This is the PowerPoint slide deck from my presentation at The Charleston Conference, on November 4, 2010.

1. CREATING A DATABASE OF
SHIP CITATIONS:
THE CHALLENGES ENCOUNTERED
IN SHIPINDEX.ORG
The Charleston Conference, 3 Nov 2010
Peter McCracken
Co-Founder & Director of Content
and Business Development,
ShipIndex.org

2. What kinds of ships are these?
Bark (or barque); Ship; Brigantine; Barquentine; Topsail Schooner; Schooner

3. Serials :: Ships
 Publication pattern (or format?) :: Vessel type
 Serial title :: Ship name
 ISSN :: IMO
  Ship research :: Any other historical research

4. Ships :: Other historical research
 Problems with ships are the same as problems
with personal names, geographic descriptors,
etc.
 Can also apply to concepts, as well as things
 Also ‘non-unique’ items, like a car model

5. Data challenges – personal names
 Innumerable works by “Anonymous”
 Names are often shortened
 Pablo Picasso’s full name was Pablo Diego José
Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de
los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad
Ruiz y Picasso
 Names have strange limitations
 Some must be unique – Consider Michael J. Fox
 Some are very common – Consider Adam Smith

6. Data challenges – geographic
names
 Numerous variations: Köln; Cologne; Keulen;
Colonia; Colònia; Kolín nad Rýnem; Cwlen;
Κολωνία; Kolonjo; ‫;كولونيا‬ Кьолн; Ķelne; Кёльн
 Name changes
 Hot Springs, NM -> Truth or Consequences, NM
 Halfway, OR -> Half.com, OR
 Clark, TX -> DISH, TX
 St. Petersburg -> Petrograd -> Leningrad ->
St. Petersburg (“Petersburg,” or “Piter”)

7. A “meaning-less” identifier
 Regardless of the topic, some meaning-less
identifier can provide significant assistance
 “Meaning-less” in the sense of a one-to-many
relationship between the identifier and the
data
 The identifier doesn’t change, but the data can

8. Overview of ShipIndex.org
 A database of citations –
 >1.42 million citations, from >200 resources
 >140,000 citations are freely available
 Changes how one does maritime research
 Far more content can researched more quickly
 Opens up maritime research to everyone
 No need for inside knowledge on where to start
searching
 Uncovers many hidden resources
 Locates free, but hidden, web resources

9. Maritime access points
 Vessel name
 Vessel number
 IMO numbers are new; hull numbers change
 Captain name
 They change between voyages, and die during
them
 Rig or vessel type
 Ships are rebuilt; definitions change; “ship”
 ALSO: Port of registration; crew members;
others

10. Vessel names – this is easy!
 “What does the
stern say?”
1872, American Lloyd’s Register of American and Foreign
Shipping
1867, American Lloyd’s Register of American and Foreign
Shipping

11. Sources of errors – primary sources
 Mistakes in primary sources are very common,
and forgiveable
 Digitized version of Lloyd’s List of 1812
Ships called “Adolph & Fredericka”

12. Sources of errors – transcribers,
indexers, OCR operators, etc.
 Transcription errors are very easy to make –
whether through incorrect assumptions, or
just mistakes
 “Earnets” for “Earnest”; “Elizaneth” for
“Elizabeth”, etc.
 Some files are much tougher to manage than
others

13. More challenges
 How do we locate Elizabeth? Or Mary?
 Elizabeth = 1899 citations
 Mary = 2614 citations
 Top ten ship names, for no good reason: Mary, Maria,
Elizabeth, Anna, Union, Victoria, Hope, Flora,
Emma, America
 Try to limit results sets?
 by time period
 by vessel rig (maybe?)
 by location(?)
 by nationality

14. Changing vessel names
 What do we do when a vessel changes its
name?
 A person researching a vessel wants to know the
life of a ship; at present they need to know its
previous or subsequent names
 This can only be done when we have unique
vessel identifiers – otherwise, how do you know
which Elizabeth became Hogwarts Belle?

15. Existing vessel identifiers
 Hull Identification Number – Only US; any
powered boat
 USCG Documentation Number – Only US; >5
net tons
 IMO Number – Assigned by Lloyd’s/Fairplay;
international; passenger ships >100 gross
tons, and cargo ships >300 gross tons;
mandatory from 1996
 Naval Identifiers – eg, PT-109, CV-42, BB-18,
DD-793, D118, etc.
 Lloyd’s numbers, and many more…

16. Unique historical vessel identifiers
 Need an easy way to differentiate between
“Mary,” “Mary,” and “Mary”
 Needs to be unique and unchanging (unlike
name, naval identifier, etc.)
 Identifier itself has no meaning – no
indication within it of size, nationality, etc.
 Identifier is quickly & automatically assigned
 Identification is coordinated with multiple
organizations

17. Creating an identifier
 Could be done through a standards-creation
process, via NISO or another organization
 Or informally, with publicly-defined
guidelines, such as (just as examples):
 Nine-digit number; ddd-ddddd-c (c=check digit)
 Allow individuals to easily request identifiers for
their vessels or their citations
 Need ability to easily combine/split/modify
 User-managed is likely most cost-effective solution

18. Creating an identifier
 Must have buy-in from many groups
 Should be easy to implement
 Should be easy to use; available to many
individuals and resources
 Pre-populate as much as possible, open
editing to all
 Maintain advisory group to address concerns,
disagreements, etc.

19. Defining <ShipIdentifier>
<OtherIdentifiers>
<IdentifierType>
<IdentifierNumber>
<ShipName>
<DateNameStartedInUse>
<DateNameEndedInUse>
<PreviousShipName>
<SubsequentShipName>
<RigType> - defined list of types, & “other”
<VoyageIdentifier> - multiple

20. More <ShipIdentifier>
<MilitaryUsage?> - yes/no/unclear
<Nationality>
<ServiceBranch>
<HullIdentifier>
<VesselMeasurements>
<MeasurementType> - list of options
<MeasurementValue>

21. Defining <VoyageIdentifier>
<ShipIdentifier>
<Captain>
<Crew> - multiple positions, multiple names
<CrewPosition>
<CrewmemberName>
<OtherVoyageIdentifiers>
<OtherVoyageDatabase>
<OtherVoyageDbId>

22. Expanding to other fields
 Makes discovery more manageable
 Makes linking possible
 Use the same concept for other areas of
research, linking everything together
 People
 Places
 Manufactured items
 Artwork
 Everything

23. Thoughts, questions, more?
Thank you –
Peter McCracken
peter@shipindex.org