📖Converting existing boxlists

Purpose of this guidance

This guidance is designed to aid conversion of existing boxlists in alternative formats to current collection development standards, and is in line with the 'Guidance notes' provided with the boxlist template.

It expands on the existing guidance by providing advice for how to retrospectively convert and improve boxlist not covered by Collection Development guidance assuming listing at point of acquisition.

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Identifying improvements

Open the scoping spreadsheet and search for the accession number to be improved. The columns reflect what is needed to bring the boxlist up to minimum standards in terms of contents such as box numbers, titles/descriptions, dates, and extents, and the notes field should provide any additional information such as whether multiple lists currently exist.

Locate the collections file in SharePoint. If there are multiple lists, open and compare them to see if there is any contradictory data, and bring them together in a single 'most complete' list before importing into your final list.

If the list is in a PDF format, first convert to text by opening the PDF file in word.

This should automatically convert the PDF into text but may be worth spot checking the text for any inaccuracies using the spell checker and comparing to the original PDF copy.

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Copying to a new boxlist and amending

Create a new boxlist and match up the data in the existing list to the fields in the boxlisting template as described in the box listing guidance. Copy large chunks of data where possible; existing older spreadsheets for example may be able to carry whole columns across without amending.

Some missing data such as extent and date can be inferred from the structure of the existing list i.e. a list of file titles would suggest each title represents 1 file. Dates can be broadly taken from the context of the content, or from the known creating dates of the individual or body the archive concerns.

If there are whole boxes missing descriptions or material to extract and itemise, recall and list this material; this should have been flagged during scoping and be available at point of conversion, including material already extracted and stored onsite that requires itemising and/or ingesting.

Note the formats and dates, where known, of the original boxlists and the additions made during the conversion process in the methodology field.

Excel and word formatted boxlists created in 1998 and 2017 were combined and converted to this template in May 2024. Some dates and extents were inferred during conversion. Boxes 10 and 11 were recalled for enhanced listing, and audio-visual material extracted and itemised in May 2024.

Once the new boxlist is complete, all older versions should have the word 'SUPERSEDED' added to the end of their titles.

AAUNAM_Acc2171_BoxList_SUPERSEDED