5.4.4  Digital Object IDs

 

 

The Digital Object ID is the unique identifier of an image and will be part of the image URL pattern that you establish in the form, Derivative Creation and URL Generation.  Under the best of circumstances, your institution —together with DS Central, we assure you— would be very happy if the first option above were the one chosen:  Automatically generate Digital Object IDs.  It's easy:  the database will pop the next sequential number, padded to seven digits, into the slot for Digital Object ID.  If DS Central is to host your images, you may be required accept this Hobson's choice.

 

On the other hand, we accept the fact that institutions have their own digital library practices, and the file names assigned to images may need to follow in-house norms.  In this case, please check the second radio button, and please carefully hand-insert the in-house digital object ID into the image record form.

 

 

If by mistake you've entered the same in-house digital object ID twice, DS-Access will fuss:

 

 

There is one other and parallel option: Capture ID. It's one of the fields offered under Technical Metadata for an image. It exists because digital cameras often automatically number images and DS is aware that institutions may want to track these numbers, or, indeed may want to use the numbers as the unique identifier for an image. Again, use of Capture ID implies very careful hand-insertion of the number into the field; in this case, however, DS-Access does not provide a safety net: you could dangerously get away with entering the same Capture ID twice, so think carefully before you choose Capture ID to act as unique identifier for an image.