Building a website with a multisearch engine for digital museum collections – works in 2020
One of the key results of the “www.wmuzeach” project will be a bilingual website available at two addresses: www.wmuzeach.pl (Polish version) and www.inmuseums.pl (English version). The site will enable presenting and searching digital collections made available by: Museum of King Jan III’s Palace at Wilanów, POLIN the Museum of the History of Polish Jews, National Museum in Lublin, National Museum in Szczecin and Castle Museum in Łańcut. The project involves the presentation of a total of approx. 10 thousand exhibits from the five above-mentioned museums. The website will also make it possible to add collections of other institutions interested in this type of common presentation, aware of its potential in terms of research and increasing popularity, created by a modern way of presenting cultural goods.
Going with the times
All materials published on the website will be professionally prepared. Registration data, a popularising description and an image in the form of documentary photography will be provided on museum exhibit cards. The selected exhibits will also be illustrated with the use of other advanced digitisation techniques such as gigapixel photos, 3D and RTI models. The website will also include over 20 educational paths combining selected resources of all project partners in an unusual and sometimes even surprising way. Suggested exercises to be used free of charge, e.g. as part of school lessons, will be linked to the created educational paths.
A museum open to everyone
The project “www.muzeach” is both a challenge and an adventure. The website with a multisearch engine will combine what is historic with the latest technologies. While digitising subsequent works of art, we are guided by values such as: openness of museum collections as a common good for the entire society, equal and free access to culture, knowledge, content and data as well as listening to the needs of users and designing the site accordingly. We strive for inclusiveness, we want to facilitate access to monuments and make art present in everyday life.
Functionality
The websites created as part of the project (Polish and English versions) can be used without logging in. By entering the site, users will be able to:
- browse collections with exhibit cards and educational paths,
- view and export exercises and challenges linked to the educational paths to their computers,
- view and save documentary photos in high resolution and various formats (document photos in TIF format, gigapixel photos, 3D models in FBX, RTI images) on their computers, according to the permission granted by the owner of the documentation,
- create their own account using an existing profile on social networks (e.g. Facebook or Google),
- share their favourite exhibits, educational paths and categories, and collections on such portals as Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest.
In addition to the abovementioned options, registered and logged-in users will be able to use a number of additional functions, including:
- adding/removing exhibits, collection categories and educational paths to/from favourites,
- creating/editing/deleting own collection categories from previously liked resources,
- adding/editing/deleting notes to exhibits (exhibit cards), collection categories and educational paths.
Going right for it
The creation of the www.wmuzeach.pl website began on 28 September 2020. The works related to its launch should last about 10 months. We can distinguish three most important stages of the project:
- creating a visual identity for the project,
- building a bilingual website with a content management system – including two rounds of qualitative tests with the participation of users and an external audit of digital accessibility,
- 36-month quality guarantee for the proper operation of the website.
During these 10 months, we plan to achieve five milestones. In December 2020, the first milestone was reached – the handover of the visual identification book and the interactive prototype of the website, ready to conduct the first round of qualitative tests with the participation of users.
Project co-financed from European Funds and from the funds of the Ministry of Culture and National of the Republic of Poland. The project is implemented under the Operational Program Digital Poland for the years 2014-2020, Priority Axis 2 “E-government and open government,” Action 2.3 “Digital availability and usefulness of public sector information,” Sub-action 2.3.2 “Digital availability of culture resources.”
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