There have been a number of enhancements to the Cinemage Multimedia Museum Archiving System over the past few months.
A significant change has been the implementation of a local catalogue. Previously the system accessed the database of the Canadian Heritage Information Network (CHIN) in Ottawa. The local catalogue, running on the server located at ACT, is updated from the CHIN database but has several advantages. One significant advantage is that access and searching is faster and the system does not stop working when the CHIN database is unavailable. In addition, having a local database allows us to implement different information fields. For example there are a number of fields in the CHIN database that are unused. In addition, because the CHIN database is used primarily by museum curators, it does not include such things as narrative or descriptive fields for images that would be of interest to the public accessing the system.
The client software has also undergone changes in the last few months, not the least of which is a change of name. Previously called the "Curator Client", it is now called the "Virtual Museum Viewer". We feel that the new name more clearly reflects what the program does.
Another major enhancement to the client package is the addition of an
intermediate window or "vignette" view of an item. This window
contains a medium-sized image along with some descriptive information about
the image. Once a search has been completed and a group of thumbnail (small)
images has been presented, clicking on a thumbnail image will display the
vignette window. Clicking on the image in that window will display a large
image of the object.