National Archives tackles Microsoft legacy

The National Archives has teamed up with Microsoft to solve the problem of reading, managing and making accessible data in legacy Microsoft formats that can no longer be read by recent versions of the company's software.

The National Archives estimates it has many terabytes in such formats, which would otherwise risk being lost in what Microsoft admits would be 'a digital dark age'.

Microsoft has provided the National Archives with its Virtual PC 2007 software, which allows any previous versions of Windows and Office to be used side by side on a single PC. 

One of the major challenges for archiving digital material is older material becoming inaccessible as the software they were created on becomes obsolete.

At the announcement of the tie-up, Gordon Frazer, managing director of Microsoft UK, said: "There is a real danger of creating a new digital dark age."

The National Archives is the UK government's official archive and contains around 900 years of historical material. It estimates to have 580 terabytes of data in formats no longer commercially available.

Natalie Ceeney, chief executive of the National Archives, said: "Public accountability is enshrined in the way we work. We can't afford to let today's digital assets disappear."

She added: "We cannot tackle this issue alone. We don't claim to be leading-edge technologists and that's where Microsoft comes in."

Using the technology, the National Archives will also be able to convert material into open file formats which can be accessed via more current software.

As part of a memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the National Archives and Microsoft, there will be further collaboration around digital preservation, with the company promising to bear archival issues in mind when developing future versions of its software.

However, Microsoft has already run into controversy with its Open XML file format — used on its latest software — which it claims is a universal open standard. It is not directly compatible with the Open Document Format, a standard created by a cross-industry consortium, and critics claim that it is not truly open. "If it were, Microsoft wouldn't need to make Novell and Xandros and Linspire sign NDAs and then write translators for them," wrote Pamela Jones, editor of the Groklaw blog.