Everything here is a file in a public repository

Add or correct a source

There is no login and no moderation queue. The data is JSON on GitHub, and a change to it is an issue or a pull request.

Three things are worth more than anything else you could send:

No account needed

David: «so to add sources users need a git account? not really feasible». Correct, and this is the way round it. Fill in what you know — anything you leave blank is simply left blank — and this writes the message for you. Nothing is sent from this page and there is no server behind it: the button opens your own mail app with the text already in it, or you can copy it and send it however you like.

What is it called Its web address Which country or countries What does it hold What does it cost to look Anything else — how you know, what is wrong, what changed

Open this in my mail app

It goes to thestocksoup@gmail.com. It will be checked against the source before anything changes — that is the whole method here, and it applies to a message from a stranger exactly as it applies to everything else.

Most useful

A provider this map does not have Especially a national or regional archive outside western Europe. The spine is thin wherever this project has not personally researched.

Rarest

A region's filing history Which archive holds a piece of ground's records, for which years, under which regime. This is the hardest thing to find and the thing this map is for.

Always welcome

Something that has changed A dead link, a portal that moved, a collection that went from free to paid. A directory that lies is worse than no directory.

Or send a pull request

The files are small and hand-editable:

data/providers.json — who holds records, and what access costs
data/regions.json — record regions, their eras, and whose archive each means
data/places.json — places and the volumes that cover them

python3 scripts/check-data.py will tell you whether your change is sound before you send it, and the build runs the same check, so nothing lands that fails it.

Every source row must carry a checked date. Not because dates are tidy, but because a link with no date is a claim about the present made out of a memory of the past.