A Use Case Lens on Digital Cultural Heritage

Purpose. Our objective was to explore the practices around creating and analysing use cases related to digital cultural heritage. Our review of the literature unveiled substantial deviation in the depth and coverage of use cases and revealed the need for a more robust and consistent approach to creating use cases in a digital cultural heritage context. Consequently, we developed a framework to inform the development of use cases. This can support ongoing efforts to expand the use of eInfrastructures in the digital cultural heritage domain as a first step.

Design/methodology/approach. Our research design combines desk research of existing literature and analysis of examples of use cases documented in digital cultural heritage projects. We examine the challenges and inconsistencies in the current practice of use case production in digital cultural heritage. Finally, we synthesize a systematic process to generate use cases which is illustrated by five example use cases within the digital cultural heritage context.

Findings. We discovered that the current practice of use case design and creation in the domain of digital cultural heritage is highly inconsistent. Our analysis of issues enabled us to propose a more systematic approach to developing use cases in digital cultural heritage space, which we had approbated by developing five use cases which benefit from the use of eInfrastructures.

Originality. Our paper offers an original methodology for capturing use cases in digital cultural heritage that could also be generalised to other contexts.

Research limitations/implications. We focused on the digital cultural heritage domain, reflecting on the specific communication needs of users within this area. Our findings and methodology may be applicable to other domains, but we have not explored these. More specifically, our work draws on the development of five specific use cases involving user engagement with a specific eInfrastructure. Whilst we argue that these cases provide useful insights in use case development in general, they are not generalisable to cover all uses.

Practical implications. The practical implications of improving the quality and consistency of use cases in digital cultural heritage are substantial. Use cases serve as tools to: (i) describe the behaviour of systems, in this case, eInfrastructures under development, such as the European Cloud for Heritage Open Science (ECCCH) and the European Data Space for Cultural Heritage (DS4CH); (ii) define the processes of communication with users and HPCs; (iii) keep the communities behind eInfrastructures aligned with their aspirations. We developed a framework to empower practical developments in modern eInfrastructures by means of a more consistent use case creation practice.

Social implications. Users of eInfrastructures in digital cultural heritage are diverse, they include researchers, educators, general citizens, and other types or categories. By offering improved means to capture and represent an increasing diversity of user perspectives to using eInfrastructures, our work contributes to the wider use and reuse of digital content in society.

Our work impacts directly such infrastructures and communities as the International GLAM Labs Community, AI for Libraries, Archives, and Museums (AI4LAM) and Time Machine Organisation (TMO). This work advances the use of data research infrastructures within communities of researchers, scholars, students, GLAM (Galleries, Libraries, Archives, and Museums) institutions, and Cultural Heritage and Cultural and Creative Industries (CCIs).