Ruby

tool: PostgreSQL

Purpose:

PostgreSQL is a powerful, open source object-relational database system.

Features:

• fully ACID compliant
• full support for foreign keys, joins, views, triggers, and stored procedures (in multiple languages)
• includes most SQL 2008 data types, including INTEGER, NUMERIC, BOOLEAN, CHAR, VARCHAR, DATE, INTERVAL, and TIMESTAMP
• supports storage of binary large objects, including pictures, sounds, or video
• multi-Version Concurrency Control (MVCC)
• Highly customisable

A&H use case 1 description:

The “Great Britain Historical Geographical Information System (GBHGIS)” has used PostgreSQL to store the geographically-located historical statistics for Great Britain.

Creator:

Michael Stonebraker

Publisher:

PostgreSQL Global Development Group

Data capture:

Manual input and transcription

Specifications:

PHP

eXtensible Markup Language (XML)

Suite:

Software/programming languages used:

PostgreSQL

Tags:

database

query language

Alternate tool(s):

FileMaker, MySQL, SQLite, Firebird

Licence:

PostgreSQL License

lifecycleStage:

structuring

Platform:

All major operating systems

By Valentina Asciutti at Thu, 17/06/2010 - 10:44

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tool: Solr

Purpose:

Solr is an open source enterprise search platform from the Apache Lucene project. It operates as a standalone full-text search server within an appropriate servlet container, such as Tomcat. Solr uses the Lucene Java search library at its core for full-text indexing and search, and has REST-like HTTP/XML and JSON APIs that make it easy to use from virtually any programming language.

Features:

• May be tailored to many types of application with minimal programming knowledge
• Extensive plug-in support
• Full-text indexing and search

A&H use case 1 description:

The “British Cartoon Archive Digitisation (BCAD)” project has used Solr to deliver the search results and metadata.

Creator:

CNET Networks

Publisher:

Apache Software Foundation

Data analysis:

Searching and querying

Topic Detection and Tracking

Specifications:

Software/programming languages used:

Solr

Apache SOLR

Suite:

Apache

Data structuring and enhancement:

Cataloguing and indexing

Alternate tool(s):

Sphynx

Tags:

Licence:

lifecycleStage:

Platform:

By Valentina Asciutti at Mon, 19/04/2010 - 10:40

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tool: Lucene

Purpose:

Apache Lucene is a high-performance, full-featured text search engine library written entirely in Java. It is a technology suitable for nearly any application that requires full-text search, especially cross-platform.

Features:

• Scalable, high-performance indexing
• Powerful, accurate and efficient search algorithms
• Cross-platform solution

A&H use case 1 description:

The “Freeze Frame – Historic Polar Images 1845-1960” project has used Lucene for advanced search of photographs from both Arctic and Antarctic expeditions.

Creator:

Doug Cutting

Publisher:

Apache Software Foundation

Data analysis:

Topic Detection and Tracking

Specifications:

Software/programming languages used:

Lucene

Apache Lucene

Suite:

Apache

Data structuring and enhancement:

Cataloguing and indexing

Alternate tool(s):

InQuira, Verity, dtSearch, ISYS

Tags:

Licence:

lifecycleStage:

Platform:

By Valentina Asciutti at Mon, 19/04/2010 - 10:27

Read more about Lucene

tool: GeoNames

Purpose:

A global geographical database that may be used to identify, tag and disambiguate all references to location. The database contains over 8 million entries, each of which possesses a geographic name (in various languages), latitude, longitude, elevation, population, administrative subdivision and postal codes and information on unique features.

Features:

• Built upon web service, enabling transparent look-up and use of content through third-party tools and sites
• Browse by geographic location, country name, size of geographic region and other categories.
• Full text search support
• Extensible, enabling users to expand existing information or contribute new content
• Support for the World Geodetic System 1984 (WGS84) co-ordinate system

A&H use case 1 description:

GeoNames is used in the Embedding GeoCrossWalk project to geotag locations found in proceedings of the Stormont Assembly.

Publisher:

GeoNames.org

Creator:

Marc Wick

Data publishing and dissemination:

Resource sharing

Specifications:

eXtensible Markup Language (XML)

World Geodetic System 1984 (WGS1984)

Communication and collaboration:

Textual interaction (asynchronous)

Data analysis:

Data mining

Record linkages

Searching and querying

lifecycleStage:

Discipline:

Classics and Ancient History

History

Data capture:

Text recognition

Use of existing digital data

Data structuring and enhancement:

Geo-referencing and projection

Tags:

geocoding

neogeography

digital maps

Strategy and project management:

Documentation

Alternate tool(s):

Unlock

Practice-led research:

Texture design and mapping

Platform:

All major operating systems

Software/programming languages used:

GeoNames

Licence:

Creative Commons

By natalie.hutchinson at Fri, 12/03/2010 - 10:57

Read more about GeoNames

tool: Perl

Purpose:

Perl is a high-level, general-purpose, interpreted, dynamic programming language. Originally developed for text manipulation, it is now used for a wide range of tasks including graphics programming, system administration, network programming, applications that require database access and CGI programming on the Web.

Features:

• C, shell scripting (sh), AWK, and sed
• powerful text processing facilities
• flexibility and adaptability
• support for multiple programming paradigms
• reference counting memory management

A&H use case 1 description:

The “Developing Archival Context Standards for Functions in the Higher Education Sector” project has used Perl to develop the web interface. Perl was used to design simple navigation between the various data components, free-text and index controlled searching based on the underlying structure of the XML formatted data and an easy means of updating existing data.

Creator:

Larry Wall

Publisher:

Perl.org

Strategy and project management:

System quality assurance and code testing

Data publishing and dissemination:

Disk publishing

Desktop publishing and pre-press

Server scripting

Web browser scripting

General website development

lifecycleStage:

Specifications:

Microsoft's .NET Framework

Tags:

Alternate tool(s):

Ruby, Java, Python

Platform:

All major operating systems

Licence:

GNU General Public License

Artistic License

Software/programming languages used:

Perl

By Valentina Asciutti at Thu, 04/03/2010 - 12:21

Read more about Perl

tool: BBEdit

Purpose:

A text editor designed for use by software developers and web designers. BBEdit provides native support for several programming and scripting languages. Third party custom modules are available, created by users, to handle languages that are not supported in the native application.

Features:

Multi-file text searching
Scripting
Syntax highlighting for ANSI C, C++, CSS, Fortran (through Fortran 95), HTML, Java, JavaScript, JSP, Object Pascal, Objective-C, Objective-C++, Perl, PHP, Python, Rez, Ruby, Setext, SQL, Tcl, Tex, UNIX shell scripts, XML and YAML

A&H use case 1 description:

The Newton Manuscript Project used BBEdit to prepare 20 volumes of Newton's non-scientific papers for online delivery.

A&H use case 2 description:

The Exhibitions of the Royal Photographic Society project used BBEdit when creating a research database of 45,000 records from the annual exhibition catalogues of the Photographic Society, London, published between 1870 and 1915.

Publisher:

Bare Bones Software

Creator:

Bare Bones Software

Licence:

Tags: