The Library of Congress maintains an excellent, comprehensive list of digital formats on their Digital Formats for Library of Congress Collections website.
The site has four main sections, Introduction, Sustainability Factors, Content Categories, and Format Descriptions. The overall goal of the site is to provide a resource for documenting digital formats and evaluating long-term preservation issues for each. Much of the site discusses the implications of digital formats for the American Memory Project at LOC, but it is equally valuable to other institutions.
The meat of the site is the Format Descriptions section. Formats are broken down into five categories:
* Still Image
* Textual
* Sound
* Moving Image
* Generic
Each category includes an alphabetical list of formats. Clicking on a format displays a full record with the following information:
* Identification and description
* Local use
* Sustainability factors
* Quality and functionality factors
* File type signifiers
* Notes
* Format specifications
* Useful references
These descriptions serve as a resource for selection and acquisition at the Library of Congress. They also support the preservation of digital content as a resource for implementations of the Representation Network that is an element of the Open Archival Information System (OAIS) [PDF] reference model. The Format Descriptions are intended to be consistent with and complementary to the proposed Global Digital Format Registry.
The site appears to be routinely maintained and updated.
Links: http://www.digitalpreservation.gov/formats
Posted by Paul H at September 20, 2005 03:27 PM
