Digitization of LTSA Vault Records

Digitization is the process of converting analogue records (e.g. paper, linen, leather-bound books, mylar, or microfilm) into a digital format. Digitization prolongs the life of vault records which reduces handling and improves accuracy.

Digitization improves the accessibility and retrieval of vault records and supports the adoption of advanced technologies including automation, geolocation and natural language processing and machine learning based on optical character recognition. Vault records refer to thousands of land and survey documents stored in two climate-controlled areas collectively referred to as the vault.

LTSA works to ensure its digitized vault records represent the original analogue source record with authority and remain trustworthy over time. Producing trustworthy digitized records requires planning, preparation, metadata, quality assurance, file management, digital preservation, and databases for locating, searching and displaying records and information about them.

Every day, vault records are indexed, digitized and made available through an LTSA online account or an on-site digitized image repository called DocuWare. Many digitized images of Surveyor General records are available through Tantalis GATOR, the Government Access Tool for Online Retrieval.

A selection of Surveyor General vault records are freely available through two University of Victoria Libraries Digital Collections: Early British Columbia Maps and Indian Reserve Maps.