Prerequisites for Data Suppliers

CommonsDB is designed specifically for cultural heritage institutions, media archives, and organizations who steward collections of Public Domain or openly licensed digital works. Before beginning the onboarding process, ensure your institution has the appropriate administrative and technical foundations in place to actively manage and stand by your data:

• Structured Metadata: Your catalog data should be available in standard formats like CSV, JSON, or XML to ensure smooth mapping to the registry schema.
• Standardized Open Licensing & Rights Accountability: Assets must be labeled with one of the following open rights statements: the Public Domain Mark (PDM), CC0, CC BY, or CC BY-SA. Crucially, this is not just a technical requirement. By submitting a digitally signed declaration to CommonsDB, your institution is stating publicly and on the permanent record that the provided rights information is accurate. Therefore, participation only makes sense if your organization has robust internal rights clearance and identification processes in place, and is fully willing to stand by the rights information you declare. (For guidance on structuring rights information and data, the Europeana Licensing Framework provides excellent documentation.)

Technical Infrastructure Approaches

Every cultural heritage institution operates with different resources. We recognize that while a national library might have a dedicated software development team, a regional archive might rely on a single collections manager. To accommodate these varying levels of technical capacity, CommonsDB offers two distinct infrastructure pathways for making declarations. You can choose the approach that best aligns with your team's IT expertise and the volume of your digital collections.

Approach 1: The Integrated Workflow

This pathway is designed for institutions that manage massive, continuously updating collections and possess dedicated IT or developer support. By choosing this route, your team will build a direct, automated pipeline between your internal Content Management System (CMS) and the CommonsDB Declaration API.

To execute this, your infrastructure must have the server capacity to run automated ISCC generation scripts, manage custom API requests, and securely handle cryptographic private keys (similar to managing an SSL certificate).

Approach 2: The Declarer Application

We understand that not every institution has the developer resources available to build custom API integrations. If you are managing smaller, static batches of content, or if your collections team needs to work independently of an IT department, this pathway is for you.

This route requires zero API programming. You simply need a computer capable of running a lightweight, local Docker desktop container and the ability to organize your media files and metadata spreadsheets into local folders. The Declarer application provides a user-friendly visual interface that processes your files, generates the required fingerprints, and securely submits your declarations to the registry without requiring you to write a single line of code.