The Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative

(ECAI)

University of California, Berkeley

Berkeley, CA 94720

http://ecai.org

Lewis R. Lancaster, Director

Michael Buckland, Co-Director

“Ways of Seeing: The Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative As A Digital Museum for Cultural Data”

Caverlee Cary, Associate Director, ECAI

David Blundell, National Taiwan University

Brian Zottoli, University of Michigan

with contributions made by: Jeanette Zerneke, Ruth Mostern, Kim Carl, and Kevin Mickey

Phuket, January 23, 2002

The Electronic Cultural Atlas InitiativeThe Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative

Creating a Distributed Digital Library of Networked Research Projects

Developing an Infrastructure for Interoperability of Datasets

Visualizing Cultural Data from contributors around the world working in a range of disciplines on a map-based interface

ECAI: A Digital Museum of ECAI: A Digital Museum of Cultural DataCultural Data

Inviting contributions of datasetsPreservation of dataPersistent access to dataEncouraging the development and

enhancement of dataSupporting researchVisualizing data for display

ECAI: A Digital Meta-Museum of ECAI: A Digital Meta-Museum of Cultural DataCultural Data

A collection of projects digitally preserving and making available for study a range of cultural materials

ECAI: A Global Collection of Digital ECAI: A Global Collection of Digital ExhibitionsExhibitions

Digital collections of art historical materials, such as the Huntington Archive of Buddhist and related art

What is ECAI?What is ECAI?

A consortium of over 700 humanities scholars, IT researchers and heritage managers from around the world

A globally distributed museum of interoperable spatial data with a time-enabled GIS interface.

A coordinating body for selected research and development projects intended to enhance ECAI’s ability to support cultural data sharing. Targeted priorities include gazetteers, temporal GIS, spatial data in the humanities, digital library networking, and electronic publication

A publisher of humanities scholarship utilizing new technologies An editorial body for reviewing and classifying humanities and

historical spatial data An institution to train and disseminate these methodologies to

humanities scholars, heritage managers, IT researchers and students

ECAI Organizational StructureECAI Organizational Structure

Technical Teams– Collaborative groups of scholars and technicians working to define the

architecture and tools required to develop ECAI.

Regional Teams– Comprised of scholars whose work concerns a particular world area.

– Regional team editors foster the creation of strategic or base data sets such as historical boundaries, linguistic maps, gazetteers, or satellite imagery for their region.

Thematic Teams

– Thematic teams are comprised of ECAI affiliates that share particular thematic interests.

– Team members may study diverse regions or work in different academic fields.

ECAI TechnologyECAI Technology

ECAI relies on two key technologies:

The ECAI Metadata Clearinghouse

TimeMap suite of software A set of tools to create and display spatial and temporal data

ECAI Metadata Clearinghouse SystemECAI Metadata Clearinghouse System

1. Enter search criteria

2. Select a dataset

3. View the metadata

4. See it mapped

METADATA is central to ECAIMETADATA is central to ECAI

DESCRIPTIVE metadata

FUNCTIONAL metadata

ECAI Metadata Clearinghouse SystemECAI Metadata Clearinghouse System

Standards for resource identification and retrieval– dc. = Dublin Core Descriptive Metadata

• Search and retrieval

– ECAI. = ECAI Administrative Metadata

• Record keeping, evaluation, team affiliation

– TM. = TimeMap Functional Metadata

• Locate and Display in the Time / Place interface Distributed Resources

– In which the clearinghouse is a catalog of distributed resources that are accessed through the spatio-temporal browser by users wherever they may be. 

ECAI IT ArchitectureECAI IT Architecture

ECAI Metadata Clearinghouse ECAI Archives Local and Distributed Data

Servers Project Development Tools Spatio-temporal Search Tools and

Browsers ECAI Web site

TimeTimeMap Software ComponentsMap Software Components

TimeMap Viewer (TMView, TMV)

– Integrate local and remote TimeMap datasets

– Control map cartography

– Uses metadata to time-enable the map producing complex, interactive visualisation of data over time and space

TimeTimeMap Software ComponentsMap Software Components

TimeMap is actually a set of three key applications.

TimeMap Editor (TMEdit, TME)

– Metadata creation tool used to generate, export and import information about datasets.

– Metadata serves as a reference to dataset content and allows a dataset to be displayed in TMView

TimeTimeMap Software ComponentsMap Software Components

TimeMap GeoRegistration (TMGeoReg, TMG)

– Quickly and easily generate geographic coordinate information about raster ('bitmap') datasets.

– Images in both the .jpg and the .sid format can be registered in TMGeoReg, which then generates metadata for integration into TMEdit.

Resource LinkingResource Linking

One of the essential functions of TimeMap is the linking of objects on a time-filtered map to local or web-based resources.

Resources may be web pages, images, video, databases, spreadsheets or complete multimedia presentations

ECAI indexes data byECAI indexes data by

PLACE

TIME

Showing Change Over TimeShowing Change Over Time

German Shrines702 - 957 AD

German Shrines963 - 1231 AD

German Shrines1272 - 1570 AD

Components of ECAI ProjectsComponents of ECAI Projects

Metadata Spatial information Temporal Information Maps Internet Accessible Digital Resources

– images, text, statistics, sound, and videos Connections from Maps to Resources

– Attribute display and web resource linking Cartography

– Controlling map layer display range, icon color and shape, time range

Documentation

ECAI Project: ECAI Project: Austronesian LinguisticsAustronesian Linguistics

ECAI Affiliated Project: The Austronesian Linguistic Mapping Project

Editor: David Blundell, National Taiwan University

Technical Directors: Eric Yen, Academia Sinica, and Jeanette Zerneke, UC Berkeley

ECAI TrainingECAI Training

Two week-long training programs and one introductory workshop have been held for development of ECAI-compatible projects:

November, 2001: Indianapolis, Indiana: A training session for collaborators working with major projects or data collections

September 2001, Berkeley, California: A pilot training session for close collaborators

January 2002, Hue, Vietnam: A workshop conducted by ECAI TimeMap software and Metadata Clearinghouse developer Ian Johnson for representatives of Vietnam cultural heritage site management teams.

ECAI Training in Southeast AsiaECAI Training in Southeast Asia

Two further training opportunities in Southeast Asia have been proposed for 2002-2003:

Sukhothai, Thailand: A UNESCO collaboration to introduce GIS and ECAI time-enabled GIS viewer TimeMap for use in cultural heritage site management

Siem Reap, Cambodia: A collaboration with APSARA, the Center for Khmer Studies, and the University of California, Berkeley to digitize and geo-reference Southeast Asian inscriptions and rubbings

Hue, Vietnam: A regional workshop for Southeast Asian scholars and specialists, in collaboration with UNESCO

ECAI Project Technology: ECAI Project Technology: Brian ZottoliBrian Zottoli

ECAI Proposed Affiliated Project: The Art and Culture of Champa

Editor: Truong Ky Phuong, former curator of the Danang Museum of Cham art

Technical Director and Content Developer: Brian Zottoli, University of Michigan

Technical Consultant: Lawrence Crissman, Griffith University

ECAI ConferencesECAI Conferences

Seoul, Korea, May 21-24: “Cultural Heritage and New Technologies” (Sponsors: Ministry of Culture, Korea and Seoul National University)

Shimane, Japan, September 15-18: “Digital Data Sharing for International and Area Studies” conference and ECAI Technical Development Work Sessions (Sponsor: University of Shimane)

Osaka, Japan, September 20-23: PNC Annual Conference and Joint Meetings with the Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative, Electronic Buddhist Text Initiative, and IPSJ Humanities Computing Group (Sponsors: Pacific Neighborhood Consortium and Osaka City University)

ECAI Southeast Asia ConferenceECAI Southeast Asia Conference

October, 2003: Annual full communitty ECAI meeting at the PNC Annual Conference and Joint Meetings in Bangkok, Thailand, hosted by NECTEC: An opportunity to feature work done by Southeast Asian affiliates and institutions

ECAI welcomes participation from interested individuals and institutions that:

• have data to share in a digital environment

• would like to create a digital exhibition of cultural materials

• technical expertise

• wish to explore the use of the ECAI infrastucture in support of their professional activities

• would like to participate in upcoming conference programs

• would like to host ECAI TimeMap software training programs

For Further InformationFor Further Information

Visit our website, ecai.org

Email ecai@socrates.berkeley.edu

Contact Caverlee Cary (cari@uclink4.berkeley.edu)