RICHES is an interdisciplinary digital project that partners with multiple academic units at UCF, six Florida universities, and commercial and nonprofit sectors of the community. The project has two goals: 1) to serve as a model for documenting regional history, especially “hidden” history and culture, through an interactive database that draws from multiple repositories and personal collections, and 2) to develop new digital tools for historians. The RICHES Mosaic Interface (RICHES MI) is a graphical, map-driven interface that overlays an Omeka database.
RICHES Mosaic Interface™
The RICHES Mosaic Interface™ (RICHES MI), the interactive website and database of Central Florida’s history. The RICHES™ (Regional Initiative for Collecting the History, Experiences, and Stories) of Central Florida project has been in operation since Fall 2010.
The mission of RICHES MI is to to enable users to Search the database using natural language, tags, topics, and categories to maximize their search results; Analyze saved items using the innovative Bookbag tool, and apply the Connections feature to discover related historical items based on a RICHES-developed algorithm; Visualize through digital exhibits, timelines, map overlays, and visualizations.
RICHES MI was developed using well known tools, including Google™ Maps and Omeka. As part of public history programming, the RICHES staff and project coordinators host community and academic workshops to familiarize the public the RICHES MI and to demonstrate the process for digitizing and uploading materials through the “Add Your Story” feature. RICHES MI contains over 4000 digital items for users to explore.
Audience
The RICHES Mosaic Interface™ (RICHES MI), serves four audiences, general users interested in the region; scholars conducting research in cultural, social, diversity, economic, political, and environmental history; urban planners seeking to understand regional development and; K-12 students studying a variety of topics ranging from art to economics and history.
Funded in part by:
