Thanks to all who gave me information and guidance on College and University Archives and database use. Summary of replies are below with identifying information removed. While I am now working in a university archives, I have used PastPerfect - when working for a mid-sized historical museum. it really is better suited for museum collections although it does have an archival component. It uses a nomenclature that museum registrars and/or catalogers would use and has modules so you can catalog objects and artifacts as well archival collections. I believe it is for small-ish collections so don't know how appropriate it would be for a university collection. For college archives PastPerfect is alright. This program does have some limits and I think it is geared more to smaller historical societies. Here at Ashland I use the program to catalog smaller manuscript collections because the fields are preset and you just fill in the blanks which apply. For larger collection a standard wordprocessing or database works better. We recently decided to buy Eloquent Archives System. We just ordered it, so I can't really tell you what we think of it yet, but it appears that we can customize it to work for anything we need it to do. http://www.eloquent-systems.com/products/archives.shtml I do not use Past Perfect here. I think your inclination is correct, that it’s really best for small historical societies and/or museums. I did an internship while doing my degree in 2001, and they were using Past Perfect. I loved working with it – it was easy, user-friendly, and when there were issues with it, their tech help was immensely helpful and patient assisting over the phone. I’m not sure if they use Past Perfect there anymore. I’ve been an Archivist for a College 2 years and we don’t use PastPerfect. As part of the Library system, I have cataloged the archives holdings using MARC and everything is indexed via the online catalog. I’ve found that PastPerfect is often used by Historical Societies or other organizations that do not have a library catalog. Cataloging archival collections using MARC is not difficult, just time consuming. Our archives is part of a library that has an online catalog, so bibliographic records for our archival collections are created in that expensive library database. (Our database is Unicorn, by Sirsi.) For in-house accession records, finding aids, etc., I use MS Access. I don't think, however, that there is an industry standard in any type of archives. There is currently a project to create a free software called Archivists Toolkit. I am hoping I will be able to use it to replace the crude Access database I have put together. I think they are trying to have the first version of the Toolkit ready this fall. You can get more information at http://archiviststoolkit.org/ATspecification/index.html I'm looking around myself re appropriate softwares, and comments I've heard discourage Past Perfect. From the comments I've heard, it is very museum oriented, and more geared toward artifacts than archival materials. I know of at least two college archives that use it, but I’ve been very hesitant myself for that reason. Previously, the other problem with Past Perfect is that it wasn't MARC compatible, but I hear that they have a new capability out, although I have no idea of quality. The other negative I've heard is that it isn't EAD compatible. While many of us don't have the staff to even think about EAD right now, it seems shortsighted not to purchase something that might have a helpful capability down the road. My understanding is that Past Perfect doesn't have a public web module, although I’m not positive about that, which would be another perhaps important element. Some of us, even those at big institutions with money, have been keeping an eye out on the Archivists Toolkit, which New York University and UC Santa Barbara are developing on a Mellon grant. It is being designed for "smaller" archives, meaning larger historical organizations and academic archives, and once completed, will be available as open source software. Most academic archives that I've heard or seen are using Filemake Pro or Access. I did spend time looking at different softwares available for archives management. Many were extremely expensive and provided heavy records management control, rather than archival control. The one that I was very impressed with is called Re:discovery, and I plan to look at it more carefully this summer for myself. It looked very logically designed, had nice interfaces, was a more reasonable price (and they give an educational discount), and I've also seen good comments about it on Archives-L. Thanks again, you guys are the nicest group of people! A posting from the Archives & Archivists LISTSERV List sponsored by the Society of American Archivists, www.archivists.org. For the terms of participation, please refer to http://www.archivists.org/listservs/arch_listserv_terms.asp.

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