Digital on a Shoestring: Omeka with AWS

Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary had previously relied on a combination of iTunesU and CD/DVDs to make media content available to students and the wider community, but when Apple announced that they would no longer host our content we began searching for a replacement. The archives had an Omeka server but didn’t have the storage or bandwidth for video. We didn’t want to “Just put it on YouTube” and it quickly became apparent that our relatively high storage requirements would put most of the standard options out of our reach. It was then that I stumbled across a blog post (https://bavatuesdays.com/setting-up-s3-storage-for-omeka/) discussing the AWS adaptor for Omeka Classic. We decided to give it a shot.

The resulting hybrid conventional/cloud hosting requires no on-site hardware and has allowed us to provide users intuitive access to video/audio through HTML5 players and digitized archival material at a fraction of the cost of most of the other platforms. Users no longer need to install a 3rd party program on their device or make a trip to the library.

This presentation will provide an overview of Omeka configuration to work with AWS, AWS-side setup, configuration, and permissions, migration through the Omeka API, budget notifications, lambda scripts for the budget kill switch (or how I learned to stop worrying and have AWS turn itself off before bankrupting my institution), working with large files, theme customizations, creation of a Youtube-style “channel intro” video to summarize the site, and the navigating challenges of caused by the competing needs between library and public relations.