After more than 2 years of development and enhancements, we are nearing the end of our PA-SHARE 2.0 project. As part of the final set of improvements, we want to highlight significant changes to the Archaeological Resource artifacts.
PA SHPO’s work to improve this area of our archaeological data included extensive review of the existing structure and collaboration with the Archaeology Curation staff to identify new artifact categories and type groupings to better capture this important data. As a reminder, archaeological information in PA-SHARE is restricted to users who individually qualify for archaeological privileges.
The improvements can be broken into three groups: data entry, data structure, and search. Each improvement is detailed below.
Data Entry
This enhancement streamlines the artifact data entry into a single data entry screen that includes the artifact category, type and material(s). Previously, the data entry screen had users enter the artifact category and type first. Users would then have to reselect each entry to add appropriate materials and counts. This method of data entry was confusing and resulted in a loss of data.
The new single-entry form for adding artifact records.
Additionally, to help make data entry faster and easier, PA-SHARE now uses something called cascading dropdowns. This means that when you pick a choice from one list, it helps narrow down the options in the next list. For example, when you choose an artifact category, the artifact type list will only show the types that match that category. The same thing happens when you pick a material group — the material list will only show materials that belong to that group.
The picture above showcases one example of how selecting an Artifact Category will now dynamically filter for Artifact Types.
Materials are now split into Material Groups and Artifact Materials. Selecting the overall Material group will filter the corresponding artifact materials list. Quantities should be added as appropriate.
Data Structure and Conversion
As touched on in the data entry section, a second large component of this work included reviewing the data structure and values used for artifact recordation and updating these to be more compatible with the Archaeology Curation Section’s standards as well as more reflective of current trends and terminology for artifacts. This conversion effort also standardized legacy data that was unsearchable through the Search interface in PA-SHARE.
With the new structure, we are emphasizing the physical description of the artifacts. This will allow for more cross comparison of sites across the Commonwealth.
To illustrate this work, here are screenshots of the previous data entry and updated data entry.
The previous data structure organized information around the “diagnostic artifact” which left the data ambiguous as to whether the diagnostic represented the entire artifact category or was a single diagnostic amongst other types. In the glass example above, we see a blown bottle base as the diagnostic artifact of an assemblage of 50 glass fragments categorized as pieces of alcohol bottles. In the ceramic examples, the artifacts are categorized by diagnostic (creamware and redware) without any other information given.
With the new data structure, the glass fragments are still identified as alcohol bottles but there is no confusion around the bottle base. With ceramics, in addition to the material types, the distinction as a tableware or a food storage jar is separated from the material so that a researcher could better compare tableware assemblages across sites.
Search
Archaeological artifact search functionality has been updated to match the updates to the data structure/values and incorporates the cascading dropdowns. A box has also been added to visually distinguish the different artifact searches available within the Advanced Search options. Tool tips have also been added to highlight the changes and explain search functionality.
Searching by artifact category, types, and materials is available under the Advanced Search after selecting Archaeological Resource as the resource type.
As always, if you have any questions or problems with PA-SHARE, please contact the Help Desk at pashare@pa.gov.
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