Register Your Collection for Discovery via OurOntario.ca


Hello colleagues

OurOntario.ca is an online resource discovery tool - a portal to Ontario's digital collections (audio, video, image and text files) about Ontario history, heritage and culture. Search results from OurOntario.ca points to the digital collections of libraries, archives, museums, historical societies, women's institutes, and other content providers on contributing member's websites.

If your organization/institution has digital resources or is planning to digitize collections let us assist you in bringing users to your content via the OurOntario.ca meta-search. There are a variety of ways that your digital content can be discovered through the portal:

  • For existing, complete digital collections in which each digital object has a separate URL and metadata (catalogue) record, we suggest importing the existing records into the Our Ontario index so that each object can be discovered through the portal.

  • For existing, complete digital collections in which individual objects are not identified with unique URLs, we can add a link to your Collection home page through the portal (please complete the Collections via OurOntario.ca Survey).

  • What's the difference between importing records and linking to a collection? For example: University of Toronto: Anatomia 1522-1867: Anatomical Plates from the Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library is an Imported Collection and the Fort Erie Public Library has three Linked Collections.

  • To create a new digital collection, the VITA toolkit offers contributors a free user-friendly software package for creating digital objects, record management, hosting, and a customizable web site for collection display.

  • If you need a user-friendly record creation and editing tool, it is possible to transfer the existing collection metadata (catalogue) records into the Our Ontario web based toolkit, supplying your organization/institution with software, hosting and a customizable site for displaying your collection online (e.g. Whitby Images).

Let us help you determine what the best choice is for your organization/institution by telling us about your digital content.

This online registry form takes approximately 5 minutes to complete. We realize that some legacy documentation may not contain answers to some of our questions, but please provide as much information as possible.

Once you submit the survey, we will review the information and contact you for a follow-up discussion.

If you have any questions or comments about this form, please do not hesitate to contact
Jess Posgate, Our Ontario Project Coordinator, jposgate@ourontario.ca or by phone 1-888-537-1377 x.38.

Thank you.