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The Victorian Electronic Records Strategy (VERS)
The documents in this menu contain the PROV Standard 'Management of Electronic Records (PROS 99/007)', also known as the VERS Standard.
Why have a Standard?
The Victorian Government is increasingly doing business electronically. Much of the digital information created in the course of this business is important and must be kept for legal, accountability or historical reasons.
The Victorian Electronic Records Strategy has been developed by Public Record Office Victoria to preserve the electronic records of the state for the long term.
The first version of the Standard was launched on 26 April 2000 by the Hon. John Brumby, MP, Minister for State and Regional Development. The revised version of the Standard was launched on 31 July 2003 by the Hon. John Thwaites, MP, Minister for Victorian Communties.
General Information
Under Section 12 of the Public Records Act 1973, Public Record Office Victoria (PROV) has the ability to "establish standards for the efficient management of public records" in the state of Victoria.
Under other provisions of the Public Records Act PROV and public offices share responsibility for the management of records in all formats and, where appropriate, their long term preservation. In order to assist public offices to meet their responsibilities under the Act, PROV publishes Standards for the management of public records. These include Standards for the creation and maintenance, management, destruction and transfer of public records. They apply equally to records in all formats, including electronic records.
Version 2.0
Click here to view version 2.
Version 2.0 of the VERS Standard was released in July
2003. It superseded Version 1
Errata to the VERS Standard
Version 2 PDF
(1.69 MB)
This document contains minor changes and clarifications
to all section of the VERS Standard Version 2.0 including the Specifications
and the Advice.
The major differences between Version 1 and Version 2.0 of the VERS Standard are that Version 2.0:
- Focusses on the preservation requirements of an electronic recordkeeping system, rather than the general requirements of such a system.
- Provides several optional extensions to Version 1.
- Corrects a small number of errors in Version 1.
- Has been restructed to aid understanding and implementation of the Standard.
- Provides a large amount of explanatory material to help users of the standard understand how to apply the standard.
The relationship between Version 2.0 of the VERS Standard, the Specifications that support this Standard, and the Introduction and Advices that explain VERS is shown below.
These documents have the following purposes:
- Management of Electronic Records. This document is the Standard itself and is primarily concerned with conformance. The technical requirements of the Standard are contained in five Specifications.
- Introduction to VERS. This document provides background information on the goals and the VERS approach to preservation. Nothing in this document imposes any requirements on agencies.
- Specifications. These five documents provide the technical requirements that support the Standard. Agencies must conform to the mandatory requirements of the specifications, must conform to the conditional requirements of the specifications if the appropriate conditions are satisfied, and may conform to the optional requirements. Some optional requirements are strongly recommended and these are noted as such.
The five Specifications are:
- Specification 1: System Requirements for Preserving Electronic Records. This document specifies the overall functions that a recordkeeping system must perform to preserve electronic records for a substantial period.
- Specification 2: VERS Metadata Scheme. This document specifies the metadata that a recordkeeping system must hold to conform to VERS.
- Specification 3: VERS Standard Electronic Record Format. This document contains the technical definition of the VERS Encapsulated Object (VEO) format; the mandatory long-term format for records.
- Specification 4: VERS Long-term Preservation Formats. This document lists the data formats that PROV accepts as suitable for representing documents for a significant period.
- Specification 5: Export of Electronic Records to PROV. This document lists the approved media and mechanisms by which PROV will accept an export of electronic records.
- Advices. These six documents provide background information, explanatory material, and examples in support of the Standard and associated Specifications. None of the information in the Advices imposes any requirement on agencies.
Relationship between Specifications. A second view of the relationship between the five Specifications of Version 2.0 is shown in the following diagram:
Specification 1 (System Requirements for Preserving Electronic Records) details the overall requirements on a recordkeeping system for preserving electronic records over a significant period. Amongst other requirements, the recordkeeping system must be capable of exporting the records in a standardised format.
The overall features of this standardised format are defined in Specification 3 (VERS Standard Electronic Record Format), but some details are defined in two other Specifications. Specification 2 (VERS Metadata Scheme) defines the meaning and allowed values of the metadata that appears in a record. Specification 4 (VERS Long-term Preservation Formats) defines the formats in which the record content must be expressed.
Specification 5 (Export of Electronic Records to PROV) defines the mechanisms by which records are exported to PROV.
Relation to Version 1 of this Standard. This version of the VERS Standard completely replaces Version 1 of the Standard. Version 2 is identical in its base requirements, but makes those requirements clearer and more explicit. It also contains a number of conditional and optional extensions to Version 1.
Click here
to view version 2.
Click here
to retrieve the current version of the VERS DTD.
Version 1
Click here to view version 1.
Version 1 of the VERS Standard was released in April 2000. It has now been superseded by Version 2.0.
The major differences between Version 1 and Version 2.0 of the VERS Standard are that Version 2.0:
- Focusses on the preservation requirements of an electronic recordkeeping system, rather than the general requirements of such a system
- Provides several optional extensions to Version 1
- Corrects a small number of errors in Version 1
- Has been restructed to aid understanding and implementation of the Standard
- Provides a large amount of explanatory material to help users of the standard understand how to apply the standard
The relationship between Version 1 of the VERS Standard and the Specifications that support this standard is shown below.
These documents have the following purposes:
- Management of Electronic Records. This document is the Standard itself and is primarily concerned with conformance. The technical requirements of Version1.0 of the Standard are contained in three Specifications.
- Specifications. These three documents provide the technical requirements that support the Standard. Agencies must conform to the mandatory requirements of the specifications, must conform to the conditional requirements of the specifications if the appropriate conditions are satisfied, and may conform to the optional requirements. Some optional requirements are strongly recommended and these are noted as such.
The three Specifications are:
- Specification 1: System Requirements for Preserving Electronic Records. This document specifies the overall functions that a recordkeeping system must perform to preserve electronic records for a substantial period.
- Specification 2: VERS Metadata Scheme. This document specifies the metadata that a recordkeeping system must hold to conform to VERS.
- Specification 3: VERS Standard Electronic Record Format. This document contains the technical definition of the VERS Encapsulated Object (VEO) format; the mandatory long-term format for records.
Click here to view version 1.
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