Talk:Archival research

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 28 August 2018 and 11 December 2018. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Baaschido.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 17:31, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Internet Archiving section
I am not sure if the people who wrote it understands that the servers that make up the Internet use limited storage devices, many of them based magnetic storage such as hard drives. Writing “There is no limit to how much information one can store online in their archive” seems also very misleading. The Internet’s storage capacity only extends as far as how much the interconnected servers provide you. 80.212.129.198 (talk) 16:47, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Rewriting required
Sometimes, when one's browsing randomly on wikipedia, one comes across an article that is so riddled with error, so mistaken in its underlying assumptions, and which so fails to address its supposed subject matter, that it fairly takes one's breath way. This is one of those times. I don't know whether to laugh or weep. It's a real shame, because this is a topic that deserves an article, and I can see that a fair amount of work's gone into it. But, to my mind, at least 60% of what's there needs to be ditched, and a lot of more fundamental information added about what archives are, what their value is to the researcher in different disciplines and fields, and the methodologies of using them. I just haven't got the energy at the moment, so I've contented myself with adding a few extra categories, and adding the article to WikiProject History, in the hope that that brings it to the attention of someone with more stamina and enthusiasm than me. GrindtXX (talk) 17:26, 15 October 2012 (UTC)


 * I've now made a start. But there's a long way to go. GrindtXX (talk) 02:02, 6 March 2013 (UTC)

External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20150218205915/http://ukadoptionregister.org/ to http://www.ukadoptionregister.org

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Introduction Paragraph
Might the second paragraph of the introduction ("Archival research is generally more complex and time-consuming...") be better in its own section in the body of the article since it is describing some of the ways to do "archival research"? Baaschido (talk) 15:23, 19 October 2018 (UTC)

American Archives month
This should have it's own page, possibly as part of a page on promotional activities such as #askanarchivist on twitter. Morethangrass (talk) 04:29, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

Peer Review
This topic is very interesting! It was especially interesting reading the history of the archives! You've done a great job so far with an extensive subject!

In the 2nd paragraph, explaining why archives may be closed to the public, you may want to include the fact that sometimes donors restrict the release date of their documents when they are donated.

In the 3rd paragraph, along with possible uses of archives, the addition of Genealogy, as this have become quite popular.

For types of archives, the addition of corporate archives, eg. Coca Cola and the purpose of these, eg. nostalgia, promotional, and legal.

What do you think of adding a section listing professional archival organizations? eg. SAA?

Overall great job! It's quite a big subject to tackle! 18:53, 27 October 2018 (UTC) Historydet (talk) 18:54, 27 October 2018 (UTC)

Archival Science category
I am changing this page back from the archival science category, as it is about archival research for historians, rather than the practice of public programs and outreach, which would be appropriate.

As per the archival science page, that category is aimed at professional archival practice. Morethangrass (talk) 03:02, 30 December 2018 (UTC)