The Arches heritage inventory and management system: a platform for the heritage field
Journal of Cultural Heritage Management and Sustainable Development
ISSN: 2044-1266
Article publication date: 15 August 2016
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to describe the Arches heritage inventory and management system for the benefit of practitioners working with heritage inventories. Arches is a modern software platform purpose-built for the creation and management of inventories to support effective heritage place management. The system was developed as open source software jointly by the Getty Conservation Institute (GCI) and World Monuments Fund (WMF).
Design/methodology/approach
The paper discusses the needs and challenges addressed by the GCI and WMF in developing Arches, explains the system’s design and functionality, reports on software releases and ongoing enhancements, describes current software implementations, and concludes by discussing the role and growth of the open source community and the Arches project’s aspirations.
Findings
The needs and challenges in the heritage field that the GCI and WMF originally identified have been confirmed through interactions between the Arches project and a range of practitioners. The suitability of Arches to address these needs is demonstrated through steady growth of the open source community and an increasing number of implementations of the Arches platform.
Practical implications
Arches provides a purpose-built system that is freely available and ready for use. It offers a system that requires a marginal investment by organizations compared to building digital inventories from scratch. The Arches project has created an international community of information technology and heritage practitioners to share experience, knowledge, and skills to address their common challenges in dealing with digital inventories.
Originality/value
The paper offers heritage practitioners details on a new tool for overcoming their challenges in building and managing digital heritage inventories.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
© Copyright 2016. The J. Paul Getty Trust and World Monuments Fund. All rights reserved.
The authors wish to thank Annabel Lee Enriquez, Getty Conservation Institute, for assisting with review of this paper and help in preparing the figures included.
Citation
Myers, D., Dalgity, A. and Avramides, I. (2016), "The Arches heritage inventory and management system: a platform for the heritage field", Journal of Cultural Heritage Management and Sustainable Development, Vol. 6 No. 2, pp. 213-224. https://doi.org/10.1108/JCHMSD-02-2016-0010
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2016, Authors