Judit Makai - Gábor Veres

Ministry of Cultural Heritage

The effective legislation allows exclusively hard copy inventory for national museums. At the same time several museums use computer programs recording the required data, sometimes with additional information. Certainly, in accordance with the current regulations, these museums also use the hard copy inventories.

In May 2001, the MCH (Ministry of Cultural Heritage) launched a project with the contribution of Department for Public Collections and IT Department involving external museologists and IT experts, aimed at finding a way for museums to use official computerized inventories.

1. Amending the MCH ministerial decree about the inventory regulations for museums

2. Establishing standards and recommendations for the development of new IT systems and modification of existing ones according to the above decree.

3. Workout a system flowchart and develop a computerized inventory system based on the order, coordinated by the Ministry.

- allows both traditional (hard copy) and computerized inventories

- in the case of computerized inventory system annual printing and validation of inventories is required

- the programmes developed by the museums need auditing before official use

- museums can build up their own index lists

- etc.

The presentation is about the decree draft and the project’s next steps.