Technology: Tools for Managing Information.

• Author: PHILLIPS, JOHN T.

More than ever before, computers and related advances in office technology enable individuals and organizations to create higher quality products, to deliver information services more quickly, and to store vast reservoirs of documents in easily accessible formats. Many new enterprises, such as Internet-based "electronic-commerce" businesses, exist solely because of the creation of an international computer-networking infrastructure that supports the exchange of electronic business data and documents. However, as computing technology becomes increasingly vital to conducting business and communicating with associates, new and more complex issues must be resolved. Among them is the need to ensure that the benefits derived from using computers are not reduced due to accompanying information management inefficiencies or to the creation of new business risks.

Will electronic business records be available when needed? Will electronic files and data be managed in a manner that assures their synthesis into a fertile knowledge base of documented enterprise actions, findings, and insights? Will these information assets be adequately preserved to enjoy long-term viability and usefulness? To answer these questions positively will require, the creation of new tools and methods for managing documents and records in electronic formats.

This issue of The Information Management Journal focuses on five critical professional areas that will require technology innovation and methodology development to ensure successful information management activities in the 21st century.

Creating Trustworthy Records Requires Standards

Computer software tools used to manage electronic records must be capable of systematically categorizing, classifying, and organizing all electronic documents in a standardized manner to preserve the context, content, and structure of electronically recorded information. A major tool for accomplishing this goal is the creation of standard metadata that can be used to describe documents in a globally acceptable manner, greatly enabling the creation of authentic and trustworthy electronic records.

In "Recordkeeping in the 21st Century: Can Computer System Metadata Aid in the Creation of Trustworthy Electronic Records?" Jason Baron, a trial attorney with the U.S. Department of Justice, illustrates how computer-system-recorded information about records (metadata) can be used as a tool to manage records as authentic and trustworthy documents. Through a brief review of recent important...