preferred or acceptable file formats"
"Duplicate records"
"Legacy recordkeeping system"
"File inventory and metadata".]
Now, let's assume the archivist has confirmed that all the records on the diskette are archival. What do we do next? To begin with, only one copy of each record should be transferred to LAC. We will need to ensure that these records are not duplicates. There are two levels to this challenge. First, make sure that there are no duplicates on the diskette itself. There are numerous software programs that can help you with this task. If you would like recommendations, please contact your archivist who will be able to put you in touch with the experts at LAC. Second, we need to ensure that there are no duplicates with records in other record management systems that include your paper records. Since the diskette came from a paper file, just do a quick review of that file to make sure this isn't one of those scenarios where records were printed in order to file them while keeping the digital version. You will also want to check whether a paper version of these records is already at LAC. Here, your archivist can help you. Even after these checks, we can never be sure that we have exhausted all possibilities of duplication. However, we just want to make sure that we conduct a reasonable check to ensure deduplication of records before transfer. Next, it's time to evaluate file formats. I emphasize that, to transfer digital records, they must be in a preferred or acceptable file format according to our guidelines, which I will soon show you. There are free tools like DROID, which was developed by the National Archives in the UK, that can help you by identifying all the file formats in a digital collection and help you isolate problem areas and potential for processing. For example, you may encounter older formats like WordPerfect files. You will need to convert this file to a modern format like a doc or PDF to ensure its capability for preservation and future access.
For some formatting issues, there are many tools available to help you migrate toward an acceptable format. In other cases, such as with the proprietary format, it can be much more difficult. So, please talk to us throughout this process. We know that processing older file formats is one of the most challenging aspects of this digital collection. So, once the digital records themselves are ready to be transferred, that is, there are no duplicates and all file formatting issues have been resolved, we can start preparing the transfer of documentation. As with physical and analog transfers, you must provide an inventory of these records since it is a single diskette in our hypothetical scenario... you will need only one line in your inventory. Your archivist will request minimal Metadata on this line, which typically includes the same information you just saw in Natasha's demonstration. For example, the file number and title where you found the diskette, the security category and date. Finally, you may have questions about our Operational Standard on Metadata. We know that in such a situation you won't have much additional Metadata about these records. Fortunately, if you complete the required documents for the transfer, you will already meet LAC's minimum Metadata requirements, but I will talk about this in detail shortly. Next slide.
[00:48:54 A slide is shown with the title "Scenario 3: Digital – Part 2" above the GCdocs logo and an image of a control room.]
Now let's move on to another scenario involving digital records that you're probably more familiar with. Recent records that have just exceeded their retention periods but which were managed in a modern record management system such as EDRMS, GCdocs, SharePoint or M365. Since these records were managed actively and in a sound manner, much of the preparation needed to be simpler. However, recent transfers to LAC involving records managed in that system have highlighted some unique challenges that I would like to discuss now. Next slide.
[00:49:38 A slide is shown with text that reads:
"Challenges and Strategies"
"Lists, data dictionaries, code books, etc."
"Relational data and databases"
"File inventory: still necessary? "
"Minimal metadata requirements vs. "what about the rest? "".]
By now, you should fully expect what the first step of the transfer preparation should be. Talk to your archivist. In this case though, much of the information we require can probably be generated through extracting some sort of disposition report or digital object inventory directly from your system. Additionally, this type of object inventory may later also act as the official transfer inventory, though probably with some additions or edits that I will talk about shortly. With digital records coming out of an electronic recordkeeping system, you may also need to provide your archivist with additional information to help them interpret the records or the list, things like code books, data dictionaries or other reference materials related to how the recordkeeping system works are crucial bits of information for us to do our jobs. Now, this type of object that you… or disposition report may be enough for your archivist to confirm if the records are in fact archival and eligible for transfer to LAC. Additionally, archivist can confer with other subject matter experts in the institutions such as those in digital preservation, to ensure that we are not foreseeing any technical issues with the transfer. If so, we can deal with those early, preferably before you fully extract the records out of your system.
Once you've confirmed with your archivist that the files are archival and eligible for transfer, you will need to extract the records out of the system again onto an LAC approved carrier for transfer. However, I will take this moment to mention two things. One, LAC can provide a hard drive for you if you'd like. Just let your archivists know. Second, we don't have a current business line for direct transfers. However, we are exploring this capability on a pilot basis. If you are interested, again, talk to your archivists and we can provide you with more details. However, much of the following preparatory work will remain the same, other than the obvious step of loading the records onto a physical carrier. Extracting records from a modern system can sometimes be difficult, sometimes straightforward, depending on the system. However, sometimes, there are complex relationships between the records like approval tracking that need to be well documented in the metadata list and maintained during extraction. So, talk to your IT staff for guidance here. As with the last scenario involving the floppy disk, you will need to ensure that the file formats are suitable for long-term preservation and check for duplicates. However, these issues can be made much easier by building the appropriate rules into a modern recordkeeping system. Lastly, these types of systems will have much more robust metadata than older legacy digital records. We can assume as a starting point that you will probably have met the minimal requirements for transfer to LAC. However, just because we've met the minimal metadata doesn't necessarily mean that's all we want to acquire with the records.
It's possible, even likely, that additional and full metadata might be useful to provide additional context for the records. For example, things like approval history or access permissions can help us provide necessary contextual information when cataloging the records or reduce ATIP work for providing access further down the line. Now, I'll come back to the transfer documentation. Can that disposition report or digital object inventory that your system spits out be used in place of the file inventory that you had to create in the first two scenarios? Well, maybe, it depends. As Natasha mentioned earlier, our procedures don't specify that you must use our inventory template, but if you use something else, it must be in Excel and it must contain all the same information. So, I would recommend looking at what the… what the default metadata extract from your system looks like and read it against the template on the transfer web form to see if it contains the same information. In my experience, it usually does. Most systems have dates, titles, security classification information. However, sometimes things like file titles are missing. So, your archivist may ask you to manually add some information in order to accept this lists as the inventory to attach on the transfer request as Natasha showed you earlier. And now, I'll switch over to the screen share please.
[00:54:35 The Government of Canada webpage titled "Information management and disposition of government records" is shown.]
So, one thing I haven't spoken a ton about today yet is LAC's operational metadata standard. The reason for this is I want to give a practical example of how you might consult this tool when preparing your records for transfer. You can find this tool on our website. If you recall, Natasha brought you to this page on Information management and disposition of government records. She brought you directly over to the request to transfer government records. But for our purposes, we will go to this first link on managing government records.
[00:55:02 A webpage link titled "Managing government records" is clicked on.]
And then, guidelines for information management.
[00:55:06 A webpage link titled "Guidelines for information management" is clicked on.]
[00:55:07 The Government of Canada webpage titled "Guidelines" is scrolled through.]
And you will be brought to a page with all of our policy tools that implicate transferring government records. You'll see the transfer procedures that were updated last year as well as the file format guidelines that I mentioned… that I mentioned earlier that you can use to see if your records are in a preferred or acceptable file format for transfer.
[00:55:33 A webpage link titled "Operational Standard for Digital Archival Records' Metadata" is clicked on.]
Right now, we're going to go look at the operational standard for digital archival records metadata.
[00:55:38 The Government of Canada webpage titled "Operational Standard for Digital Archival Records' Metadata" is scrolled through.]
As a reminder, this metadata standard lays out 12 concepts or categories that are to be… are required to be included with archival government records. However, this does not mean that every digital object must be tagged with all 12 concepts. There are different levels of aggregation at which they are required on individual items or aggregations such as files or folders or the transfer as a whole.
[00:56:07 A webpage link titled "Appendix E: Summary of metadata concept obligations" is clicked on.]
[00:56:08 The Government of Canada webpage titled "Appendix E: Summary of metadata concept obligations" is shown.]
Appendix E summarizes the level of requirement for each of the 12 concepts and may be helpful to use as a sort of checklist when preparing records for transfer. So, let's take a look at the past two scenarios to see how they both may meet the minimal requirements laid out in this table, but in different ways. For example, classification code typically refers to a file number connected to your recordkeeping manual. You can see here that it is mandatory where present for items. This means that for the records like those maintained in an EDRMS where each object is likely tagged with a classification code that becomes required. Luckily, you'll have already provided us with this if you had submitted that object inventory we discussed earlier. For the floppy disk however, we're not expecting classification code to be present at the item level. So, if you continue through the table to the right, you'll notice that classification code becomes mandatory for aggregations or for groups of records. In the case we discussed above, a file number and file title from the paper file the floppy came out of or maybe written on the label of the disk itself is sufficient to meet this mandatory for aggregations requirement and this information would have already been included in the file inventory you would submit with the transfer. It is a similar story for creator metadata. We know that systems like GCdocs will have robust creator metadata at the item level. It is mandatory where present for items. So, we'll want that. However, for something like the floppy disk, you'll see that the creator metadata is only mandatory for transfers, which means that when you submit that web form Natasha showed you, you'll be asked some basic information about the business unit that created the records that are being transferred. We scroll down to language for another example. This is only mandatory when present for item… for items and not mandatory at any other level. This means that where your system includes item level language metadata, please include it in the inventory you send us. But we know that won't be present in cases like the floppy disk scenario. So, we won't ask for it.
Most of the metadata concepts that are always required at the item level, such as date, time, format and title are metadata that will be part of the computer file itself. So, while they were always required at an item level, you typically don't need to do much extra work when preparing for transfer. However, during the management of the record, you just need to be sure that this metadata doesn't get overwritten, say, for example, date to metadata being overwritten during system migrations. If you suspect that the embedded metadata is inaccurate for any reason, please speak with your archivist so we can try to figure out a suitable alternative. Some metadata concepts are only required at the transfer level. For example, disposition authorization will need to be included in the transfer web form, while the total of the extent of the transfer will be documented in the digital transfer assessment form, that I'll show you briefly. The reason that I show you this table and worked through it in such detail is to reflect that if you are filling out the required transfer documentation, you would have likely met the minimal requirements laid out in the operational standard shown here. One concept that I have not mentioned yet is the integrity concept. You'll notice the big asterisk next to it. This reflects that this metadata is only required at the point of transfer and not throughout the lifecycle of the archival records. We… So, in other words, we do require at the point of transfer for you to include an integrity check or checksum which can… we can verify once we have the records in our control to ensure nothing was corrupted in transit. For the sake of time, I won't go to any details about checksums, but if you don't know how to run them, please reach out to your archivist. We have several staff at LAC with lots of experience with this requirement.
[01:00:29 The Government of Canada webpage titled "Submit a request to transfer government records" is shown.]
So, now that we've ensured that the records are archival and are healthy digital records with the required metadata and inventories included, let's return to the web form that Natasha showed you earlier. If you recall, there was a question about whether the proposed transfer contained digital records. We will obviously select 'Yes'.
[01:00:42 The option "Yes" is selected next to the text "Are any of the records being transferred digital" and a new text box appears that reads "Do any of these containers contain portable storage media (Diskettes, CDs, USB keys)? Please fill out the Digital Transfer Assessment Form and attach it to this request. Attach the form. Choose File".]
In the two scenarios we have discussed, we have migrated your records over to an appropriate portable storage media, such as an external hard drive.
[01:00:53 The option "Yes" is selected next to the text "Do any of these containers contain portable storage media (Diskettes, CDs, USB keys)? " and a new text box appears that reads "Please specify in the inventory and/or the Physical Carrier Inventory tab of the Digital Transfer Assessment form which containers or files contain portable storage media".]
So, we would select yes, it does contain portable storage media. Remember that LAC can do carrier-less transfers on a pilot project basis. So, if you would like to explore this, speak with your archivist as we will need to do some sort of temporary workarounds around the web form. The next thing that you will be asked to fill out here is a digital transfer assessment form. This is the last piece of required documentation that you will be asked to include with digital transfers on top of the web form that you're seeing and the file inventory or whatever that looks like in your case. So, let's move over to the web form now.
[01:01:30 The Digital Transfer Assessment Form is shown.]
I will start by mentioning that we are currently revising this form to make it simpler to fill out. So, it may look different soon, but the key bits of information will be the same. For instance, the general information here is a lot of the same information you would have provided to your archivist earlier. The physical context of the records, whether they came from a paper file, whether they are born digital or digitized material. When we get into the scope and contact information, this is where you will be asked some key information, such as the total extent of the transfer and the total number of digital files included. If you don't know how to find this information, please let us know as this is crucial data to help all the key business areas at LAC plan their work. The file format information is where you can log that information when you analyze the file formats at an earlier stage of the transfer prep. For instance, if you did run a DROID report using the DROID tool, you should be able to copy much of that information over here to show your archivist, as well as our digital preservation stuff that all the records are in fact in preferred or acceptable file formats.
[01:02:46 A new Excel spreadsheet tab titled "Inventory" is opened on the Digital Transfer Assessment Form.]
Next, if you move to the second sheet in this workbook, you'll be presented with a digital physical storage media inventory. If you're only transferring one single hard drive, for example, this is perhaps not as important, however, if you are including multiple carriers, either because it's a very large transfer that doesn't fit on one drive or because you've segregated digital records based on security classification, filling this out is crucial so we know which files from your inventory are on which carriers. And with that, we'll move back to the PowerPoint presentation and I will pass it over to Martha for some concluding remarks. Thank you.
Martha Sellens: Thank you, Brian. So, once again, we've covered quite a lot of information today, but I just want to reassure everyone here as we're wrapping up, that there are really just two main points that we would like you to get from all of the things that we've… we've discussed today. Firstly, or I guess, for the 22nd time, this presentation, perhaps more actually.
[01:03:51 A slide is shown with text that reads:
"Conclusion"
"TALK TO YOUR ARCHIVIST! "
"PRACTICE GOOD IM! ".]
So, if you were keeping a tally, definitely include that in your feedback for the event. We'd love to hear what it was, what it actually ended up being, but talk to your archivist. The better our communication is at absolutely every stage of the records lifecycle, the easier it will be to transfer records when the time comes. And part of that reason is because our needs and your needs are complementary. So, as Natasha mentioned at the beginning of the presentation, practice good IM and you will find it easier to meet all of our transfer requirements. This also makes it easier for us archivists to determine whether records are archival or not, whether at the point of transfer or before. But also, just if you do encounter mystery situations, things that are difficult, like for three different scenarios that we've discussed today, don't hesitate to reach out to your archivist or to the liaison center. We won't be able to wave a magic wand and solve all of your problems, but we can use our experience to help focus your efforts and just ensure that we're not duplicating any efforts or minimizing… being as efficient as possible as we move forward with this process. Ultimately, our goal is to make sure that our archival records are transferred to LAC so that we can preserve them and people can find them for hundreds of years into the future. And that is the foundation of all of the required information and all of the packaging and electronic records transfer requirements that are listed in the procedures themselves or in the metadata standard. LAC cannot do a work without your contributions. So, thank you very much for your work. Thank you for being here and being engaged in this whole process. And also, thank you for your patience whenever an archivist responds to one of your very straightforward questions with 'It depends'. We look forward to continuing to work with all of you in the years to come. And on the next slide here, we just have a few links to some of the items that we've discussed, for your ease of reference when you look back at this presentation deck in the future. And with that, thank you very much. And I will hand it back to Francis. Thank you.
Francis: Thank you very much, Natasha, Martha and Brian.
[01:06:25 The CSPS logo appears onscreen.]
[01:06:31 The Government of Canada logo appears onscreen.]
