Curation Micro-Services
Micro-services are an approach to digital curation based on devolving curation function into a set of independent, but interoperable, services that embody curation values and strategies. Since each of the services is small and self-contained, they are collectively easier to develop, deploy, maintain, and enhance. Equally as important, they are more easily replaced when they have outlived their usefulness. Although the individual services are narrowly scoped, the complex function needed for effective curation emerges from the strategic combination of individual services.
Micro-services provide a curation environment that is comprehensive in scope, yet flexible with regard to local policies and practices and the inevitability of disruptive technological change. Micro-services can be deployed in environments in which it makes most sense, both technically and administratively. UC3 will use micro-services as the basis for its centrally-managed curation activities (for example, the Digital Preservation Repository); micro-services can also be operated in local campus environments either individually or in strategic combinations.
The initial set of micro-services can be grouped into four
categories that provide incrementally increasing levels of preservation assurance and
curation value. For more information and documentation, see the 
UC3 Curation wiki.
Providing security through redundancy
Maintaining meaning through descriptive context
Facilitating utility through service
Adding value through use
Background information
- UC3 Curation Foundations. Rev. 0.13 (2010-03-25)
- Merritt: An Emergent Approach to Digital Curation Infrastructure. Rev. 0.6 (2010-03-25)
