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Category: Formats

Preserving a History of Digital Mapmaking: Inside the Geospatial Software and File Formats Documentation Web Archive

Posted by: Tracee Haupt Fugate

In this interview, Tim St. Onge and Meagan Snow explain how web archiving is preserving documentation essential to understanding the evolution of modern cartography. They outline the motivations behind the Geospatial Software and File Formats Documentation Web Archive, describe their curatorial approach, and highlight the collection’s value for both current and future researchers. This is …

Screenshot of the Format Description Document for PyTorch, from the Library of Congress' Sustainability of Digital Formats site.

New File Format Research and Documentation on the Sustainability of Digital Formats

Posted by: Liz Holdzkom

This post is the most recent in a series about file format research for the Library of Congress' Sustainability of Digital Formats site. The post highlights new format description documents as well as updated information on support for digital accessibility features, such as screen readers, alt text, captions and audio description.

Screenshot from the Significant Properties for Digital Video resource showing information about the Display Aspect Ratio (DAR) property.

Updated FADGI Resource: Significant Properties for Digital Video

Posted by: Liz Holdzkom

The Federal Agencies Digital Guidelines Initiative (FADGI) Audiovisual Working Group has released a revised version of its popular resource, Significant Properties for Digital Video. This updated resource dives deeper into the area of significant properties for digital video to provide definitions for common terms and how changes in these typical criteria would impact the digital video content, technical parameters and display.

Screenshot from introduction page for the Library of Congress' Recommended Formats Statement.

Recommended Formats Statement: Updates for 2024-2025

Posted by: Liz Holdzkom

The Library of Congress has published the 2024-2025 Recommended Formats Statement. Updates, all captured in a Change Log, include support for digital accessibility features as a criterion for evaluating digital formats, an FAQ to address user feedback and adjustments to preferred and accepted formats across multiple content categories.

Screenshot of the "Documenting Accessibility Features" webpage that describes the work that the Formats team did to document Accessibility Feature information in FDDs.

More Formats and More About Formats: New Entries, Format Accessibility Features and Other Updates

Posted by: Liz Holdzkom

This post is the most recent in a series about file format research for the Sustainability of Digital Formats site at the Library of Congress, including many new format descriptions across multiple content categories. In addition, the post provides details about a new effort to document digital accessibility features in formats included in the Recommended Formats Statement.

Graphic of a word cloud that shows keywords for FDDs

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Data Points: Visualizing File Format Data

Posted by: Liz Holdzkom

Technologist Ashley Blewer is using the format description document XML files to gather data across all FDDs. She has pulled this data into data visualization tools which allow us to see what categories our FDDs fall into and how many FDDs are being updated (by category, each year). These visualizations help the formats team to identify issues and streamline internal review and update processes.

Screenshot from FFV1/MKV test file, with timecode and caption indicating material produced by the Library of Congress.

Embracing FFV1 in Matroska Container as a “Preferred Format” in the RFS

Posted by: Liz Holdzkom

The digital preservation landscape is ever-evolving, and the Library of Congress has recently made a significant update to its Recommended Formats Statement (RFS), to upgrade FFV1 (version 3) in Matroska (.mkv) container from an "Acceptable Format" to one of five "Preferred Formats" for the preservation and long-term access of video materials, reflecting its ongoing commitment to staying at the forefront of audiovisual preservation.