6.1.7 Defining the Digital Object

6.1.7.1 The audio file is only one part of the information that is to be preserved. The Reference Model for an Open Archival Information System (OAIS) identifies four parts to the digital object, described by them as the information package. These are the content information and the preservation description information, which are packaged together with packaging information, and which is discoverable by virtue of the descriptive information.

6.1.7.2 Though the information may be distributed across the storage system, it is well to remember that the conceptual package is the audio information, the ability to replay that audio, to know its provenance and to describe and find it. There may also be critical relationships between the one audio file and others in the collection, and these relationships are important to the use of the material and so must also be preserved.