«Vicentino21» and NIE-INE. An Unfortunately Much Too Short Cooperation

Every end is also a beginning. This admittedly very hackneyed phrase describes the relationship between “Vicentino21” and NIE-INE quite well. NIE-INE stands for “National Infrastructure for Editions” and is a project supported by swissuniversities. Its aim is to create a comprehensive work and publication platform for Swiss editions. 

For more than four years, the task of NIE-INE has been to support edition projects in each of their phases and to develop or promote products that allow the most sustainable use of the data and research results possible, which can also be used by future projects. Particularly noteworthy are the work and publication platform inseri (https://github.com/nie-ine/inseri), which was developed within the framework of NIE-INE, and the Semantic Web Technology (http://e-editiones.ch), which allows for extensive linking of any form of knowledge. However, the past tense would already be appropriate at this point, as NIE-INE ends on 31 December 2020.

Now the meaning of the introductory sentence also becomes clear: While NIE-INE was busy closing its affairs last year, “Vicentino21” was in the process of being built. While on the one hand negotiations were underway on data archiving, on the other hand a first data model had to be created.

In between there was me, working both in the organisation of NIE-INE and as tool coordinator for “Vicentino21”. A greater discrepancy is hardly imaginable and I must say that the balancing act was not always easy for me. I am all the more pleased that NIE-INE was able to set up an eXist-db instance with TEI publisher for “Vicentino21”, which will continue to be used in the future. (Details will probably be reported in more detail later here). While NIE-INE now definitely ends, work on “Vicentino21” can really start. I am curious how this great project will develop.

www.nie-ine.ch (The website will be online until April 2021)