About Kiskemisowin
Learn what Kiskemisowin does and how to use these guides.
Kiskemisowin is an application that helps communities describe and organize archive material, acknowledge contributions and manage access to records.
It brings descriptions and digital files together with information about the people, places, languages and circumstances connected with them. This helps readers understand the material and the responsibilities around using it.
An archive may include oral histories, photographs, documents, audio or video recordings, and descriptions of physical objects kept elsewhere.
Kiskemisowin is in development. These guides introduce the platform, with more practical guidance to be added over time.
Community decisions guide the work
Each community decides how to organize its archive work. People, families and communities connected with particular material may also have knowledge and responsibilities that guide how it is described and shared.
Kiskemisowin supports this work through permissions, review and access settings. It cannot determine who has cultural authority or whether permission to use material has been obtained.
Those decisions remain with the people responsible for the material and the archive.
What a record brings together
An archive record describes material and brings together information that helps people understand it. In Kiskemisowin, a record is called a Cultural Item.
A record can include:
- Digital files, such as images, recordings and documents.
- Credits acknowledging people and their contributions.
- Dates, languages, places and collections.
- Sources and information about where the material came from.
- Rights information, cultural guidance and connections to other records.
One record can bring several files together. It can also describe a physical object without including a digital copy.
You do not need to know every detail before beginning a draft. Record what is known and make uncertainty clear. More knowledge can be added over time.
How descriptions develop
Work begins in a working draft, where people with the necessary permissions prepare a description, attach files and add other information.
When the draft is ready, someone with submission permission sends it for review. A person with review permission can approve it for publication or reject it so the draft can be revised.
Publication does not automatically make a record public. Its access settings determine who can read the published version.
Later corrections and additions can be prepared in a new draft while the existing published record remains available under its access settings. Earlier versions are retained in history.
Using these guides
If you are new to Kiskemisowin, follow the introductory guides in order:
- Community decisions and responsibilities considers how work is shared, whose guidance is needed and how decisions are made.
- Understanding archive records explains how descriptions, files, people and surrounding information fit together.
- How records change explains drafts, review, publication and later corrections.
- Understanding access and sharing explains working permissions, reading access and responsibilities around using material.
If you have a particular task in mind, go straight to a practical guide:
- Acknowledge someone’s contribution.
- Give someone access to work in Admin.
- Choose who can read a record.
You can also use the sidebar or search to find a guide. On smaller screens, open the navigation menu to browse the articles.
The On this page outline helps you move between sections within an article.