Omeka

We’ve created a zipped download for the 0.10 Beta Preview release, and we’re asking for your help in testing it. This version of Omeka is a preview of what’s to come in our full beta release of 0.10, and isn’t designed for use on production sites. Rather, it’s your chance to give us feedback on bugs that have arisen since our last release.

As Jeremy noted last month with the release of the 0.10 Alpha version, we’ve implemented a new data model based upon an unqualified Dublin Core standard, and implemented new plugin and theme APIs.

The Exhibit Builder feature of Omeka, which was previously part of the core software, has become a separate downloadable plugin that will also pre-packaged with the upcoming 0.10 beta release. This change will allow for greater flexibility in updating the plugin more often than the core of the software by allowing its separate development.

The most notable changes to the Exhibit Builder include updating the plugin API to be compatible with 0.10, adding exhibit page titles and slugs, and improving the interface for building exhibits by adding greater navigation and consistency.

There are several key functions of Omeka and the Exhibit Builder that need to be tested:

• Does Omeka and Exhibit Builder successfully migrate your old data from previous versions?
• Do you have issues when using a specific browser?

Please post your feedback as either a comment on this blog post, or on the Omeka Developer Google Group as a new thread. Thanks very much for your feedback as we move toward 0.10 beta! Please go download 0.10 beta preview, and let us know how it works for you!

EDIT (10/27/2008) In the 0.10 Beta Preview, the db.ini file has been moved to the root of the application. When installing 0.10, you’ll notice this file has been moved from the application/config/ folder. That should be the only change in the installation process from 0.9.

If you thought only large urban libraries (eg, New York Public Library) could launch a unique Omeka-powered digital collection site, think again. The Ringwood Public Library in New Jersey recently released, the Upper Ringwood Collection with a great theme designed by the Web Developers Studio.

In this site you will find over 120 images browseable by four categories: people and places, events and keepsakes, schools and churches, and mines and stables. These categories are actually Omeka collections. While most of the packaged themes offer browsing by all items, exhibits, and collections via the main navigation bar, you can gently tweak the theme to allow browsing by specific collections, types, or tags.

The Upper Ringwood Collection provides another excellent example of how Omeka’s themes can be modified to create attractive and distinctive looks for any web project.

I’m happy to announce the launch of Experiencing Medieval Places, a website created Dolly Jørgensen of the Norwegian University of Science & Technology, Norway and proudly powered by Omeka.

In Dolly’s words, Experiencing Medieval Places is a “website for exploring the lived experience at medieval (Europe, 400-1500) sites. The goal of the site is explore how medieval people experienced places, including churches, castles, marketplaces, and homes. More than a travel site, Experiencing Medieval Places encourages modern visitors to recognize and stay in touch with the historical experience in medieval places.”

This is a great example of how Omeka sites can be used to publish scholarship on the web, and easily build rich narrative around digital objects in Omeka’s built-in archive. Dolly’s first exhibit, Experiencing Stained Glass, discusses the functions of medieval stained glass for both the medieval and modern church visitor.  It also demonstrates how minor changes to the default Omeka theme can produce an attractive and original site.

The Reynolds Journalism Institute at the University of Missouri School of Journalism launched the Pictures of the Year International Archive over the weekend using Omeka. The Archive, which contains over 40,000 historic photographs arranged by collection, chronicles more than fifty years of journalism history, including striking images of the fall of the Berlin Wall and Jack Ruby’s shooting of Lee Harvey Oswald. In future the Archive will feature thematic, museum-style exhibits using Omeka’s exhibit builder functionality. The POYi Archive features an elegant original Omeka theme and offers a good example of the kind of customizations and display choices Omeka enables. It also provides another example of the range of collections-based research being published with Omeka. Check it out!

[Crossposted from Found History]