What is FACTS (Faceted Archival Content Transmission System)?
 
FACTS (Faceted Archival Content Transmission System) is a tool for access to historical materials that allows users to search and refine by collection as well as topic, name, date, location, genre, and more. These materials come from all collecting areas of Special Collections and Archives (Carson-Brierly Dance Library, the University Archives, Ira M. and Perle Hayutin Beck Memorial Archives, Rare books and manuscripts, etc.). Searchable materials include:
  • Photographs
  • Documents
  • Video
  • Audio
  • Three-dimensional objects
In addition, information about materials that have not yet been cataloged to lower levels (e.g., folders and boxes), or items that cannot be made available digitally, are also searchable.

Q: How long will FACTS be in beta testing?
A: FACTS 1.0 will be in beta testing until September 2009. The new Penrose Library website will begin beta testing in December 2009, and will include new ways to search the Special Collections and Archives materials. These new search methods will include:
  • Collecting focus/thematic search (Theater, University of Denver Athletics, Rocky Mountain Jewish history, etc.)
  • Collection (Milton Lewis Anfenger Papers, Arnold Family Papers, etc.)
Q: Why can't I search all collections and collection materials at the same time?
A: Our collections were placed online at different times using a variety of tools, and this made it difficult to search or browse across multiple collections at once. We are in the process of migrating our collections into FACTS so that patrons can search or browse across multiple collections at the same time.

Q: What can I do with items that I find in the collections?
A: The materials on this web site are made available for use in research, teaching and personal use. Although the material on this web site is publicly accessible for the limited purposes described above, some material is not in the public domain. Copyright in specific materials may be owned by the University of Denver, by another institution or corporate entity, or by an individual. Each collection may have specific copyright information and access/use rules.

Q: How is this different from a finding aid?
A: A finding aid is a tool that provides access to historical materials by their origin or provenance. FACTS enables this type of collection-based searching for historical materials, in addition to searching and sorting by date, topic, name, location, genre, and more.

Technical Information

PEAK Digital, the University of Denver's consortial Fedora-based digital repository provides the base for discovery, access, and long-term management functionality for DU's digital objects and associated metadata, as well as storage and support to other Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries member institution's repository programs. All metadata and digital objects that are discoverable within the FACTS system are stored and managed within the PEAK Digital environment.
FACTS is a discovery tool for both repository and non-digital content developed in-house at Penrose Library that utilizes the following software components:
  • Java web technologies (XML, JSP and Servlet 2.5)
  • Spring web application framework
  • GWT Google web tool kit, (compiles Java to javascript which runs in the browser).
  • Solr web interface to Lucene search engine.
  • Jetty web server and servlet container.
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Hours: Mon - Fri 9:00 am to 4:00 pm. | Phone: 303.871.3428. | E-mail: archives@du.edu