Navigating the world of Collections and Digital Asset Management Systems (CMS, DAMS) can be challenging. It is important to understand the requirements of your particular archive before looking at what systems are available as there are many different tools and systems which can be used to record and publish information about collections.
- A collections management system (widely referred to as CMS) maintains data about collections and can include information on acquisition, cataloguing and a location database.
- A digital asset management system (widely referred to as DAMS) is used to store, organise and manage digital files, which can include images, video and audio. A DAMS is not a digital preservation system and you will need to ensure you have processes in place to preserve your digital content so that it remains accessible in the long term. We have guidance and resources to help with this on our preserving digital collections webpages.
- An online (or public access) interface is the presentation layer to the public of your catalogue data and/or digitised content. You may have two separate online interfaces for your catalogue data and your digitised content, however increasingly there are options to have all content displayed through one online interface.
There are both commercial and open source suppliers of products and tools and you can work directly with commercial suppliers for off-the-shelf solutions. There are also consultancy firms that can help design bespoke public access solutions for archives. Some factors worth considering when deciding on commercial vs open source are:
- Existing data: do you need to ingest existing content or are you starting from scratch?
- Finance: do you have an ongoing budget for this – paying for licences plus support contracts, possible hosting fees and initial start-up costs? If not, open-source and low-cost solutions do exist
- IT support: do you have access to technical support? Will you need to install and manage software independently? Do you have adequate tools – PCs, network, internet connection, etc?
- Standards: will you use just archive standards or also standards from the museum and library sectors?
- Usability: do you need a user interface as well as a back office to manage collections data?
- Functionality: what additional features, if any, do you want a new service to have?
- an enquiry management module
- capture digital objects and/or metadata
- capture accessions data
- ability to contribute data to archive networks easily
We have compiled a list of CMS and DAMS options for archives, including commercial and open source solutions. For each option we have included information such as:
- links to the features page for the product
- whether it is open source or commercial
- an example of the system from an archive that uses it
- whether there is easy-to-access documentation and an active user community, which can be particularly important for open source products
- whether it supports archival standards
While we cannot individually endorse one product over another, this list should serve as a useful overview of the options available to archives.
CMS and DAMS options for archives (XLS, 2.0 MB)
The list is by no means exhaustive and will be updated to include new systems as and when we become aware of them. It also predominantly focuses on archival management. The Collections Trust have a collections software tool which allows you to compare the features of leading Collections Management Systems based on more than 40 different criteria. There is also a crowd-sourced list of digital repository options available in Google Sheets curated by Ashley Blewer, Archivist and technologist.
Contributing to archives networks and other resources
Contributing to an archives network can open up access to your collections. These networks bring disparate collections information together for exploration online and are very often at the forefront of resource discovery innovation. These networks may have different audiences and outreach tools which both you and your users can benefit from.
The National Archives provides guidance on contributing to Discovery, including using Manage Your Collections, which provides a single point of online access to catalogue and organisational data from across the archive sector. This incorporates data previously made available via the National Register of Archives (NRA), Access to Archives (A2A), the ARCHON Directory and the Manorial Documents Register (MDR).
There are also other national, regional and thematic based networks including Archives Hub, ArchiveSearch, AIM25, Archives Wales, Genesis and the Scottish Archives Network.