I had the opportunity last week to observe the 2018 TPAC, W3c’s Technical Plenary and Advisory Committee meetings. The opportunity arose when I was connected to the recently formed W3C Web Publishing working group by a fellow Mellon grantee I met at the New York all-projects meeting at the end of September. He connected us
As is apparent by now, we spend a lot of time thinking about ways to preserve and archive the digital web-based projects we’re publishing. While our technical guidelines provide authors with recommendations for building projects that are more easily sustainable, the fact is technology changes, and even the most rigid technical standards and requirements will
Being a pioneer in digital publishing means we have plenty of experiences to share, both successful and, well, educational, but not always very many people to share them with. Although we benefit from fellow presses’ digital initiatives and they graciously keep tabs on and encourage ours, much of our work is very different and it’s
In the year 2017, over three decades since the personal computer became virtually commonplace in homes, it’s probably safe to assume many of us have come across the stray CD ROM or USB thumb drive or maybe even floppy disk and eagerly, or perhaps with trepidation, inserted it into a working computer or external drive
Perhaps the most appealing aspect of the web as a scholarly publication platform is the ability to make your work interact with content or data that others already have made accessible online. For instance, Scalar can access networks of archives, collections, and resources from places like the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Internet Archive, the
When imagining the various platforms and formats digital authors are using to communicate their complex and interactive arguments, it can be easy to overlook some of the simpler components of web-based content. The topics we’ve covered so far in the Technical Guidelines series have ranged from somewhat to significantly philosophical, but our focus this week,
This week our team travels to New York to participate in a convening of Mellon-funded scholarly communications projects. Part of the aim is to share with each other our purpose, progress, challenges, and next steps. We’re looking forward to learning what our friends are doing and sharing our own experiences with them. The group will
According to Market Share Reports, in August 2017 the top-used web browser on desktop computers was Chrome. Its combined versions were used by 59.38% of people online worldwide. Second place was Internet Explorer, which, combined with the stats for Edge, Microsoft’s new banner browser, accounted for 21.24% of web users. Trailing behind these were Firefox,
Part 2 of the Technical Guidelines Series focuses on documentation. It’s a topic that is touched on in the previous Archivability section, but it’s one that really requires a bit more unpacking, so it has its own page in our recommendations package. As usual, I won’t reprint the document in this blog post—you can view
Developing a scholarly digital project is a complex process. In addition to the research and writing typical of any scholarly project, authors must choose a platform or a framework that suits the needs of both the argument and content. Depending on their digital literacies, they may need to learn these systems and recruit collaborators with
