Having established a new file structure for the 40 collections I wanted to accommodate, I set about making indexes and the digital objects themselves, as visible and accessible as possible. I used three  different types of indexes – a document containing a list of the objects, a set of folders with index information in the folder titles, and a set of files with index information in the file titles. In each case, access to the index was provided either by placing the index, or by placing a shortcut to the index, into the relevant collection folder. The table below shows the number of instances of each type that are employed in the overall set of collections.

Another way of creating an index is to piggyback one collection’s index on another collection’s index. This is what I’ve done for the ‘Other Display Case Items’ collection which is identified by the term ‘Other Display Case Items’ in the facet column of the Mementos index. In similar vein, two indexes can simply be combined as I’ve done in two cases. In one, I’ve merged the indexes of two separate Memento collections (my own for before I was married (1366 entries), and the other for myself and my wife (870 entries) into a single spreadsheet making it much easier to manage and to conduct searches. The digital objects still have different Ref Nos prefixes enabling them to be distinguished from each other. In fact, I now have 4 different collections recorded in the Mementos Index, all with different Ref No prefixes, and all with their files kept in separate sub-folders. In the other case, the separate Publications, Significant Work Reports, and Certificates & Trophies indexes (containing 68, 98 and 41 entries respectively) were combined into a single word document and the collection renamed the ‘Trophy Gallery’ collection.

This combination of different indexing approaches and the ability to either locate the actual index, or a shortcut, in a collection folder, provides a great deal of flexibility in the work required to creating and maintaining an index, while enabling very quick access to the index information whichever approach is taken.

The use of shortcuts also provided a very useful aid in the storage of digital objects associated with collections. In three particular cases (Music, Videos and Photos) the collections are located in separate libraries in the Windows File Manager, take up many gigabytes of storage, and, in the case of Music and Photos, comprise hundreds and thousands of files respectively. To be able to leave them where they are, and just to refer to them with a shortcut, was a much easier option than to have to physically relocate them. Another very important advantage in leaving them in their separate libraries is that the backup of the Documents library will be much quicker, and will take up considerably less space which means that I will not be so worried about a potential lack of space in the destination of the backup.

Interestingly, shortcuts have played much less of a part in cross referencing between collection objects. This is because you want to spot a cross reference while you are looking at a particular object – you don’t want to have to go looking for a separate shortcut file – indeed you wouldn’t necessarily even be aware that a separate shortcut file exists. Hence, cross references are best defined either in indexes, or as links on some text or images. I have cross references in the indexes for 12 of my collections – though none are in a specific cross-reference field. Instead, I have used fields such as ‘Notes’ or ‘Comments’ or have simply added a cross reference in brackets at the end of a description or a title. For the most part these cross references specify Reference Numbers – it doesn’t work so well with a general description or a lengthy pathname. I am still musing on whether to add a specific Cross-Reference field into some of my indexes.

Regarding links on text or images, I have only employed this technique a couple of times. First, in this Blog in which it is invaluable in referring to other posts and to supporting files; and second, in the Story Boards collection in which the approach was integral to the Story Board concept: the things that an object reminds you of are placed around it on a single page, and then further information about that snippet is available via a link to some back-end material. Its very effective. I may use more of the link approach now that I have an established and comprehensive digital structure for all my collections such that I’m confident that the objects will stay in the same place for quite a while and that the links are unlikely to get broken.

The reorganisation of the digital versions of my collections hasn’t affected the display of collection objects a great deal – though it has prompted me to put additional folders into the Windows Lock Screen function. Previously I had only included the Paintings, Drawings and Collages collection, but I’ve now added the Computer Artefacts, Other Display Case Items, Mementos, and Photo collections, and these four have added well over 26,000 extra objects to be displayed when the PC is inactive. It’s easy to add items into the Lock Screen function since it will accept high level folders and will display the items at the bottom of the folder tree. A final point about displays is that at some point in the near future I’m going to have to rearrange the way all these collections are displayed in my iPad to reflect this newly reorganised master structure in my laptop. A disconnect in the way the two versions are represented would not be helpful…