The restoration process has begun.

Welcome to the restoration

The restoration of the Museum Archive software like any restoration is focused on the future usability of the software. With that in mind, the focus of this first stage is moving the entire project to a more easily managed development environment that will allow us to keep things where they are so that no one gets lost along the way. 

In any restoration there is some history to recognize

Past

Jim Halpin started the Museum Archive Software Project in 2009 which has allowed Museums, Historical Societies, Schools, Nonprofits, and other groups to organize their collections without spending valuable resources on collection management database software. The Project continued to do so without any changes since the last revision in 2014 when active development ended. The Basic version was free while the Premium version required the purchase of his book on the development of the software. Jim removed that requirement in 2018 and cut back on the support. 

 Present

Late 2021 Jim decided to retire and contacted me to say that he had taken the project off line. I let him know that we were sorry to see the project go; I had always liked the idea of the project. He asked if we were interested in developing it further and we agreed to support the project for a year or so to see what we could do.

RESTORATION – Through 2022 and 2023 we got to help quite a few organizations with various issues from simple setup questions to helping a castle museum in Ireland consolidate 3 installations of the software across a network to a single database. 
As we became more familiar with the software and the users, we were able to make a couple of revisions in the software that we’d like to make available very soon.

Future

The fact that the software has continued without an update since 2014 is a testament in itself. A lot of things have changed in that time. For one thing, Windows 10 and 11 have made 64 bit operating systems common place. The software is still more than adequate for the job it does for collections across this country as well as others around the world.  To stay healthy, though, the software is in need of an update and continued maintenance. While our restoration is progressing, perhaps what is needed is a renovation.

Over the next few weeks we will start contacting existing users known as having bought the book or that have been in contact with Jim or ourselves in order to reconnect with them and let them know just what is happening.