Background:
Kevin Swanson, Chris Haley, and Arian Ravanbakhsh visited the Montgomery County Register of Wills office in Rockville to review the electronic imaging system installed by Vredenberg as the pilot system for all the registers in the State. Archives staff met with Bill Schwartz, Automated Information Systems Manager, and Charlie Keyser, both from the Register's office.
System:
The imaging system became live with current data on Tuesday, January 21, 1997. The operating plan on the part of the Register had been to get the equipment running so that all documents from 1997 could be integrated into the system. Scanning is done by a Fujitsu model M3093GX scanner (Actually a new model released by Fujitsu, the serial number on this device is simply 35). Resolution of the scanner can run from 200 to 1000dpi, the Register is using either the 300dpi or 600dpi setting, depending on the document type. The Register also has a HP ScanJet 4 that they have not attached to the system because they would like to replace it with another Fujitsu. Software used in both scanning and retrieval is the off-the-shelf package called Highview, version 2.0. Vredenberg has customized some of the options for the Register and is awaiting the release of Highview 2.01 and 2.02, which will be installed when they are available. Hardware/Networking for the system is residing on the County's existing LAN and is Windows NT. Images are placed directly on their network server which contains 2, 4 gigabyte harddrives. As of this moment, the optical server (made by HP) containing 32, 2.6 gigabyte platters is not on-line. Vredenberg has had HP in to service the SCSI connections between the jukebox and the network server.
Documents that come in are taken to the workstation set up for scanning. At this point, the operator enters information into an SQL database. Information captured at this point includes: estate number, decedent's name, document type, docket number. Scanning is completed by operator and quality controlled by a supervisor. Each document, regardless of how many pages, is a single TIFF file. Average file size, according to Bill Schwartz is around 50K, some files have been twice as large. Right now, they do not have any photographs in the system. When they do come in, it is anticipated that they will use Photoshop or some compatible software package to be determined. Also, photos will be either the GIF or JPEG format. Backups of the entire system are completed daily on one of two DAT tapes. It is anticipated that they will also conduct monthly backups of everything. The current plan calls for migrating all the images for an estate onto the optical server when the estate is closed. Otherwise, the files will remain resident on the server's harddrives. When documents are brought in for older estate files, the plan calls for the scanning of all the documents in that estate as part of the normal workflow.
Retrieval of the documents is, as of now, done through 2 public workstations. Vredenberg is going to put 4 additional workstations on line. Use of these workstations by the general public will require familiarity with Windows '95. Users start by opening the index database which will search on either name or estate number. Index search returns possible hits, listing every document that is in the system for that estate. User can then select which document to view. While the system is retrieving the first image file for view by the user, it is also caching all the remaining image files in that estate for quicker access. Workstation monitors are 19" Cornerstones. Users can print the documents on 600dpi HP laserjets.
There has been little thought on the part of the Register to how to migrate the data onto film. Probably, the way to go is use the files that they migrate onto the optical server as the basis for the transfer to microfilm. Once the optical server is on- line, we can begin exploring these issues with both Vredenberg and the Register.
One final note. Bill Schwartz complimented us on the quality of our website. He picked it up by surfing over to MEC and finding "your cloud."