Documentation tool ScieDoc

Digital reconstructions are designed at the interface of architecture, archaeology and their history and now constitute an autonomous field of research and education. If the creation of these digital reconstructions is based on scientific findings, documentation enabling good scientific practice is indispensable. If such documentation is not ensured, the knowledge on which these decisions rely is in danger of being lost. In Darmstadt, a prototype for a web-based documentation tool (www.sciedoc.org) was developed at the Digital Design Unit, which is now being used in 86 projects. Of these, 43 have been completed and are online. The core of the documentation is the comparison of two-dimensional images of the reconstruction with the images of the original sources. These are accompanied by a textual argumentation. This textual argumentation is the decisive factor and reflects the intellectual and scientific achievement. In the spirit of good scientific practice, the presentation of different versions in ScieDoc is also possible. With this online tool, a prototype template for the documentation of research results in the field of digital reconstructions has been created, which is available to the professional community free of charge. Furthermore, the approach that has been chosen makes it possible for the tool to be used with a minimum training time : only 15 minutes.