The repository shall be able to provide a complete list of all such identifiers and do spot checks for duplications.

This is necessary in order that actions relating to AIPs can be traced over time, over system changes, and over storage changes.

Documentation describing naming convention and physical evidence of its application (e.g., logs).

A repository needs to ensure that there is in place an accepted, standard naming convention that identifies its materials uniquely and persistently for use both in and outside the repository. The ‘visibility’ requirement here means ‘visible’ to repository managers and auditors. It does not imply that these unique identifiers need to be visible to end users or that they serve as the primary means of access to digital objects. Ideally, the unique ID lives as long as the AIP; if it does not, there must be traceability. Subsection 4.2.1 requires that the components of an AIP be suitably bound and identified for long-term management, but places no restrictions on how AIPs are identified with files. Thus, in the general case, an AIP may be distributed over many files, or a single file may contain more than one AIP. Therefore identifiers and filenames may not necessarily correspond to each other. Documentation must represent these relationships.

Duplicates are not possible in the system. A list of all identifiers can be provided as a subset of the object index, which provides a list of all the intellectual objects associated with a particular institution or the repository as a whole. Similarly, the file index provides a list of all the generic files, inclusive of their identifiers, associated with either a particular intellectual object, a particular institution, or the repository as a whole.

See the sections on Object EndPoints and File Endpoints.