software (actually anything classic computer related) directory

[Julian Wolfe]

I'd like to help though I have no idea how I'd do so at this point.   It
sounds like a great idea.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org 
> [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Jay West
> Sent: Wednesday, March 21, 2007 3:26 PM
> To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
> Subject: software (actually anything classic computer 
> related) directory
> 
> Some mention has been made on the list with regards to a 
> "global" list of classic computer related artifacts, be those 
> documents (manuals), software bits, other historical 
> ephemera, etc. The concept I've been working with is defining 
> a standard record format for interchange amongst those that 
> wish to participate. Think of this as something like ANSI 
> X.12 (Electronic Data Interchange).
> 
> Each site who wants to participate would (in an automated 
> fashion) periodically (nightly?) run a program or process 
> that takes data about their collection items and puts it into 
> this standard record format. The format has things like 
> document name, title, description, document type, owner site, 
> http vs. ftp, URL, FTP address, email contact, date, key 
> words, categories, distribution allowed, etc. For example, a 
> program could pretty easily be created that would take all 
> the documents on bitsavers and puts them into this standard 
> record format. Then the source systems send this record dump 
> (or deltas from a previous dump) to the classiccmp server.
> 
> The classiccmp server takes all these records from all the 
> various sites and puts them together into a single database 
> internally, and also provides a seamless mechanism (http, and 
> yes... gopher, archie?) for people to search the database or 
> browse based on given criteria. It looks like one database. 
> But when a user tries to pull up one of the specific entries 
> it is actually redirected to the sponsoring systems server to 
> get the data.
> 
> This way each system can keep their classic data (jpegs, 
> pdfs, disk images,
> whatever) in the format they are already using without 
> changing anything. 
> They just need to have something that takes their 
> format/sources and puts it into the standard format which is 
> then sync'd to classiccmp.org.
> 
> Provisions could be made to the standard record format to 
> address all types of media, allow some items to be listed as 
> "present" but "unavailable" for things that can't be released 
> due to copyright issues (but at least people would know it 
> had been preserved).
> 
> I'd be happy to start a separate mailing list to discuss this 
> record format, and if people are interested in participating. 
> I'd hate to chew up cctalk/cctech bandwidth discussing 
> project design :)
> 
> Jay
> 
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