Meeting digital preservation requirements for software through an emulation strategy

Abstract

Digital preservation aims at ensuring digital artefacts remain accessible and usable. This includes preserving application software for the resulting experience but also software required to provide access to valuable digital artefacts. This paper surveys different preservation strategies of such software with a focus on the use of emulation which is gaining momentum over the more traditional migration approach. We highlight some requirements to consider when selecting emulators. We illustrate the process on the preservation of software on a micro-computers of the 1980’s. We also discuss how to design software architectures for the long term preservation of the emulators themselves.