The Finding Aids collection is indexed using Open Text's pat50 SGML aware search engine. The user may search the full text of the findings by using a query form on the Web or browse a list of all finding aids available. Queries are sent to a CGI script which retrieves the information from the database using pat50 and then processes the results on-the-fly to display them in HTML. There is no accommodation for displaying native SGML at this point.
Most of the finding aids from both repositories are in some electronic form. Long container lists are partially encoded using a perl script. The remainder of the finding aid is put into a standard template. Most finding aids are currently being prepared by students from the University of Pittsburgh School of Information Sciences. We use Emacs with psgml and Jade tools on our NT workstations. We are currently in the final phase of testing a web-based data entry form for collection level encoding so that those unfamiliar with EAD can automatically encode new finding aids.