Appendix H. Profile for the Long Term Preservation of NATO Digital Information of Permanent value

186. Information of permanent value shall be submitted by the NATO Information Managers in their role as Information Custodians to the NATO Archivist in one of the approved sustainable archival formats and packaged in this appendix.

187. The submission process for information of permanent value for long-term preservation is shown in Figure H.1.

Long-term preservation
Figure H.1. Long-term preservation

188. This profile outlines the file formats (Section H.1) and package structures (Section H.2) approved by the Archives Committee for the long-term preservation of NATO digital information of permanent value.

189. NATO information custodians shall provide information in these formats and structures to the NATO Archivist.

190. Further guidance on best practice will be issued in the near future. The contents of this profile shall become part of Volume 3 of the NATO Interoperability Standards and Profiles [4].

H.1. File Formats for Long Term Preservation

191. The following sustainable file formats are approved by the Archives Committee for the long term preservation of NATO digital information of permanent value. The formats are ordered by content type. A brief characterization of the generic requirements for the preservation of content is included.

H.1.1. Data sets

192. Data sets are typically collections of individual values or larger coherent structures such as messages. The data set might be an export from a database or the results of an information exchange between systems.

193. There is typically a structure associated with the data set, either implicitly contained within the data set (e.g. a table structure of an Excel document or a database), or explicitly defined (e.g. as a schema definition)

Service Standard Implementation Guidance

Data sets (e.g. scientific data) and any structured information not fitting other content types

Mandatory

Requirements

  • Preserve structured and unstructured data for future analysis

  • Preserve logical structure of dataset as well as syntax and semantics of elements within the dataset

  • Preserve data types and data structures

Database content

Mandatory

  

H.1.2. Text

194. Documents consisting primarily of textual descriptions are the most prevalent and important category of information of permanent value in the NATO context. Text documents might also include embedded diagrams, pictures, or other non- text material. These items shall not be separated from the text and kept as part of the document.

Service Standard Implementation Guidance

Text documents, including common MS Office document formats (docx, xlsx, pptx)

Mandatory

Use conformance level : PDF/A-2a

Requirements

  • Preserve integrity of text, diagram and figures, pagination and navigation (formatting)

  • Preserve document metadata

  • Inclusion of fonts, layout information, and indices

Email (e.g. MS Outlook PST files)

Mandatory

Requirements

  • Preserve email content including attachments

  • Preserve complete mailboxes. Important messages might be exported and preserved as individual text documents.

Chat (e.g. JChat conversations)

Mandatory

Use conformance level : PDF/A-2a

Requirements

  • Preserve message content, including attachments

  • Preserve complete dialogs per user or multi-user chat room with time-stamps.

  • Preserve information about users and user groups

H.1.3. Still Images

195. Still images are visual representations, including photographs, graphs, and diagrams. Still images can be divided into two main types, bitmap (or raster) images and vector images. Bitmap images are typically photographs produced by scanners and cameras at a fixed resolution, while vector images consist of scalable objects. Both types can be combined, e.g. in course of action diagrams where a bitmap image of an area can have symbology vector overlays.

Service Standard Implementation Guidance

Bitmap/raster images

Mandatory

Requirements

  • Preserve resolution (clarity, colors), scalability, and ability of render the image

  • Preserve image metadata

  • Compressibility, preference for lossless compression

  • Preference for larger resolution

Vector images

Mandatory

  

H.1.4. Moving Images

196. Moving images are digital recordings of still images at a particular frame rate and resolution. A compression is often applied by only capturing the difference between adjacent frames. Moving images are typically combined with audio data and packaged into a common container.

Service Standard Implementation Guidance

Video files

Mandatory

Requirements

  • Preserve resolution (clarity, colors), scalability, and ability of video

  • Preserve video metadata, including timecodes and other tagging

  • Compressibility, preference for lossless compression

  • Preference for larger resolution and higher audio bitrates

H.1.5. Sound

197. Sound files contain recordings of voice or other audio. This includes audio recordings from meetings if they contain information of permanent value.

Service Standard Implementation Guidance

Audio files

Mandatory

Requirements

  • Preserve resolution (sampling frequency) and depth

  • Preserve audio metadata

H.1.6. Geospatial

198. Geospatial information is typically produced, used, and contained in geographic information systems (GIS). The information is related to the still image category, as geospatial information consists of bitmap or vector images plus additional attributes associated with particular locations depicted in the image data.

Service Standard Implementation Guidance

Geospatial information (e.g. GIS data)

Mandatory

Requirements

  • Preserve resolution and scalability

  • Preserve geospatial metadata

H.1.7. Web Archive

199. The web archive type concern the archival of entire web sites, portals, or parts of them. While some information might be contained in static web pages and is therefore easy to capture, other parts might be dynamically rendered.

200. Web archives typically contain structured textual descriptions as well as still and moving images.

Service Standard Implementation Guidance

Web sites and portals

Mandatory

Requirements

  • Preserve structure and content of web, including scripts

  • Inclusion of external content might be necessary

  • Preserve metadata associated with content

  • Dynamic/interactive or userspecific content is problematic

References

[1] NATO Core Metadata Specification. C3B. Copyright © 2014. NATO Unclassified.

[2] Information Management Directive for Confidentiality Labelling of NATO Information. C3B. Copyright © 2014. NATO Unclassified.

[3] Information Management Guidance for Confidentiality Labelling of NATO Information. C3B. Copyright © 2014. NATO Unclassified.

[4] NATO Interoperability Standards and Profiles, Version 8 (NISP V8). C3B. Copyright © 2013. NATO Unclassified, Releasable to Australia/New Zealand/Singapore..

[5] Guidance on File Naming. C3B. Copyright © 2010. Unclassified, Releasable to PfP..

[6] Space data and information transfer systems – Open archival information system – Reference model, First Edition. ISO. Copyright © 2003.

[7] Information technology -- Document description and processing languages -- Office Open XML File Formats -- Part 2: Open Packaging Conventions. ISO/IEC. Copyright © 2012.

[8] PREMIS Data Dictionary for Preservation Metadata, Version 2.0. PREMIS Editorial Committee. Copyright © 2008.