NARA rolls made digital

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nickterry
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#781

Post by nickterry » 08 Nov 2022, 00:05

Another cool thing about the new/preview catalog: you can sort by NARA ID number, either oldest or most recent, which wasn't an option on the old catalog, it sorted from oldest to newest but wouldn't display more than 2000 hits. Sorting by most recent NARA ID number immediately highlights what's newly added and digitised within a record group.

Zakr11
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#782

Post by Zakr11 » 08 Nov 2022, 01:21

Thanks. That's all really helpful. I take your info on the NARA ID to mean that the highest ID numbers represent the most recently digitized rolls. Great tip.


nickterry
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#783

Post by nickterry » 08 Nov 2022, 12:18

Zakr11 wrote:
08 Nov 2022, 01:21
Thanks. That's all really helpful. I take your info on the NARA ID to mean that the highest ID numbers represent the most recently digitized rolls. Great tip.
On the new/preview catalog, yes. There are some placeholder item entries that have lower ID numbers, but for microfilm series especially, one can use this to see the latest uploads. In RG 242, the T175 microfilms uploaded in August 2022 were followed by some Luftwaffe target files on British cities, then T81 and T454 in November 2022.

Mori
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#784

Post by Mori » 08 Nov 2022, 13:36

nickterry wrote:
06 Nov 2022, 20:48
Mori wrote:
03 Nov 2022, 21:05
Your help will be *much* appreciated if you come across a proper index.
p.13 of the M892 guide for the IG Farben trial microfilms notes that on reel 1, there is a 'prosecution and defense exhibit index' and a 'list of witnesses'
https://www.archives.gov/files/research ... m/m892.pdf
Unfortunately, this index doesn't go further than "Roll 16, Prosecution Exhibits 1-109". It doesn't give the title of these 109 exhibits.

Same for "Defense exhibits", it just says "Roll 63, All defendants exhibits 1-107" without any additional information.

nickterry
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#785

Post by nickterry » 08 Nov 2022, 14:42

Mori wrote:
08 Nov 2022, 13:36
nickterry wrote:
06 Nov 2022, 20:48
Mori wrote:
03 Nov 2022, 21:05
Your help will be *much* appreciated if you come across a proper index.
p.13 of the M892 guide for the IG Farben trial microfilms notes that on reel 1, there is a 'prosecution and defense exhibit index' and a 'list of witnesses'
https://www.archives.gov/files/research ... m/m892.pdf
Unfortunately, this index doesn't go further than "Roll 16, Prosecution Exhibits 1-109". It doesn't give the title of these 109 exhibits.

Same for "Defense exhibits", it just says "Roll 63, All defendants exhibits 1-107" without any additional information.
Oh well.

Prosecution and defense document books usually have tables of contents, so that is the other tactic. I've seen the paper copies of translated and untranslated document books from NMT trials (via IWM Duxford, the British set of copies), and they do have tables of contents by and large.

I am sure this also applies to the document books for IG Farben trial since I extracted the locations for some documents on some themes from the profit-over-life.org microfilm reels:
NO-2360 radio message to Au IG Farben doc book 83
NO-2361 Radio WVHA-Au IG Farben doc book 83
NO-2362 2.10.42, Liebehenschel, Material IG Farben doc book 83
NO-2363 clearance for Dessau IG Farben doc book 83

nickterry
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#786

Post by nickterry » 13 Nov 2022, 15:28

T81 and T454 are now uploaded to the classic NARA catalog, with full OCR searchability - keywords that would be especially common in these series have risen considerably, e.g. 'Ostland' went from 1670 to 2168 hits within RG 242 digitised items.

Since T454 only went up last Sunday evening on the new/preview catalog, this confirms the once-a-week upload on the classic catalog, which is generally Sunday morning. As the new/preview catalog is simply not populated with everything from the classic catalog, nor is the search engine capturing everything that is on the new catalog, presumably until this is sorted with the switchover, there'll be regular updates to the classic catalog - the transition is going to take a while.

Links to the nine digitised T-series (5,256 reels) on the classic catalog are now updated here at the top under USA
http://holocaustcontroversies.blogspot. ... s-and.html

T77 Records of the Headquarters of the German Armed Forces High Command (1,687 reels)
T81 Records of the National Socialist German Labor Party (740 reels)
T84 Various German Records (489 microfilm reels)
T175 Records of the Reich Leader of the Schutzstaffel (SS) and Chief of the German Police (678 microfilm reels)
T178 Fragmentary Records of Various Reich Ministries and Offices (28 microfilm reels)
T311 Records of German Field Commands, Army Groups (305 microfilm reels)
T354 Various Schutzstaffel (SS) Records, Einwandererzentralstelle, Waffen-SS, and SS-Oberabschnitte (799 microfilm reels)
T454 Records of the Reich Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories (167 reels)
T501 Records of Rear Areas, Occupied Territories, and Others (363 microfilm reels)

Not bad for a year's work of digitisation!

ETA: on the new/preview catalog, if searching RG 242 as a whole, the current numbers are 42,776 results of which 20,672 are digitised. These numbers might soon rise with the addition of already-digitised series - T77 and other series are not on the new catalog yet. But sorting by NARA ID (highest first) shows the latest genuinely new additions, currently the T454 reels from 167 downwards.
https://preview.catalog.archives.gov/se ... aId%3Adesc

Mori
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#787

Post by Mori » 13 Nov 2022, 22:01

By the way, it looks like they have a download speed limit. Above a few rolls (less than 10), the download is so slow it takes 5-10 hours to get any additional roll. It's IP-based, change your IP and you can resume download. However, one does not always have other IPs available, or they are also limited (e.g., going through my phone).

It's another case of a site offering a wide collection while making it only available by drops... Not that I am complaining. Just that I'm happy with all I could download *before* this restriction popped up.

nickterry
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#788

Post by nickterry » 13 Nov 2022, 23:37

Mori wrote:
13 Nov 2022, 22:01
By the way, it looks like they have a download speed limit. Above a few rolls (less than 10), the download is so slow it takes 5-10 hours to get any additional roll. It's IP-based, change your IP and you can resume download. However, one does not always have other IPs available, or they are also limited (e.g., going through my phone).

It's another case of a site offering a wide collection while making it only available by drops... Not that I am complaining. Just that I'm happy with all I could download *before* this restriction popped up.
On the old or new/preview catalog? I was downloading PDFs of T454 reels fine this week from the new/preview catalog.

nickterry
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#789

Post by nickterry » 14 Nov 2022, 02:12

A small bonus in RG 238: the 70 reels of the NG-document series (T1139) from the NMT trials have been uploaded to the new/preview catalog (58 reels of documents, rest analysis sheets). From experience, these are often but not always photostats (white on black), so can sometimes be slightly harder to read, but many are proper copies and clear.
https://preview.catalog.archives.gov/se ... hin/643701

This suggests that the RG 238 microfilms will be tackled by T-series one by one, but the batches are small enough that they can likely be knocked off quickly - the Milch trial is 13 reels, the NG-series is 70 reels, they can probably make good progress over the winter with these bite-sized chunks. Hopefully also concentrating scanning labour on the bigger RG 242 series and squeezing the RG 238 series in alongside those.

The one-reel WA series (M946) is already on the classic and new/preview catalogs.

Documents etc - 398 reels, 70 digitised
Records of the Office of the United States Chief of Counsel for War Crimes, Nuernberg Military Tribunals, Relating to Nazi Industrialists (NI Series). Microfilm Publication T301. 164 rolls. (roll list)
Records of the U.S. Nuernberg War Crimes Trials:
NOKW Series, 1933-1947. Microfilm Publication T1119. 47 rolls.
NG Series, 1933-1948. Microfilm Publication T1139. 70 rolls.
NM Series, 1874-1946. Microfilm Publication M936. 1 roll. (DP)
NP Series, 1934-1946. Microfilm Publication M942. 1 roll. (DP)
WA Series, 1940-1945. Microfilm Publication M946. 1 roll. (DP)
Franz Guertner Diaries, 1934-Dec. 1938. Microfilm Publication M978. 3 rolls. (DP)
Interrogations, 1946-1949. Microfilm Publication M1019. 91 rolls. (DP)
Register Cards to the NG Document Series, 1946-1949. Microfilm Publication M1278. 3 rolls. (DP)
Register Cards to the NOKW Document Series, 1946-1949. Microfilm Publication M1291. 2 rolls. (DP)
Register Cards to the NI Document Series, 1946-1949. Microfilm Publication M1397. 8 rolls. (DP)

Records of the U. S. Nuernberg War Crimes Trials, United States of America v.: - 740 reels in all, 13 digitised
Karl Brandt et al. (Case I), Nov. 21, 1946 - Aug. 20, 1947. Microfilm Publication M887 (Medical Case). 46 rolls. (DP)
Erhard Milch (Case II), November 13, 1946 - April 17, 1947. Microfilm Publication M888 (Milch Case--Luftwaffe). 13 rolls. (DP & Special List 38)
Josef Altstoetter et al. (Case III), Feb. 17 - Dec. 4, 1947. Microfilm Publication M889 (Justice Case). 53 rolls. (DP)
Oswald Pohl et al. (Case IV), Jan. 13, 1947 - Aug. 11, 1948. Microfilm Publication M890 (Pohl Case-SS). 38 rolls. (DP)
Friedrich Flick et al. (Case V), Mar. 3 - Dec. 22, 1947. Microfilm Publication M891. (Flick Case-Industrialist). 42 rolls. (DP)
Carl Krauch et al. (Case VI), Aug. 14, 1947 - July 30, 1948. Microfilm Publication M892 (I.G. Farben Case-Industrialist). 113 rolls. (DP)
Wilhelm List et al. (Case VII), July 8, 1947 - Feb. 19, 1948. Microfilm Publication M893 (Hostage Case). 48 rolls. (DP)
Ulrich Greifelt et al. (Case VIII), Oct. 10, 1947 - Mar. 10, 1948. Microfilm Publication M894 (RuSHA Case-SS). 38 rolls. (DP)
Otto Ohlendorf et al. (Case IX), Sep. 15, 1947 - Apr. 10, 1948. Microfilm Publication M895 (Einsatzgruppen Case-SS). 38 rolls. (DP & Special List 42)
Alfried Krupp et al. (Case X), Aug. 16, 1947 - July 31, 1948. Microfilm Publication M896 (Krupp Case-Industrialist). 69 rolls. (DP)
Ernst von Weizsaecker et al. (Case XI), Nov. 4, 1947 - Apr. 14, 1949. Microfilm Publication M897 (Ministries Case). 173 rolls. (DP)
Wilhelm von Leeb et al. (Case XII), Nov. 28, 1947 - Oct. 28, 1948. Microfilm Publication M898 (High Command Case). 69 rolls. (DP)

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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#790

Post by nickterry » 14 Nov 2022, 02:23

The new/preview catalog does now have more of the hitherto-digitised T-series uploaded, but the search engine isn't OCRing keywords to reveal them. They start around page 435 of the RG 242 online textual items search, placed in NARA ID order, lowest first
https://preview.catalog.archives.gov/se ... %20Records

T178, T84, T175, T354, T501 look complete or getting there. T77 is still short (1000 hits for T77 within RG 242), as is T311, but the uploading is clearly underway.

Unlike the classic catalog, one *can* browse along all of the results in the new/preview catalog, whereas the old catalog tops out at 2000 hits before throwing in the towel and refusing to display any more.

nickterry
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#791

Post by nickterry » 20 Nov 2022, 16:30

Old catalog link: https://legacy.catalog.archives.gov/

The new catalog has taken over any old links to catalog.archives.gov, but the search engine is still not comprehensively capturing all keywords within files/reels via OCR.

The legacy catalog continues to be updated as usual overnight on Saturday/Sunday; e.g. they have now added the NG-documents microfilm reels which were uploaded last Sunday evening.

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Piet Duits
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#792

Post by Piet Duits » 20 Nov 2022, 17:20

Let's hope they will surprise us all by uploading T312 and T313 tomorrow :-)

Glider42
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#793

Post by Glider42 » 23 Nov 2022, 04:33

Speaking of OCR: if you're like me and you don't read German, you might be relying on the OCRed text, to run it through something like Google Translate. However, I'm finding that, in some of the reels I've seen, the OCRed text is often full of mistakes. Instead, I can recommend another method: download the Google Translate app onto your iPhone (certainly available for Android as well). In that app, you can access your phone camera to view the original German text and translate it in real time. It works very well, even when doing it from your computer screen. You might have to make the print large enough on screen to enhance accuracy.

If needed, you can then take a photo and save the translation to your phone.

Hope this helps someone.

Mori
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#794

Post by Mori » 23 Nov 2022, 09:31

Thanks for the tip!

My limited experience with OCR is reliability differs a lot from one software to the next.

The best online tool I found is https://www.newocr.com/

But then I tried ABBYY Finereader - which you install on your computer in a traditional way - and output is way better. It recognizes headers and footers so that clean up is much faster. Moreover, this can both OCR text to Word and charts to Excel.

The OCR embedded in Acrobat Reader (when you pay for it) is pretty good too, but not as flexible as ABBYY, I think.

wekusta
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Re: NARA rolls made digital

#795

Post by wekusta » 23 Nov 2022, 11:23

Here is an alternative for those with a desktop system:-

My preference is now to OCR using NormCap and then paste into DeepL to translate. Both are free to download. Having said that you can pay for a "PRO" version of DeepL.

NormCap is a very "lite" application and captures the text in images fairly well depending on the quality of the image in the first place. See https://dynobo.github.io/normcap/ to download and an explanation of the functionality.

I used the free version of ABBYY Finereader, that performed the same functions as NormCap, for many years. However, I found that NormCap gives better results for what I am now doing. Like Finereader, NormCap allows you to change the language and has two modes regarding speed and accuracy.

DeepL is an AI based translation tool - you can either use the online tool or download the application. I have downloaded the application - I find this much more accurate that Google Translate. Here is a link to the app https://www.deepl.com/en/app/. (Strangely you can download an app for IOS, Windows and Macs but not Android....)

Hope that this is of help
Best Regards

Andy Mitchell
www.luftwaffedata.co.uk

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