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Unreserved Glossary

Unreserved Glossary

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         

Term

Definition

Accession Number

The unique number or designation assigned to an item when it is received into the Archives. All items are assigned an Expanded Number. Some items have also been assigned an External ID as they were accessioned prior to the introduction of electronic records management systems.

Archives

A collection of historical materials relating to an organisation, place, purpose, or group of people. Also, the organisation that hold the historical materials.

Audio

A sound recording.

Booklet

A thin book with a small number of pages and a cover.

Bound

An item that is held together along the spine. The information contained in items of this type is predominantly written using a machine such as a computer or typewriter. This Format does have OCR.

Bound Volume

An item which has a cover and is held together along a spine.

Cultural Object

Anything created by humans which has as central motivation the culture of its creator and/or users or audience.

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

The DOI system provides a technical and social infrastructure for the registration and use of persistent interoperable identifiers, called DOIs, for search and citation of digitised items on digital networks. A digital item with the DOI is the definitive version – the version everyone needs to cite.

Expanded Number

An Accession Number assigned to all materials in the Archives.

External ID

An Accession Number assigned to materials in the Archives prior to the introduction of electronic records management systems.

File

Documents held together in an ordered way.

Format

The way in which the information is organised or presented.

Handwritten

An item where the information contained is predominantly written by hand rather than typed. This Format does not have OCR.

Index Cards

Small cards used to record information kept in a card index.

Ledger

A bound record in which information has been regularly recorded, especially business and financial activities.

Loose Papers

One or more papers that are not bound together in any way either by traditional methods or file fasteners. Examples include forms and vouchers.

Metadata

The information that describes the record or item.

Object

A physical item.

Optical Character Recognition (OCR)

A technology that is used to convert scanned documents or PDF files into searchable text.

Pamphlet

A thin book with only a few pages and no cover; smaller than a booklet.

Parent Series Index Provide information on the high level arrangement of the archives and the entities that created the records. They describe the parent series and show the Series and sub-series it contains.

Pass Book

A small book used to officially record money deposited in and withdrawn from a customer's account.

Photograph

A captured image produced using a camera.

Research Guide

Highlight topics of potential interest drawn from the material in the Reserve Bank of Australia Archives. They provide background to the topic as well as details on how and where to find information relating to that topic.

Series

Records organised and maintained as a group because they have a common function or subject, result from the same activity or filing process, or because they have some other relationship arising from their creation or purpose.

Series Guide

All Series have an accompanying page that provides information on the content, context and arrangement of the records in that Series.

Type

A sub-group of Format that further defines groups of records or items based on similar characteristics in how the information is organised or presented.

Video

Moving images, often accompanied by sound.

Work of Art

An item made by an artist.