OHMS Now Available For Avalon

Avalon Media System is proud to announce the successful completion of integrations between Avalon, a Samvera solution bundle for audio and video management, and OHMS, the Oral History Metadata Synchronizer.

Libraries and archives host rich collections that include audio and video recordings of oral histories and interviews, often first-hand accounts of events important to cultural memory.  While many of these recordings have languished in formats that made them inaccessible to researchers and, in many cases, the public, the combination of OHMS and Avalon can make these oral histories accessible and manageable, leveraging open technologies designed specifically for the specific needs of libraries and archives.

The integrations, developed by AVP (formerly AVPreserve), will enable media managers to use the latest version of OHMS to index or connect interview transcripts with video or audio media, managed and stored in the robust Avalon Media System via Avalon's JavaScript player API.  Paired with the powerful time-based search, discovery and navigation features in OHMS, the final product will create a package complete with transcripts and menus derived from user-created metadata, ready for display.  

Douglas Boyd of Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History at the University of Kentucky Libraries states “Indiana University is the first institution besides the University of Kentucky to make a significant contribution to the OHMS code.  We are always looking for ways to make OHMS a more effective solution and the incorporation of Avalon represents significant step forward for OHMS and Avalon.”

This work was supported by the Indiana University Office of the Bicentennial as part of Indiana University’s Bicentennial Oral History Project.  Avalon Media System is developed by Indiana University Libraries and Northwestern University Libraries, with support from the Institute of Museum and Library Services and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.  OHMS is developed and managed at the Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History at the University of Kentucky Libraries and was made open source and free through support from the Institute of Museum and Library Services. 

For more information regarding Avalon and OHMS, please contact Avalon at:  http://www.avalonmediasystem.org/contact