AUREXUS unveils MEDUSA, its interactive automated Conversion Platform for Archives and... -- NEW ORLEANS, Aug. 19, 2013 /PRNewswire-iReach/ -- NEW ORLEANS, Aug. 19, 2013 /PRNewswire-iReach/ -- New Orleans SAA Conference Archives 2013 Today, AureXus, a Conversion Specialist for libraries and archives revealed its online conversion platform to convert legacy documents, library cards, finding aids and rare books. Once they are digitized, the working images of the finding aids or library cards or pages of rare books are accessible online to the Subject Matter Experts. The SME can then review the content and check the OCR results for possible errors. The interactive platform lets specialists in many different countries intervene on the projects to enter the correct data and correct the possible recognition mistakes. This method of work distribution enables AureXus to address multiple languages projects with multiple foreign characters that could not otherwise be solved by local staff. With the Medusa platform, we can leverage the expertise of language specialists around the world, we can travel through distance and time to reach a specialist of Russian or Persian language for example, or to a Middle Age or Renaissance expert who can easily and accurately resolve difficulties that will be minor to them, but often impossible to resolve for a non-specialist: says Thierry Leger, President of the Vancouver-based AureXus. In addition to the conversion of images and data to digital content, Medusa enables automatic harvesting of pre-existing library records. Valuable time is thus saved and accuracy is gained. Medusa uses the data from OCR or entered by the specialist to check against a number of predetermined data bases, such as WorldCat or LOC, to check if identical or similar records are pre-existing. The operator can then select to harvest the existing record totally or partially, edit it or, create a new one. In some cases, an exception can automatically be sent to the library customer who will use MEDUSA online to immediately resolve record creation or harvesting anomalies. Medusa even helps optimize the physical access to books or documents for verification of records with the documents in hand by the customers, by sorting the records in a logical order such as physical proximity of identical topics. Medusa provides automated or semi-automated double removal to allow the customers to match related or identical records. Finally, MEDUSA performs automated encoding of MEDATA in XML EAD or MARC format or provides other METS format such as Dublin Core. The platform is currently at work on several AureXus projects such as the French National Library Cyrillic conversion project. Libraries and archives have done the easy work of converting their easy catalogues. Now the projects that have to be processed are the more complex ones with a mix of foreign languages, foreign characters, or very old hand writing. That is where MEDUSA shows its versatility and full capacity," adds Thierry Leger. The company has many prestigious customers such as the United Nations, the Rockefeller Center, French National Library (BnF), the Northwest Digital Archives, the Historical Archives of Bordeaux, many Departmental Archives in France, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization NATO, and many more. AureXus is a data processing and content management company based in Vancouver, BC, Canada with presence in Canada, USA, France and India. AureXus offers a complete set of services for archives and libraries to convert their existing material; library cards, finding aids, indexes, rare or new books and content into XML/EAD, MARC, multilayer PDF, ALTO and other searchable formats using data processing, OCR and coding software. Media Contact: Paul Watson, AureXus, +1 702 508 4265, conversion@aurexus.com