It is a commonly understood fact that archival, bibliographic and curatorial items cannot be accessioned nor catalogued in the same application without sacrificing one item's unique standards for documentation. That fact has now been shattered with the practical, easy to use and multi-faceted MINT application. MINT has understood that as a museum tries to catalogue in detail every individual object, archives although they conduct some item level description – tend to describe their holdings in groups or series. It is clear that archives cannot possibly perform item level descriptions of their holdings. A library on the other hand although they do perform item/detailed book cataloguing, there is a need to strictly conform to the major bibliographic standard known as MARC.

Therefore, how can one application bring these three collections or diverse descriptive focused items?

The answer is MINT.

Providing federated access to information about objects, documents (electronic or physical), archival records, and books is the future for every cultural/educational/research institution. Taking the lead in achieving this goal, MINISIS has created a dynamic product known as MINT (MINISIS Integrator) that is the result of years of accumulated expertise in the archival, bibliographic and museum fields. MINT goes beyond the concept of posthoc integration of data from disparate systems, currently the norm for most federated access solutions, by providing the option to apply multiple descriptive methods to items at the point of ingest. While MINT can be used like other federated systems to simultaneously pull data from bibliographic, object and archival applications, its real power is found in its ability to create the appropriate descriptive records for any object at the time of acquisition. For example, art works acquired as part of an archival collection can be described with the full scope of the CDWA, while still recorded within an EAD compliant archival finding aid. Likewise, bibliographic items that are part of a museum permanent collection can be described with the precise physical accuracy afforded by an industry standard collections management system and simultaneously have a MARC standard bibliographic record. MINT’s fully integrated solution works through a central registration module that seeds records in specialized applications for museum, archival and bibliographic data (M3 and M2A and M2L), by using an assigned “descriptive focus”. The descriptive focus is a validated field in the registration database that indicates an item is fundamentally either: curatorial, archival, bibliographic, or a mixed focus. Administrative and financial control of the item is maintained in the Registration Module.  Physical control is established through the default creation of a collections management record in M3 for all items, regardless of type. If an item warrants archival or bibliographical descriptions, the system will create new records in M2A and/or M2L with basic data supplied from the Registration Module (referred to in MINT documentation a “pushing” the record).

This application was originally created in 2000 and in its first attempt MINT received accreditation via Canadian Heritage Information Network’s accreditation process.

MINT is unique and although many try to copy its design, it is still the leader in SME leader in the notion of the complete, totally integrated solution for cultural entities. 

To view a OPAC from the Historic New Orleans how is using MINT solution.

Click Here to view the Online Public Access for The Historic New Orleans Collection who is currently using the MINT application and accompanying OPAC.