Final Call for Comments: Revision of Encoded Archival Description

The Technical Subcommittee on Encoded Archival Standards (TS-EAS) is pleased to release the second draft of Encoded Archival Description (EAD) 4.0 for public review and comment.

This version includes additionally proposed changes based on suggestions and comments received from the community during the first call for comments, which ran between April and July 2024. The subcommittee would like to thank those who contributed to the review with their comments and invites all EAD users around the world to have another look at the proposed EAD 4.0 draft 0.2 with a focus on these additional changes. The deadline for comments in this round is Friday, 16 May 2025.

Following the first call for comments, TS-EAS met for a two-day hybrid meeting in Chicago alongside the Annual Meeting of the Society of American Archivist (SAA) in August 2024 to review the feedback received and to discuss the potential implementation of what was suggested as well as the impact of those suggestions on other elements and attributes if applicable. This was followed up and extended during the monthly meetings between October 2024 and February 2025 resulting in EAD 4.0 draft 0.2.

In these conversations, TS-EAS continued applying its design principles (https://github.com/SAA-SDT/TS-EAS-subteam-notes/wiki/Design-Principles/), introduced in 2021 as a general framework, and following the main areas identified as being of importance for the current major revision of EAD:

• Evaluating EAD’s relation to other standards often used in connection with EAD; this includes but is not restricted to
  • Aligning with EAC-CPF where useful, and
  • Considering the impact of Records in Contexts (RiC) replacing the existing ICA standards such as the General International Standard Archival Description (ISAD(G));
• Enabling more support for the use of Linked Open (Usable) Data with EAD; this picks up on relevant approaches introduced by EAC-CPF 2.0 and includes
  • Reviewing EAD’s approach to encoding relation(ship)s to other entities;
• Simplifying where possible, e.g. by
  • Revising the terminology used in the names of elements and attributes, and
  • Aligning the encoding options of elements that include information about the same “things” such as agents or functions;
• Concentrating on encoding the descriptive archival information rather than encoding how this information is to be displayed.

Currently available files and documentation

• Editorial on suggested changes in EAD 4.0 draft 0.2 (in comparison to EAD 4.0 draft 0.1 as published in April 2024)
• EAD Schema 4.0 draft 0.2 (xsd, rng, nvdl, schematron)
• EAD 4.0 Tag Library draft 0.2 (pdf)
• Example files in EAD 4.0 draft 0.2 (focus on additional changes)
• Additionally, we recommend the following for an overview of EAD 4.0 more generally:
  • Benefits of EAD 4.0 Infograph
  • The recordings of the Open Sessions Series as part of the first call for comments (please note that details to some elements and attributes presented during these sessions might have changed in draft 0.2)
    • 1st Open Session, 24 April 2024
    • 2nd Open Session, 22 May 2024
    • 3rd Open Session, 18 June 2024
    • 4th Open Session, 9 July 2024

All information relevant to the major revision on the TS-EAS GitHub page, where we will continuously add more documentation throughout the call for comments phase.

Current timeline

• Until 16 May: Final Call for comments open
• Throughout April to July 2025: TS-EAS to discuss comments and change requests and to decide on their implementation
• Autumn 2025: Submission to SAA’s Standards Committee

To give comments on the proposed changes, please contribute directly in GitHub at https://github.com/SAA-SDT/eas-schemas/issues or via the TS-EAS webform (https://www2.archivists.org/standards/TS-EAS-report-an-issue). For more information on how to do this, see the “How to Submit a Bug Report or Feature Request for EAD and EAC-CPF tutorial” (https://github.com/SAA-SDT/TS-EAS-subteam-notes/wiki/Submitting-an-Issue-or-Feature-Request).

Alternatively, you can also send an email to ts-eas@archivists.org with a brief description and the rationale for the proposed change.

To ensure that the revision process is as open as possible, all comments must be attributable to named individuals and affiliated organizations where appropriate. Anonymous responses will not be considered. All change proposals will be made publicly available via GitHub. E-mail addresses are requested so that we may contact respondents for clarification. We will only use your e-mail addresses in the specific context of the EAD revision and the feedback you have provided.