Getting Started
The Shoah Foundation Visual History Archive (VHA) may be accessed by anyone as long as they are on the Yale University network. Any sufficiently modern workstation on the Yale campus should be able to display the VHA. Researchers from outside of Yale as well as members of the public are invited to use the public workstations in the Cowles Reference Center of Manuscripts and Archives in Sterling Memorial Library. The workstations in Manuscripts and Archive are equipped with headphones, but users need to provide their own in all other locations. Macintosh users must follow an additional set of special instructions, click here.
Upon connecting to the VHA, the first page displays boxes for a user name and password. Click on the link to register as a user. The registration page requires some basic demographic information. This information is used for statistical purposes and is kept private. It is important to enter a valid email address because the VHA system will use this to communicate important information to you regarding your requests for testimony files to be transfered to Yale.
Once you are logged in, the next screen is the Advanced Search Menu. This menu has links to the four methods available for searching the VHA. These methods are Quick Search, Biographical Search, People Search, and Keywords Search. The Advanced Search Menu is always available on the link bar at the top of the screen, this link bar also includes a Help option and a link to the Projects section where you can save searches and search results for easy access during later visits to the archive.
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Quick Search
The Quick Search is a brand new feature of the VHA. It allows a rapid "google-like" search of all the text that makes up the cataloging and indexing information. This text includes the interview code number, the biographical profile, the keywords and all names mentioned in the testimony or the Pre-Interview Questionnaires. The search terms are entered into the search box and results are located using one of the three search methods represented by the three buttons to the right of the box. These three methods are the same as the "AND" search which looks for instances of all words appearing in the same testimony, the "OR" search which looks for any of the words in the same testimony, or the phrase search which searches for all the words in the same order as they are entered into the search box.
This feature is under development and the Foundation will be incorporating user feedback into changes and updates to the search and its functions. Please contact the Shoah Foundation's Manager of Online Access at 213-740-6046 or email:vha-help@vhf.org if you have questions, comments or suggestons.
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Biographical Search
The Biographical Search is similar to the Shoah Visual History Foundation's Testimony Catalog because both search the biographical extracts taken from the Pre-Interview Questionnaires. These extracts contain basic biographical information about the interviewee such as birth dates and city and country of birth as well as some basic experiential information such as places of detention or hiding during the war.
The biographical extracts are categorized within nine separate "experience groups" (see figure 1). Only one group may be searched at a time. The vast majority of testimonies are in the "Jewish Survivor" group. After selecting a group, click the "NEXT" button to move to the next screen.
In the Biographical Search section all searching is in the AND mode by default - this means that if one selects more than one search criteria the search will only return results that match both criteria. For example, if the city of birth "Zagreb", and the religious affiliation "judaism" are selected, the search results will only include interviews in which the interviewee was born in Zagreb and listed judaism as their religious affiliation. Use the pull-down menu on the left side of the screen to switch the search to the OR mode - this would return search results containing all interviewees born in Zagreb and all interviewees with judaism as their religious affiliation. In order to achieve a combination of these search types, conduct the broadest search first and save the results to the Projects section. Then use the features in that section to narrow down the search within that project.
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People Search
People Search allows users to search for a specific name among all names in the Shoah Foundation archive. The archive includes names of people listed by the interviewee in their Pre-Interview Questionnaires and names of people that were mentioned during the interviews. Users can find a testimony for a specific interviewee or a testimony that refers to a specific person. The mechanics of the name search can be manipulated using the three choice buttons to the right of the first and last name search boxes. The default choice is "Starts With" This allows entire names or simply the beginning part of a name to be entered. For example entering "kar" in the first name box would return all of the first names in the VHA that begin with those three letters in that order. If a search is too broad, for example attempting to return any last names that start with "s" without a specified first name, the time it takes to return the results and the size of the result set will be too large for the computer's memory capacity - this will result in a need to restart.
The preliminary results in this search are shown as a list of names fitting the search terms in a box labeled, "CHOICES". These names are each followed by a colon and then a term describing that person's relationship to a testimony. For example "Janet Klein : sisters" links to a testimony of a person who lists or refers to Janet Klein as a sister. Names followed by the word, "interviewee" link to that person's own testimony. To move on to final search results, highlight names from the preliminary results list labeled, "CHOICES" and use the "ADD" button to move them to the box labeled, "SELECTED NAMES". Once this is accomplished, click the "NEXT" button to move to the next screen. There is one last screen before the search results that allows restriction of the search results by Language, Gender, or Project - this is helpful if the number of results is too large, or to eliminate testimonies in languages one cannot understand. Apply any of these restrictions if desired and/or click the "NEXT" button to view the Search Results. This search provides testimony-level results from over 50,000 interviews.
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Keywords Search
Global Keywords Search allows users to search for segments of testimonies that discuss specific topics, using more than 30,000 geographic and experiential keywords. Although the majority of the keywords are related to geographic locations, a rich collection of keywords have been assigned during indexing to identify important or common aspects of interviewees’ diverse experiences. Experiential keywords include keywords like “living conditions in the camps,” “contact with loved ones, renewed,” and thousands of others. The Global Keywords Search provides segment-level results from more than 50,000 interviews.
The keyword vocabulary was created by the Visual History Foundation and does not necessarily comply to any bibliographic authority such as Library of Congress Subject Headings. However, the Foundation has included many synonyms for their keywords - called "thesaurals" - that do match VHF keywords to some authority keywords. A list of the Foundation's indexing vocabulary is available in print form in the Manuscripts and Archives Reference Center. Click here to view this list as a series of adobe acrobat ".pdf" format documents along with a detailed explanation of the Shoah Foundation's indexing vocabulary.
The keyword search requires the user to move keywords into the "Selected Keywords" box using the "Add" button. Keywords may be discovered in the VHA either by typing them into the search box, or by clicking on and browsing through the "Keyword Choices." The browsing feature works much like a browsing through a directory of files on a computer - clicking on a category opens it and reveals the sub-headings and actual keywords below it. Entering a term in the search box and clicking on the "Search" button will move the view of the "Keyword Choices" directly to the first match for that search term. The keyword will be highlighted and can be moved to the "Selected Keywords" box using the "Add" button. Clicking on the "Search" button again will move the viewpoint further down the list to the next match and so-on. Note: clicking on the keyword in the "Keyword Choices" will reset this search and cause it to begin from the beginning of the list.
If your web browser permits pop-ups, the VHA will open a small window when the "Search" button is clicked that shows all of the matches. Clicking on a desired match moves the "Keyword Choices" directly to that match.
Testimonies are divided into a series of one minute segments and the keywords are linked to a time-coded segment of the video testimony. Search results from a Keyword Search will be presented as a list of Segments rather than a list of testimonies. The search results might contain more than one segment from the same testimony if they contain the keyword (see figure 4).
The Keyword Search uses an OR searching mode by default, unlike the Biographical Search. This means that, for example, if the search terms "paris(france)" and "partisans" are entered into the Selected Keywords box and the "Next" button is clicked, the search results will include any and all segments of video testimony that have either or both keywords attached to them. The search mode can be changed to the AND mode using the choice buttons to the right of the Keyword Choices box. If the search mode is switched to AND, there is a pull-down menu available that allows one to specify the proximity of the keywords within the testimony. For example, if the search mode is AND and the Segment Range is 1 segment, then a search for "paris(france)" and "partisans" would return results with only those segments that contain both keywords within the same single segment.
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Search Results
The VHA displays search results five to a page with a small amount of information about each result. The search results can be sorted by any of the attributes using the pull down menu above the results. If the number of search results is large, there may be a time lag in the sorting process. At this point the search results can be saved to the "Projects" section of the VHA. This will allow a quick return to these results as well as the ability to search within the results.
It is important to note that a keyword search returns results by testimony segment rather than a list of testimonies. The search results might contain more than one segment from the same testimony if they contain the keyword (see figure 4.) People Search and Biographical Search results are shown as one result per testimony.
Each search result contains a small still image of the interviewee as an icon, the name of the interviewee, the experience group, the language of the testimony and the video availability. Occasionally, an icon will show as a grey square with the words "Data Only" on it. This may indicate a video that has not yet been digitized, however the digitization of the entire archive is due to be completed this year so the Video Availability section will be a more reliable indicator of the current condition of the testimony.
The Video Availability section gives important information about the actual video files. In order to view a video, the file must be transferred from the Foundation's storage system in Los Angeles to the local cache server at Yale. In optimal conditions, the average transfer time for an entire testimony is about one hour, but this can often take longer depending on the number of users simultaneously requesting transfers. If the Video Availability section says, "Available within 24 hours" then the video must be requested for transfer. Click on the search result to go to the Viewing Screen and use the request feature. If the Video Availability section says, "Viewable now" then the testimony is already on the local cache server. Click on the search result to go to the Viewing Screen and the video will start automatically.
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Viewing Screen
The Viewing Screen (figure 5.) provides the interface for the actual viewing of the video testimonies. If the video is not on the local cache server, it must be transferred there in order to be viewed. In this case, the text to the left of the video window will contain a link for requesting a download. When this link is clicked, a small pop-up window will appear to confirm the request. The VHA will send an email to the address you entered on the registration page when the transfer has been completed. If there is ever a problem with a transfer, this information will also be communicated via email along with information for contacting technical support. It is possible to continue using the VHA for other searching and viewing while waiting for the download. Once the video is transferred, return to the viewing screen and the video will begin playing automatically. The download time can vary based on other traffic on the network. A transfer can take as little as one hour to complete, but may take up to 48 hours.
If the testimony has already been transferred to the local cache and is available for immediate viewing, the video player will start playing automatically. The center of the screen contains a video window. This is the standard Windows Media Player plugin. Access the control menu for this player by right-clicking on the actual video window. This produces a menu that includes the option to zoom to full-screen for easier viewing. Right-click again or press the Esc key on the keyboard to exit the full-screen and return to the viewing screen.
To the right of the video window are links to choose "Video" or "Slide Show" The video is automatically selected if the testimony is in the local cache and will start playing. If the "Slide Show" link is clicked, or if the video is not immediately available, a slide show made up of stills from the video will display in the video window. These stills are usually from the last segments of the video where photos and artifacts are displayed and family members are often introduced. Below these two links is a drop-down menu that allows a choice of tape number. The videos are recorded in half-hour tapes. An average testimony will contain four to five tapes depending on the length of the testimony. During playback, the video player will automatically transition from the end of one tape to the beginning of the next. The time code in the video window will always show the time lapsed and the total time of the tape which is never more than 30 minutes.
Directly below the video window is a text window that displays all the various indexing and catalog data. This window can be made larger by clicking the "Maximize/Minimize Data" link at the top of the column just to the right of the text box.
The column of links to the left of the text box controls which data are displayed inside the text box. The first link, "All Keywords in this Segment" displays the list of one-minute segments that make up the video index along with any keywords that have been applied to these segments. If a segment is blank, it is either an introduction segment with no substantive testimony, or the keywords from the above segments continue to apply. Each segment number is a link that will move the video to the beginning of that segment and start playing.
The "All People in this Segment" link displays the segments of the video with all names of people mentioned in the testimony. The "Biographical Profile" link displays the 20 item-long extract from the Pre-Interview Questionnaire. This profile includes basic biographical information such as place and date of birth, the language and length of the testimony and a selection of experiential information. This extract is the data that is searched by the Biographical Search. The "All People in this Testimony" link displays a list of all the names recorded in the Pre-Interview Questionnaire alphabetized by first name. The "Donor Recognition" link displays the names of any people or organizations who underwrote the cost of digitizing or indexing the testimony.
The links to the right of the text box allow for some basic navigation within the list of search results. The second and third links will read "Next Segment" and "Previous Segment" if the search results are in segment form (from a Keyword Search) these will move to the next or previous segment in the list of results. These links will read "Next Testimony" and "Previous Testimony" if the search results are in testimony form (from a Biographical or People Search) these will move to the next or previous testimony in the list of results. "Back to Project" returns to the Project section, "Choose New Search" returns to the Advanced Search Menu and "Save to Project" saves the current testimony to either a new or an existing project.
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Projects
The Projects section is a place within the VHA where a user can save and organize lists of search results as well as individual testimonies. A link to the Projects section is in the link bar at the top of every screen in the VHA. A list of search results may be saved from the search results screen and given a name as a project. This list will then always be available under the given name in the Projects section. Individual testimonies may also be saved from the Viewing Screen. Once a project has been created, more lists or individual testimonies may be added to it.
Another useful feature of the Projects section is the ability to run further searches upon selected lists of search results. This can be done from within the Projects page by clicking on the "Search Within Project" button. A project to search within can also be indicated in the last page of the search building process where one may limit search results by language and gender. This page also allows a project to be specified to which the search can be applied.
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Technical Requirements
PC Requirements
Macintosh Requirements
Macintosh users must follow an additional set of special instructions, click here.
Internet Connection: Broadband Only
All Yale University Library workstations comply to the minimum standards required to use the VHA. The VHA is intended to be run on the Microsoft Internet Explorer web browser. A computer must have a version 7 or higher of the Windows Media Player in order to display the videos. Determine the current version on your system. From the Start Menu - Programs Menu select Windows Media Player. In the application's Help Menu, select "about Windows Media Player" to see the version number. The latest version of Windows Media Player can be found at: windowsmedia.com®.
The video files are fairly large (around 500 MB each) If a computer has a slow processor, video card, or a small amount of RAM memory you may have difficulty displaying the video. Dedicated workstations for viewing the Shoah Foundation archive are available in the Cowles Reference Center of Manuscripts & Archives located next to the Wall Street entrance to Sterling Memorial Library. Other public workstations in the library are available for use as well. Please note that headphones are required. The dedicated computers in the reference center are equipped with headphones, users of other library public workstations must provide their own.
A valid email address is not required, but is very useful in receiving automated reports from the VHA about downloads you may have requested.
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User Support
Most of the staff in the Cowles Reference Center in Manuscripts and Archives (SML 150) have a working knowledge of the VHA and can answer basic research questions. The staff of the Shoah Foundation are also available to provide answers to research questions and technical support. Their hours of operation are 9 AM to 5 PM (Pacific) - contact the Shoah Foundation's Manager of Online Access at 213-740-6046 or email:vha-help@vhf.org.
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