OLAC-Outreach "Office hours" in Boston

[Jeff Good]

Hello everyone,

Heidi wrote:
> Some worked out metadata examples, for some typical resources like
> a recording + annotation text files would be really helpful for people,
> I suspect. It would show them what they would actually have to produce.
> A paper analog to the EMELD interface would be nice, even just a
> printout or a big screenshot, maybe, so they could take it home and
> apply it to their own data.

Yes--I completely agree. I find the lack of good examples to be
probably one of the most daunting aspects of implementing OLAC
metadata. I think most people work off of examples at first. We could
write both have these in paper form at LSA and then post them
somewhere. What could be really useful (if someone has the time) is an
example of a real resource and how it would be typed in to the ORE
editor--both as an online and paper document. Maybe when we good
example, we can look and see what that might look like.

Again, Heidi:
> People need hard information about formats, about recording, and about
> digitizing. Everyone wants to do it, and there is a paucity of sound
> information available.

Good point--Michael, does EMELD have any relevant documents in the
works that could be at the LSA. Are there gaps in what EMELD has on
this that we could try to (find someone to) fill? I recall that one
presentation at Lansing (Chi Lin's?) went through many relevant details
(maybe too many for a small handout). A one/two page document entitled:
"So, you're thinking about digitizing..." would be good. The info. is
probably out there and just needs to be brought together.

>> Also, I think a primer on descriptive versus logical markup
>> (and why the latter is better) would be good. I can write up something
>> about that.
> I don't even know what this means! Good thing you're volunteering for
> it.

I just meant something like: Why a database is better for building a
dictionary than typing it out in Word while bolding the headwords and
italicizing the part of speech. That sort of thing.


> Maybe we could elicit little flyers from some of language archives, so
> people would know (a) who and where we are and (b) that there's someone
> they can write to if they have detailed questions. We have a colorful
> brochure for this purpose, probably other places do too.

Yes--are there other archives like this. Gary, does ANLC have a
brochure. And, this raises the more general point: Does OLAC have
anything like this? A one-page handout/brochure about what it is and
what it wants to do? Something could certainly be cobbled together from
the web page. But, perhaps the OLAC organizers already have some such
document.


Jeff