OAIS version 3 - what does it mean for repositories?

On March 24th 2025, FAIR-IMPACT hosted the FAIR Implementation Workshop “OAIS version 3 - What does it mean for repositories?”. This workshop covered the history and future of OAIS from different perspectives and included some thought provoking discussion questions. The workshop drew in around 300 registrations and 175 live attendees, indicating a clear interest in learning about the topic and coming together to discuss it. This blog revisits some of the highlights of the workshop and includes follow-up thoughts from the speakers on audience questions that were submitted but not discussed due to a lack of time. 

The workshop kicked off with an introduction to the history of OAIS, the road to the update, and what has changed by David Giaretta. He also considered the link to FAIR, preservation, and sustainability of OAIS, and the implications of the OAIS changes for repositories. This introduction was followed by Barbara Sierman, who presented some observed misconceptions around OAIS and debunked these incorrect assumptions swiftly and clearly. OAIS is not just for space agencies, and no, you should not rely on your system supplier to take care of OAIS for you. Next, Olivier Rouchon presented the strong connections between OAIS and the CoreTrustSeal requirements. Both the information model and functional model of OAIS are connected at different points to the CoreTrustSeal requirements, which presents a uniform approach in repository audit and certification. As CoreTrustSeal will update its requirements through community consultation this year, it will be possible to align the requirements with the new version of OAIS quite smoothly. 

After this wealth of information, attendees were invited to share their input and questions through an online tool. First, the audience was asked whether they think their repository system is able to preserve a simple spreadsheet. To David’s surprise, more attendees were positive about this, which sparked a discussion on what is part of preserving spreadsheets and whether this knowledge goes deep enough. At the next question, it became clear that many repositories rely on external services to provide information that is important to preservation (e.g. DOIs, PROMON, etc.). This is a normal occurrence in the landscape, but introduces a risk for preservation as these external services could fail, cease to exist, or provide unreliable information in the first place. The impact of such reliance is hard to oversee and plan for, which makes preservation a precarious activity. It is not recommended or oftentimes possible to not rely on external resources, but adding additional information (technical, provenance, etc.) in your own system can help you minimise the impact of potential external failures.

Considering the OAIS standard, attendees honestly indicated that many of them have not read the full standard before. Many repositories seem to operate on an understanding of OAIS that comes to them indirectly (e.g. through summaries, presentations, or peer exchange). Honesty is the best policy, but an even better policy would be to include comprehension of the full OAIS standard in repository operations. The suggestion was made that a shorter version of the standard coming from the standard’s body could be a great starting point to introduce relevant concepts and considerations. This suggestion will be taken to the CCSDS Data Archive Interoperability Working Group which develops the standard, and could possibly help guide people through the standard in an informative and targeted way. The Working Group is open for anyone to join, which is the best way to keep OAIS alive into the future and relevant for daily practice. Another way to improve OAIS sustainability and uptake is the transparent sharing of use cases, examples, and good practices in the wider community. OAIS is not about perfection, but rather the consideration of ‘good enough’, which can be informed by seeing other implementations that you can learn from. There is a large community around OAIS, which was also clearly observable in the workshop, and opens up many opportunities for knowledge exchange and collaboration.

Remaining questions from the audience

The workshop worked up a lively discussion in the meeting chat and online tool, and unfortunately reached its end time before all of them were able to be fully discussed or commented on. Therefore, the three speakers have evaluated the remaining questions and provided input on the remaining questions, to further assist the community discussions. 

Question 1: Is there a document/websource that describes what is missing in an E-Ark/supplier AIP’s in comparison to an OAIS compliant AIP?

David Giaretta: You can see my Comment on the e-Ark draft common package specification for additional information. It does use the previous version of the Information Package diagram but the comment is still valid.

Question 2: Would you please elaborate on the reluctance to use the word “metadata”?  What would you prefer to call it?

David Giaretta: I discourage people from using ‘metadata’ because it means different things to different people/groups. This just leads to confusion and wasting time. Also it is not possible to answer the question “Have I got enough metadata?” as different people will give different answers depending on what they think the word means. I have bitter experience of this! I don’t want a new term. I want people to be more precise using existing (preferably OAIS) terminology. That is why I use the terminology of OAIS - it has a finer granularity of meaning. It allows one to ask “Have I got enough of each of the types?” For example, OAIS spends a lot of time answering that question about Representation Information.
So one can use the term “metadata” as long as it is clear it is meant as a vague collective term - and that everyone involved understands that that is how it is being used. But to put it in any serious discussion or a list of requirements (as in FAIR) then it is a recipe for confusion, or it is an excuse to simply say “Yes we have enough” - which is almost certainly misleading yourself and others.

Barbara Sierman: One of the criticisms 30 years ago was that OAIS introduced a lot of terms that were unfamiliar to librarians, archivists, and data scientists. I think the value of the OAIS shared language amongst preservationists is that we have definitions for the terminology that is used in OAIS. However, there is not yet a concordance between terminology used in certain areas and their translation into OAIS. Any volunteers?

Question 3: We discussed the reliance on external resources. Can we afford to have our archives be fully independent from the universe around us?

Barbara Sierman: If you mean that you want to be fully independent from resources you rely on now, like Pronom, your persistent identifier system or other resources, the first step is to be aware of this dependence and share this with other preservation people and the maintainers of the resource. It is a problem the preservation community should address.

Olivier Rouchon: Full independence will be hardly impossible to achieve. We don’t want preservation systems to be monolithic (to repeat what David said) or standalone. But they need to be able to cope with the fact that external information may cease to exist.

Question 4: It sounds like the speakers are happy with the new version, but you are somewhat disappointed by the ecosystem and people around it making use of it. How can we make you happy/ier? 

Barbara Sierman: Sometimes it seems that the preservation community is focused on the practical part of preservation and less on the fundamental starting points. More in depth discussion amongst a large group of practitioners and more involvement in the next version of OAIS would be better for the sustainability and relevance of the standard.

David Giaretta: Personally I am keen on the ISO approach of continuous improvement. I am disappointed that many people have not taken the trouble to seriously think about preservation. As I said, if a car mechanic told me “oh I did not read the manual - it was too difficult”, then I would not let that mechanic touch my car. Similarly if a person entrusted with preserving valuable digitally encoded information said that OAIS was too difficult, I would tell them to find another job. The big problem is that if the right actions are not taken early on then by the time it becomes apparent that the digitally encoded information has not been preserved, it will probably be too late. One can use digital forensics to recover something but the real danger is the loss of semantics.

Question 5: I feel rather discouraged.

David Giaretta: That was not my intent. I just hoped to frighten people into thinking more deeply and questioning what they are told. Please feel free to question what I said - but I am pretty sure I can convincingly defend what I said. At the risk of being accused of blatant self-advertising I recommend Thinking Digital Preservation: for the serious, intelligent, digital preserver eBook : Giaretta, David: Amazon.co.uk: Kindle Store 

Olivier Rouchon: I suppose the main objective was to raise awareness that neither OAIS nor a software will do the preservation job for you. Keep in mind the needs from your designated community and the risks associated with your digital objects to build your policies and procedures.

Question 6: How can I convince researchers to deposit metadata in repository?

David Giaretta: 1. Be more precise in what you ask for - e.g. Provenance, Representation Information etc. Of course you do not need to use those terms. Instead explain the various types of additional information you need. 2. The follow-on is that if the archive has adequate Provenance then there will be good evidence that the research was done in a good way, and can be trusted and checked.  3. Then, if there is adequate Representation Information for any datasets it will be easier for others to use and re-use that data. 4. Explain that the extra information that you are asking for will benefit them by their work being cited more - which is probably one of the most valuable things you can offer.

Question 7: What's your view on Blockchain technologies as a platform for metadata preservation, data auditing, process transparency?

David Giaretta: A useful technique which can be used as part of the Fixity Information. But maybe I don’t know enough about it.

Question 8: How can you get training in using and understanding OAIS? 

Barbara Sierman: Perhaps a good start, based on the 2012 version of OAIS is the summary that Brian Lavoie from OCLC wrote as a DPC TechWatch report in 2014. I personally wrote a summary in Dutch, but all these need to be updated with the new version!

David Giaretta: The best I know of is Training with on-line PTAB lecturer | PTAB - Primary Trustworthy Digital Repository Authorisation Body Ltd - but perhaps I am biased.

Olivier Rouchon: The DPC has also delivered training with their experts. Check Training on Digital Preservation and Open Archival Information System (OAIS)

Question 9: OAIS and case studies would be helpful, could these be shared?

David Giaretta: There were some in the previous versions of OAIS but they get out of date so we took them out. The ISO 16363 audits could be useful but they tend not to be public. 

Barbara Sierman: That is why I suggest to share your experiences and doubts with colleagues at conferences, in blogposts, articles etc. Don’t be afraid of OAIS!

Question 10: If there are open questions on compliance of OAIS within our organisation, where can we post them?

David Giaretta: You can email them to me directly or post them to the CCSDS Data Archive Interoperability Working Group mailing list. I will set up a website so people can post questions directly as well. 

OAIS now has a community wiki!

The purpose of the wiki is to provide information about OAIS and collect from users their questions about OAIS and information about their experiences using and implementing the standard. The wiki is readable by all, and you can register to contribute to the wiki. Contributions can include OAIS case studies, example implementations, suggestions for improvements, or posing and answering questions.

The wiki was created as a direct result of the FAIR-IMPACT FAIR Implementation Workshop on the new OAIS version, where it was expressed by the community that such a network would be a valuable mechanism to increase understanding and skills around OAIS.

Go to the community