Leaving CALM? An Honest Migration Path for Your Catalogue

Q: CALM exports are messy — how do you handle that?

One county archivist described it to us as a lot of gunk: random codes and system fields they did not quite understand. We agree the field mapping with you and filter the system fields. Nothing is discarded without your sign-off.

The migration path

Runs on CALM’s own exports.

Axiell has announced CALM’s end-of-life. The risk in the move is decades of description, local conventions and reference schemes.

The Archivers.ai reference code panel with Manual, CSV upload and Auto-sequence options, a base reference applied across a batch of files, and each file showing its own editable reference code

Reference numbers

Imported exactly as exported.

Reference numbers are treated as authoritative identifiers, not regenerable data. They stay visible on every record.

Never regenerated behind your back
Sequenced sub-numbering for new material
Carried through every outbound export

Written for your archivists

A completed Archivers.ai accession listing reviewed items above an export panel offering a PDF report, BagIt, and catalogue exports for EAD3 XML, AtoM CSV, ArchivesSpace CSV and Archivematica CSV

The way out

Portable on the day you arrive.

Outbound, records leave as Dublin Core, CSV or EAD3, or as CALM CSV with a former-reference concordance.

CALM CSV out, with reference concordance
EAD3, Dublin Core, BagIt with PREMIS
Your next move is yours to choose

All export formats

An Archivers.ai search for a British family who emigrated to Canada after the war, returning nineteen results as cards with thumbnails, dates, titles, extents and linked subject and name headings

The bigger question

Do not migrate the backlog. Catalogue it.

After two decades, many services find what they need next is cataloguing capacity and public access, not another database.

Description, search and a public portal
Sits alongside whatever system you land on
Genuine multilevel hierarchy, not a flat list

Public access and Explore

From the sector

What CALM services tell us.

“There’s hundreds of us that are now trying to get to another platform.”

“There’s either you use something like CALM or you use Excel. There’s nothing really in the middle — and I think this sits in the middle quite nicely.”

No live integration — and we say so

CSV and EAD in via a mapping wizard

Sample import reviewed before anything commits

CALM CSV out shipped today

Common questions

What CALM users ask first.

Is Archivers.ai a direct replacement for CALM?

Not like-for-like, and we will not pretend otherwise. CALM is a collections management system. Archivers.ai is a cataloguing and access platform that sits between a full system and a spreadsheet.

Does Archivers.ai have a direct CALM integration?

No. Inbound, the workflow runs on CALM’s own CSV and EAD exports through a mapping wizard with CALM-ish header detection. That is heuristic, not a validated canonical mapping, so you review a sample import first.

Will our reference numbers survive the migration?

Yes. They are imported exactly as exported, stay visible on every record, and are carried through every outbound export, including CALM CSV with a former-reference concordance.

CALM exports are messy — how do you handle that?

One county archivist described it to us as “a lot of gunk — random codes, system fields we don’t quite understand”.

We agree the field mapping with you and filter the system fields. Nothing is discarded without your sign-off.

When does CALM reach end-of-life?

Axiell has announced it, with dates cited across the sector clustering around the end of 2027. The timeline that matters is the one in your own contract, and migrations take longer than anyone expects.

We don’t have CALM — our catalogue is on paper or cards. Is that the same thing?

No, and it’s a different service. This page covers moving digital description out of CALM. If your catalogue has never been in any system — a card index, a typed finding aid, a handwritten register — that’s managed retroconversion instead.

Leaving CALM? Your catalogue should leave with you.