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Blog

Why and how to preserve your digital archive?

  • November 22, 2018

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The volume of digital information is increasing at warp-time speed. Whether created as a result of the digitising of non-digital collections, as a digital publication or artwork, or as an inherent part of the day-to-day business of an organisation or individual, more and more information is being created digitally and the pace at which it is being created is accelerating.

And this is perfectly understandable considering the well-known benefits and opportunities of digital information: precise replication, machine processing, online content, … And yet at the same time this rapidly increasing collection of digital information introduces hordes of difficulties with regard to the viability of these digital documents and the long-term accessibility to the valuable information stored in all these documents. The life span of digital storage media can be surprisingly short, and the rapid evolution of rendering software technology can threaten future access. This life span problem means that planning needs to go into how to preserve your digital archive.

Digital archiving solution

As an organization in the public or private sector, you probably have digital records and information that you need to keep for long periods of time. If that information is important enough for you to preserve, you should enable yourself to access it in the future. By implementing a digital preservation strategy and following a clear preservation planning you make sure that all your valuable digital documents will remain findable, accessible and useable regardless of your company’s future hardware and software systems.

Open Archival Information System (OAIS)

The Open Archival Information System (OAIS) Reference Model (ISO 14721:2012) is a conceptual framework for an archival system dedicated to preserving and maintaining access to digital information over the long term. This Model was originally developed by the Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems as a reference model for an OAIS for space agencies, but has proved to be useful to a wide variety of organizations and institutions with digital archiving and digital preservation needs.

PDF/A: the ultimate archiving file format?

An important aspect of your digital archive and preservation strategy is the file format you use for your digitally archived documents.

In an earlier post “6 good reasons for converting to PDF” we elaborated on the benefits of the PDF file format and why it has become the standard for the exchange and storage of data. PDF files may be created natively in PDF form, converted from other electronic formats, or digitized from paper, microform or other hard copy format. Once created, the files must remain useable and accessible across multiple generations of technology. This is where PDF/A comes in.

The PDF/A file format enables organizations to archive documents electronically in a way that will ensure the preservation of content and visual appearance over an extended period of time. It also allows documents to be retrieved and rendered with a consistent and predictable result in the future, independent of the tools and systems used for creating, storing and rendering the files.

PDF/A distinguishes itself due to the following characteristics:

  • Independent

A PDF/A contains all necessary information to render the document exactly like it was originally created. A PDF/A contains all information about the text, pictures, graphics, font types and colouring information. References to external sources is not required. They may not even exist any more by the time the archiving document is accessed.

  • Self-descriptive

PDF/A supports metadata descriptions. By adding metadata to your archiving document it is very easy to understand what this document is about.

  • Universal

With PDF/A you do not require multiple special applications to open and view files. A single application is all you need for viewing electronic documents from any source.

It is undeniable that PDF/A is an excellent file format for archiving purposes, but it is not the only format that is well suited to preserve your valuable electronic documents for the future.

DocShifter simplifies your digital preservation by converting your content into future-proof file formats

At DocShifter we understand the importance of digital preservation and have come up with a digital archiving solution. We have added several preservation functionalities to our platform. It is a server based solution that allows you to convert any source format to any other format.

DocShifter can generate an entire series of recommended target archiving formats (PDF/A-1b, TIFF, JPEG etc.) that can be employed in the context of an OASIS repository.

With the DocShifter document conversion software, you can easily:

  • Archive a valuable electronic document by creating an archived document version in the file format of your choice
  • Convert your existing archived documents of any file format to archived documents of any other file format.
  • Set up an OAIS Trusted Repository.

Another strong feature of DocShifter is that it works independent of the native applications of source- and goal file formats. So you do not have to worry about the costs of expensive software tools and licenses.

This is the perfect solution for everyone who is confronted with obligations of digital archiving and long-term storage of digital information, like archivists, Web developers and Integrators of DMS or IM solutions.

About DocShifter

Speed, quality, scalability, and configurability are reasons why many organizations in regulated industries (life sciences, banking & insurance) choose DocShifter. Convert your content into PDF/A, TIFF and other archiving formats for your digital archive.

High volume, high-quality document conversion, on-premise, or in the cloud. Super easy to set up. Automate. Centralize. Eliminate manual intervention. Reduce Risk. Reduce IT infrastructure costs. Rated 5 stars on Gartner’s Capterra platform.

Last update: 08/01/2021

The volume of digital information is increasing at warp-time speed. Whether created as a result of the digitising of non-digital collections, as a digital publication or artwork, or as an inherent part of the day-to-day business of an organisation or individual, more and more information is being created digitally and the pace at which it is being created is accelerating.

And this is perfectly understandable considering the well-known benefits and opportunities of digital information: precise replication, machine processing, online content, … And yet at the same time this rapidly increasing collection of digital information introduces hordes of difficulties with regard to the viability of these digital documents and the long-term accessibility to the valuable information stored in all these documents. The life span of digital storage media can be surprisingly short, and the rapid evolution of rendering software technology can threaten future access. This life span problem means that planning needs to go into how to preserve your digital archive.

Digital archiving solution

As an organization in the public or private sector, you probably have digital records and information that you need to keep for long periods of time. If that information is important enough for you to preserve, you should enable yourself to access it in the future. By implementing a digital preservation strategy and following a clear preservation planning you make sure that all your valuable digital documents will remain findable, accessible and useable regardless of your company’s future hardware and software systems.

Open Archival Information System (OAIS)

The Open Archival Information System (OAIS) Reference Model (ISO 14721:2012) is a conceptual framework for an archival system dedicated to preserving and maintaining access to digital information over the long term. This Model was originally developed by the Consultative Committee for Space Data Systems as a reference model for an OAIS for space agencies, but has proved to be useful to a wide variety of organizations and institutions with digital archiving and digital preservation needs.

PDF/A: the ultimate archiving file format?

An important aspect of your digital archive and preservation strategy is the file format you use for your digitally archived documents.

In an earlier post "6 good reasons for converting to PDF" we elaborated on the benefits of the PDF file format and why it has become the standard for the exchange and storage of data. PDF files may be created natively in PDF form, converted from other electronic formats, or digitized from paper, microform or other hard copy format. Once created, the files must remain useable and accessible across multiple generations of technology. This is where PDF/A comes in.

The PDF/A file format enables organizations to archive documents electronically in a way that will ensure the preservation of content and visual appearance over an extended period of time. It also allows documents to be retrieved and rendered with a consistent and predictable result in the future, independent of the tools and systems used for creating, storing and rendering the files.

PDF/A distinguishes itself due to the following characteristics:

  • Independent

A PDF/A contains all necessary information to render the document exactly like it was originally created. A PDF/A contains all information about the text, pictures, graphics, font types and colouring information. References to external sources is not required. They may not even exist any more by the time the archiving document is accessed.

  • Self-descriptive

PDF/A supports metadata descriptions. By adding metadata to your archiving document it is very easy to understand what this document is about.

  • Universal

With PDF/A you do not require multiple special applications to open and view files. A single application is all you need for viewing electronic documents from any source.

It is undeniable that PDF/A is an excellent file format for archiving purposes, but it is not the only format that is well suited to preserve your valuable electronic documents for the future.

DocShifter simplifies your digital preservation by converting your content into future-proof file formats

At DocShifter we understand the importance of digital preservation and have come up with a digital archiving solution. We have added several preservation functionalities to our platform. It is a server based solution that allows you to convert any source format to any other format.

DocShifter can generate an entire series of recommended target archiving formats (PDF/A-1b, TIFF, JPEG etc.) that can be employed in the context of an OASIS repository.

With the DocShifter document conversion software, you can easily:

  • Archive a valuable electronic document by creating an archived document version in the file format of your choice
  • Convert your existing archived documents of any file format to archived documents of any other file format.
  • Set up an OAIS Trusted Repository.

Another strong feature of DocShifter is that it works independent of the native applications of source- and goal file formats. So you do not have to worry about the costs of expensive software tools and licenses.

This is the perfect solution for everyone who is confronted with obligations of digital archiving and long-term storage of digital information, like archivists, Web developers and Integrators of DMS or IM solutions.

About DocShifter

Speed, quality, scalability, and configurability are reasons why many organizations in regulated industries (life sciences, banking & insurance) choose DocShifter. Convert your content into PDF/A, TIFF and other archiving formats for your digital archive.

High volume, high-quality document conversion, on-premise, or in the cloud. Super easy to set up. Automate. Centralize. Eliminate manual intervention. Reduce Risk. Reduce IT infrastructure costs. Rated 5 stars on Gartner’s Capterra platform.

Last update: 08/01/2021

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file format conversion for the regulated enterprise.

See what our beloved customers have to say about us:

"DocShifter is converting 36.000 documents per day, coming from all over our company (and external). We have no control over what is coming in. And still the failure rate is below 1%.

And what really sets it apart from what we were doing before, DocShifter tells us what went wrong, so we can act upon the documents that did not convert".
Operations Manager Large European Bank
"DocShifter will save us over 750 hours of manual work per year. And we expect the time savings to increase as we continue to expand our use of DocShifter.

This is significant for our clients who need the eCTD sequences to be published quickly, accurately and efficiently. "
Jennie MayDirector, Regulatory Operations - PharmaLex
"Very powerful tool for document conversion and generation. The DocShifter software goes further than our current needs, and from my point of view quite unique in the industry. Quick adaption due to user-friendly workflow creation functionalities. Possibility to create workflows in a user-friendly (non-IT) way. Possibilities for seamlessly integrations into existing solutions."
Kris V.ITS Business Partner, Clinical Development
"We are using DocShifter in conjunction with Documentum software. The rendition performance that is observed so far is more than 4000 documents per hour (on 1 single instance). The output provided is fully compliant to health authority specifications (FDA, EMA, PMDA, HC, SwissHealth, etc.) and is configurable for different countries. A true enterprise document conversion solution.”
Piyush J. Solution Manager
"We use DocShifter to prepare compliant, submission-ready PDF renditions for all regulatory content.

The product is reliable, extremely fast and produces output that is compliant with multiple Health Authorities."
Large US biotechnology companyRegulatory Information Systems Manager
"We implemented DocShifter into production and have converted over 35.000 documents. Our failure rate has dropped from over 10% to well under 0.1%. We have seen an astronomical improvement in our document conversion processes thanks to how easy DocShifter was to implement and to use. In the course of 12 months, we are going to convert more than 100.000 documents with DocShifter. Fantastic document conversion solution!”
Chris B. IT System Administrator - PeopleScout Technology
"We have documentation in different languages, but when converting everything to PDF for submissions, things got complicated really fast. Our rendition engine couldn't cope with all those fonts, and we lost a lot of time fixing problems that weren't supposed to be there in the first place. We decided to make a switch to DocShifter. Scalability during our peak times, ability to deal with multiple fonts, automation (conversion of source documents to simultaneous submission-ready PDFs for multiple health authorities) and performance. These are just some of the things that make DocShifter such a powerful rendering engine."
Jade O. Document Management Professional
"We selected DocShifter for the incredible ease-of-use, the simple configuration and implementation, the high-quality ICH compliant output, and the huge number of formats supported. Performance is excellent, and we reduced the number of rendition servers by a factor of 3. All of this, plus the company’s responsiveness made it an easy choice."
Regulatory Operations & Global Submissions SpecialistLarge pharmaceutical company
"DocShifter powers the document conversion solution in Generis’ new CARA cloud offering. “We already support many joint customers who have advanced document conversion requirements met by the integration of DocShifter with CARA. We are now happy to be able to offer this on a pre-built package with New CARA on our cloud for such customers.”
James KelleherCEO - Generis
"As we are in the middle of a paradigm shift from analogue to digital in Japan, I have been looking for the right solution to support this for many years. In DocShifter we have found a company with solutions that have been selected by organizations of all sizes because of their responsiveness, cost-effectiveness, class-leading performance and unique capabilities that rise above the competition.”
Kosuke OmodaPresident - eSA Japan
"One of the things we love about DocShifter is the graphic interface to configure file transformation flows. The user interface is very simple to use and rare to find within other similar document conversion products. Wide selection of connectors to different solutions (EIM & DMS systems) make DocShifter a great choice for our company as well. We also are very happy with the customer support we receive: extremely friendly and prompt.”
Nikita L.Information Management Consultant
"With DocShifter, we are seeing better performance with even less resources, compared to our previous solution. The deployment is very easy, and the utilization of hardware/software resources are extremely efficient. Thanks to DocShifter's architecture and not needing Office applications, we were able to save a lot of money and resources by the switch.”
Istvan V.Solution Architect
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15 years of experience in automating, simplifying and speeding up document conversion.
For all regulated industries. 

 

 

Rated 5 stars on Gartner’s Capterra platform.

DocShifter document conversion solution is rated 5 starts by our customers on Gartner's Capterra platform.

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