Workshop Report: Exploring ORD Practices in the Context of Collections as Data
- Cristina Grisot
- 4 days ago
- 2 min read
Author: Francesca Altorfer
On 11 June 2025, ETH Library hosted a public workshop that marked the end of the swissuniversities-funded project Exploring ORD Practices in the Context of Collections as Data (Collada) as well as the kick-off for the new DARIAH-CH GLAM working group.
As an introduction to the workshop, Christiane Sibille (ETH Library) presented the results of the Collada project, while Rita Gautschy (DARIAH-CH) provided information about the activities of DARIAH in Switzerland and at the European level.
The first thematic panel showcased projects that transform and enrich data. Lorena Bortolomeazzi and Nicolas Kessler (PTT-Archiv) presented their workflows to extract data from historical phone books. Tim Rüdiger (Staatsarchiv Zürich) focused on new intelligent document search functions at the Staatsarchiv Zürich. Gentiana Rashiti and Jeremy Marbach (both ETH Library) provided insides into current projects in the context of Digital Scholarship Services, e.g. the CHNObLI pipeline that supports Named Entity Recognition and Named Entity Linking (Rashiti), and the project KI-basierter Zugang zum Hochschularchiv (Marbach).
The second panel turned to research with and about data: Ina Serif (University of Basel) gave insight into the enrichment and varied uses of the data from the Basler Avisblatt project. Giovanni Profeta’s (University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland) Mini-Muse project offers a design perspective to research with historical sources. Finally, Antoinette Maget Dominicé (University of Geneva) discussed from a legal perspective the multilayered role of data at the intersection of cultural heritage institutions and the art market.
The last panel of the day focused on the central role of data access. Sonja Gasser (Stiftung für Kunst, Kultur und Geschichte) presented the Sammlung digital, that provides access to the extensive holdings of the Stiftung für Kunst, Kultur und Geschichte (SKKG). Gabriel Müller (Basel University Library) informed about Swiss Google Books for Research. In this project, four Swiss libraries develop a platform to present the text corpus that resulted from a co-operation with google books. In the context of collections as data accessibility also includes aspects of possible ways to export and re-use data in different formats. Elias Kreyenbühl (Zentralbibliothek Zürich) explained how this task was addressed in the Swisscollections platform and its new export function.
Summarizing the workshop, organizer Christiane Sibille (ETH Library) noted the importance of all data layers, from generation to publication, and the role of curation of large amounts of data. She also pointed out that future workshops, e.g. the DARIAH-CH study day and the DaSCHCon 2025 will also address the diversity of possible data sources, such as images or 3D objects, and the specific challenges they present.
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