*** Apologies for cross-posting ***

The open source JHOVE characterization tool has proven to be an
important component of many digital repository and preservation
workflows. However, its widespread use over the past four years has
revealed a number of limitations imposed by idiosyncrasies of design and
implementation. The California Digital Library (CDL), Portico, and
Stanford University have received funding from the Library of Congress,
under its National Digital Information Infrastructure Preservation
Program (NDIIPP) initiative, to collaborate on a two-year project to
develop a next-generation JHOVE2 architecture for format-aware
characterization. 

Among the enhancements planned for JHOVE2 are: 

* Support for four specific aspects of characterization: signature-based
identification, feature extraction, validation, and rules-based
assessment
* A more sophisticated data model supporting complex multi-file objects
and arbitrarily-nested container objects
* Streamlined APIs to facilitate the integration of JHOVE2 technology in
systems, services, and workflows
* Increased performance
* Standardized error handling
* A generic plug-in mechanism supporting stateful multi-module
processing;
* Availability under the BSD open source license

To help focus project activities we have recruited a distinguished
advisory board to represent the interests of the larger stakeholder
community. The board includes participants from the following
international memory institutions, projects, and vendors: 

* Deutsche Nationalbibliothek (DNB)
* Ex Libris
* Fedora Commons
* Florida Center for Library Automation (FCLA)
* Harvard University / GDFR
* Koninklijke Bibliotheek (KB)
* MIT / DSpace
* National Archives (TNA)
* National Archives and Records Administration (NARA)
* National Library of Australia (NLA)
* National Library of New Zealand (NLNZ)
* Planets project 

The project partners are currently engaged in a public needs assessment
and requirements gathering phase. A provisional set of use cases and
functional requirements has already been reviewed by the JHOVE2 advisory
board. 

The JHOVE2 team welcomes input from the preservation community, and
would appreciate feedback on the functional requirements and any
interesting test data that have emerged from experience with the current
JHOVE tool. 

The functional requirements, along with other project information, is
available on the JHOVE2 project wiki
<http://confluence.ucop.edu/display/JHOVE2Info/Home>. Feedback on
project goals and deliverables can be submitted through the JHOVE2
public mailing lists. 

To subscribe to the JHOVE2-TechTalk-L mailing list, intended for
in-depth discussion of substantive issues, please send an email to
<listserv at ucop dot edu> with an empty subject line and a message
stating: 

	SUB JHOVE2-TECHTALK-L Your Name 

Likewise, to subscribe to the JHOVE2-Announce-L mailing list, intended
for announcements of general interest to the JHOVE2 community, please
send an email to <listserv at ucop dot edu> with an empty subject line
and a message stating: 

	SUB JHOVE2-ANNOUNCE-L Your Name 

To begin our public outreach, team members recently presented a summary
of project activities at the iPRES 2008 conference in London, entitled
"What? So What? The Next-Generation JHOVE2 Architecture for Format-Aware
Characterization," reflecting our view of characterization as
encompassing both intrinsic properties and extrinsic assessments of
digital objects.

Through the sponsorship of the Koninklijke Bibliotheek and the British
Library, we also held an invitational meeting on JHOVE2 following the
iPRES conference as a opportunity for a substantive discussion of the
project with European stakeholders. 

A similar event, focused on a North American audience, will be held as a
Birds-of-a-Feather session at the upcoming DLF Fall Forum in Providence,
Rhode Island, on November 13. Participants at this event are asked to
review closely the functional requirements and other relevant materials
available on the project wiki at
<http://confluence.ucop.edu/display/JHOVE2Info/Home> prior to the
session. 

Future project progress will be documented periodically on the wiki.

Stephen Abrams, CDL 
Evan Owens, Portico 
Tom Cramer, Stanford University

on behalf of the JHOVE2 project team