Achievement

The next generation of field archaeology is heavily data-driven, using various state-of-the-art tools to collect “big data” records and capture a field site and its artifacts in space and time. A new field has emerged - cyberarchaeology- focused on acquiring, storing, correlating, analyzing and disseminating data, turning traditional archaeology into data driven science. This requires sophisticated cyberinfrastructure to manage large amounts of heterogeneous data. Cloud computing provides a flexible way to manage large-scale data, but a problem unique to field research is that researchers often work at remote sites with limited computer and network resources. For a data management system that has to work in a campus cloud and under vastly different field conditions, portability of computer infrastructure and common data access methods are essential. In a recent archaeological expedition, we explored portability of cloud infrastructure and implemented a portable data management system.