Frequently Asked Questions

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What is NJVid?
What kinds of material does NJVid provide acess to?
What kind of content can I contribute to NJVid
Which institutions can participate in NJVid?
What are some of the components and features of NJVid?
What is unique about NJVid?
Why NJVid?
What tape and digital formats can NJVid accept?
What technology does NJVid run on?
Where can I learn more about NJVid?

What is NJVid?

A statewide video portal & repository that provides a common online platform for presentation, storage and archiving of digital works (e.g. digital video) that educate and enlighten their audiences. Rights and access management are the responsibility of the providing entity

For more information, read NJVid In-Depth [Ms Word]

What kind of material does NJVid provide access to?
Three collections, all with the aim of educating and enlightening their audience:
Locally-owned – Material that is unique to your institution or that can be viewed by all audiences (no access restrictions)
Commercial – Commercially licensed or distributed material (permission restricted)
Learning-on-Demand – Includes class and guest lectures & other non-commercial material intended for a specific audience (permission restricted)
What kind of content can I contribute to NJVid?
Any non-promotional content that educates and/or enlightens your audience
Which institutions can participate in NJVid?
All educational and cultural institutions throughout New Jersey, including K-20, libraries, museums and archives
What are some of the components and features of NJVid?
Video 1: Why is it noteworthy that NJVid uses common open source technology?
Video 2: What are the three collections of NJVid?
Video 3: How will users be able to documents their videos on NJVid?
What is unique about NJVid?
  • Library infrastructure
  • Preservation-quality management and archiving of your digital content
  • Access protection of your content through advanced authentication and authorization
  • Annotation and segmenting tools
  • Open source technology supported and operated by NJEDge.Net, New Jersey’s nonprofit technology consortium, and Rutgers University, a statewide leader of digital resources
    • What is unique about NJVid?
  • Versatile – NJVid provides online distribution for all of your videos, including openly-accessible, locally-owned material, commercial content, and locally-recorded material, such as class lectures and guest speakers – all in one resource
  • No corporate interests – NJVid is a nonprofit resource intended to aid New Jersey’s educational and cultural institutions and their patrons; not to make a profit. It is being built by the same institutions it serves
  • Open source – NJVid runs on common open source software and architecture and is hosted by NJEDge.Net, New Jersey’s non-profit technology consortium
  • Encoding, ingestion and data management – Conducted at Rutgers University, the State University of New Jersey, a statewide leader of digital resources, including the acclaimed New Jersey Digital Highway
  • Provides consortial advantages – Through NJVid, institutions with the same resources can partner to negotiate lower licenses for commercial material
  • Hardware, software and personnel cost savings – NJVid greatly absorbs the costs of running and maintaining a streaming server, digital asset database and technical personnel
  • Synchronizes with other resources – Since NJVid runs on the same technology as many other resources, such as the New Jersey Digital Highway (http://www.njdigitalhighway.org), it can be paired with these resources so that end-users can search across them simultaneously. As a result, NJVid eliminates the need for creating an additional online video portal at your institution
  • Resource sharing – Video sharing has grown by leaps and bounds. NJVid makes it easier for libraries and educational and cultural institutions to share their holdings with their patrons and each other
  • Shared cataloging – NJVid makes it easy for institutions to copy catalog one another’s openly-accessible material
  • Simultaneous uploads to other resources – You can simultaneously upload videos to NJVid and other resources such as iTunes U
  • Customization – NJVid enables you to segment your videos into learning objects, as well as annotate and transcribe them
  • Flexibility of distribution – You can decide whether to stream your resources or make them available for download so that your patrons can remix and reuse them
  • Relevancy of distribution methods – NJVid offers resources in the popular QuickTime and Flash-enabled video formats, and is committed to updating its distribution formats as they evolve
  • Thorough metadata – NJVid provides for comprehensive descriptive, source, technical and rights metadata via the METS standard to ensure your resources are thoroughly documented and retrievable. Preset templates are available to save time and effort
  • Comprehensive documentation – NJVid will help your institution assess the rights status of your resources through exemplar documentation and face-to-face assistance. You can upload your own rights documentation certifying your legal right and permission to distribute your resources online
  • Safe and secure, but still easy to use – With authentication and authorization safeguards, NJVid prevents unauthorized access to your resources. In addition, NJVid is available on all computer platforms, ensuring your patrons have a seamless experience instead of encountering frustrating computer-based inoperability
  • Library Infrastructure with federated identity management – Access restrictions are based on local institutional standards. There is no need to create new usernames and passwords for your patrons
  • Provides remote 24/7 access – Video content is accessible around the clock to aid distance education
  • Integration into course management systems – Videos can be accessed through a variety of course management systems so that online teaching & learning resources are available wherever students go
  • A sustained resource – NJVid was conceived to provide long-term preservation of your digital assets. This applies not only to the preservation of your digital video content but to the NJVid resource as well. Since NJVid is publicly funded, there is no threat of corporate takeover
  • Friendly and effective training – NJVid will provide training to help you record and upload your own resources
  • Active participation by all – Institutions throughout the state are invited to participate in the ongoing development process
    • What tape and digital formats can NJVid accept?
    All digital file formats without Digital Rights Management attached are acceptable, as are VHS, S-VHS, mini-DV and DVD. We will announce support for additional analog tape formats when ready.
    What technology does NJVid run on?
    • Matrox Axio Encoder – used to digitize and ingest your physical material
      • Creates uncompressed AVI master file for preservation purposes
      • Streaming protocol is QuickTime H.264
      • Progressive download protocol is Flash 9 video
      • 15-20 fps, 640 x 480 video resolution, 384 - 512 kb/s data rate
    • Fedora Repository – storage and management of your digital content
      http://www.fedora-commons.org
    • Workflow Management System – metadata input and management
    • Shibboleth – authentication and authorization software used to administer access restrictions to your content http://shibboleth.internet2.edu
    • Darwin Streaming Server – streams your digital content http://developer.apple.com/opensource/server/streaming/index.html
    Where can I learn more about NJVid?

    See the Contact Us page.

    Please continue to explore our Web site for thorough documentation about NJVid, including necessary and sample forms, descriptions of procedures and up-to-date development announcements