Improving the way America accesses its historical records.
The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is the US Government’s primary record keeper and is critical to the preservation of our nation’s history.
NARA's massive collection includes 13 billion pages of records, and NARA has recognized the ever-growing expectation to digitize this extensive collection. In FY 2019 alone, there were 5.3 million views of the National Archives Catalog specifically.
Improving NARA's digital cataloging system.
The National Archives Catalog needs a finished product that has intuitive search functions and is scalable as their massive collection of digitized records continues to increase. Fearless has been awarded a sole-source contract to provide a user-focused Minimum Viable Product (MVP) to do just that.
Fearless is exploring the use of Elasticsearch to achieve this effort. Since it's a distributed, open-source search and analytics engine for many types of data, including textual, numerical, geospatial, structured, and unstructured.
User research is also at the heart of this project to ensure the user’s needs are being met through regular user interviews. This allows us to understand their pain points and identify quantitative metrics by which we can compare future iterations of this MVP.
“We're working to enhance the search experience for site visitors while improving overall site performance and scalability,” said Fearless Scrum Master Jenny Walter. “Our team will work to optimize the site behind the scenes. As we do, we'll ensure a consistent and relevant search experience for the users as the Catalog’s online collection continues to grow.”
Bringing an Agile mindset to NARA.
NARA sets the standard for knowledge sharing and management across the US. And Fearless is not only transforming digital cataloging and search at the National Archives, our team is proud to introduce Agile practices and a broader digital transformation to the agency.
By utilizing Agile, scrum practices, and open communication, progress will be continually made throughout the contract. This will lead to NARA’s goal of making 250 million descriptions with 500 million objects within the National Archives Catalog before 2025.
This announcement was published independently of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). This release does not constitute or imply an endorsement by NARA or the United States Government of the product, process, or service, or its producer or provider. The views and opinions expressed in any referenced document do not necessarily state or reflect those of NARA or the United States Government.