managing electronic records in governmental bodies - National ...

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Insects and rodents once attracted to a records storage area may start eating the
records, so:
• do not eat in storage areas
• keep surfaces (floors, tops of shelves) clean
• bait regularly for rodents and fumigate annually for insects.
Insect pest strips can be used as localized insect deterrents. However, the strips
should not come into direct contact with individual items.
7. Maintenance of equipment
The information held on optical disks can only be processed or read by mechanical
means, therefore it is essential that equipment is maintained in good condition –
poorly maintained equipment may actually cause damage as it processes. To
ensure maximum equipment life and to minimize playback problems, optical disk
equipment should only be operated in a low-dust environment. Equipment should
also be regularly wiped over with a slightly damp cloth to avoid dust build-up. Other
maintenance instructions provided by equipment manufacturers should be followed.
8. Reformatting and migration
Long-term preservation of optical disk media is always affected by two major factors:
the instability of the media, and the likelihood of technological obsolescence. Even if
optical disk made today are in excellent conditions in 30 years time, the machines
required to play them may have been superseded. Predictions made about the life
expectancy of optical disk media become irrelevant if equipment and software is not
available to ensure that information is accessible.
The main prospect for long-term retention of information on optical disks seems to
be in regular copying or data migration. This entails copying the information on the
disk to a fresh WORM or rewritable disk or to another format such as digital tape (or
other new technology formats that may be developed). If this is done regularly then
the information should survive indefinitely.