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Trove newspapers: data dashboard¶

Trove's collection of digitised newspapers is always changing – new articles and newspapers are being added by the NLA, while Trove users are busy correcting OCRd text and adding tags and comments. The search you run today might produce different results than the same query did a month ago, a year ago, or ten years ago. Researchers need to understand how these changes affect the queries they make, the results they find, and the arguments they construct. This dashboard helps researchers understand the context of their queries by presenting a snapshot of Trove's digitised newspapers, based on weekly data harvests. It shows Trove's current make up from a number of angles, as well as highlighting recent changes. It is updated every Sunday.

  • Total articles and user activity
  • Total articles by publication year
  • Total articles by publication year and state
  • Article categories
  • Newspaper titles
  • Total articles by publication state
  • Significant events
Last updated: Sunday, 2 October 2022

Total articles and user activity¶

Latest data harvest 02 October 2022
First data harvest 24 April 2022
Total harvests 24
Data https://github.com/wragge/trove-newspaper-totals/blob/master/data/total_articles_by_activity.csv

As of 02 October 2022 there are 235,892,163 digitised newspaper articles in Trove.

  Current total Change since 25 Sep 2022 Change since 04 Sep 2022 Change since 24 Apr 2022 Percentage of total
All articles 235,892,163 13,143 211,546 1,380,073 100.00%
Articles with corrections 14,240,163 10,062 61,707 384,624 6.04%
Articles with tags 4,551,971 2,616 17,809 148,977 1.93%
Articles with comments 248,541 181 1,078 9,850 0.11%

Total articles by publication year¶

Latest data harvest 02 October 2022
First data harvest 19 April 2022
Total harvests 24
Data https://github.com/wragge/trove-newspaper-totals/blob/master/data/total_articles_by_year.csv

This chart shows the total number of digitised newspaper articles by year of publication. The distribution will change over time as digitisation priorities shift and more newspapers are added. This chart is useful in understanding how digitisation priorities and copyright restraints have shaped the total newspaper corpus.


Total articles by publication year and state¶

Latest data harvest 02 October 2022
First data harvest 19 April 2022
Total harvests 24
Data https://github.com/wragge/trove-newspaper-totals/blob/master/data/total_articles_by_year_and_state.csv

This interactive chart helps you explore the distribution of articles by both publication year and state. Click on a state in the bar chart or legend to filter the results by year. Click anywhere in the background of the chart to reset. This enables you to compare digitisation patterns in different states and see how they contribute to the whole corpus.

Total articles added since 25 Sep 2022 by publication year and state

This chart shows the total number of digitised newspaper articles added since the previous harvest by year and place of publication. It's useful in seeing how search results from particular time periods and locations might be affected by current digitisation priorities.

Total articles added since 19 Apr 2022 by publication year and state

This chart shows the total number of digitised newspaper articles added since the first harvest by year and place of publication. It's useful in seeing how search results from particular time periods or locations might be affected by recent digitisation priorities.


Article categories¶

Latest data harvest 02 October 2022
First data harvest 20 April 2022
Total harvests 25
Data https://github.com/wragge/trove-newspaper-totals/blob/master/data/total_articles_by_category.csv
  Current total Change since 25 Sep 2022 Change since 04 Sep 2022 Change since 20 Apr 2022 Percentage of total
Advertising 43,874,171 4,508 79,923 372,464 18.599%
Article 163,729,079 7,895 120,442 936,619 69.408%
Arts And Culture 3,887 12 51 517 0.002%
Classified Advertisements And Notices 1,451 0 1 28 0.001%
Commerce And Business 3,739 2 94 743 0.002%
Detailed Lists, Results, Guides 26,352,108 645 9,360 100,147 11.171%
Display Advertisement 465 0 0 1 0.000%
Editorial 14,809 17 160 1,402 0.006%
Family Notices 1,946,073 170 2,203 11,270 0.825%
Humour 29,410 48 177 1,902 0.012%
Law, Courts, And Crime 9,849 5 36 386 0.004%
Letters 12,543 8 84 533 0.005%
Literature 35,369 1 15 407 0.015%
News 11,444 0 52 1,026 0.005%
Obituaries 11,811 12 181 678 0.005%
Official Appointments And Notices 1,091 0 4 26 0.000%
Puzzles 43,787 31 458 3,855 0.019%
Reviews 2,116 10 40 135 0.001%
Shipping Notices 2,483 0 4 678 0.001%
Sport And Games 16,497 6 209 1,957 0.007%
Weather 11,365 5 260 2,008 0.005%

Newspaper titles¶

Latest data harvest 02 October 2022
First data harvest 20 April 2022
Total harvests 24
Data https://github.com/wragge/trove-newspaper-totals/blob/master/data/total_articles_by_newspaper.csv

As of 02 October 2022 there are 1,726 different newspapers in Trove.

Total newspapers 1,726
Earliest publication date 05 March 1803
Latest publication date 19 March 2020

Newspapers by state of publication¶

This chart shows the place of publication of newspaper titles in Trove.

Changes in the number of newspapers by state of publication¶

  Current total Change since 25 Sep 2022 Change since 04 Sep 2022 Change since 20 Apr 2022 Percentage of total
ACT 8 0 0 0 0.46%
International 13 0 0 0 0.74%
National 8 0 3 3 0.46%
New South Wales 525 0 0 10 29.95%
Northern Territory 8 0 0 0 0.46%
Queensland 106 1 1 2 6.05%
South Australia 154 0 0 0 8.78%
Tasmania 115 0 0 0 6.56%
Victoria 410 0 1 3 23.39%
Western Australia 379 0 5 29 21.62%

Newspapers added since 25 Sep 2022

title_id title state total link
1774 The Australian (Brisbane, Qld. : 1878 - 1889) Queensland 2563.000000 https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-title1774

Newspapers added since 04 Sep 2022

title_id title state total link
1804 Royal Australian Navy News (National : 1958 - 2021) National 8363.000000 https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-title1804
1774 The Australian (Brisbane, Qld. : 1878 - 1889) Queensland 2563.000000 https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-title1774

Changes in the number of articles from newspapers since 25 Sep 2022

title_id title change in articles link
370 Port Lincoln Times (SA : 1927 - 1965; 1992 - 2002) 6,667 https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-title370
1578 The Catholic Advocate (Brisbane, Qld. : 1911 - 1934; 1936 - 1938) 3,913 https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-title1578

Changes in the number of articles from newspapers since 04 Sep 2022

title_id title change in articles link
23 Colonial Times and Tasmanian Advertiser (Hobart, Tas. : 1825 - 1827) 75 https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-title23
246 The Bacchus Marsh Express (Vic. : 1866 - 1943) 986 https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-title246
370 Port Lincoln Times (SA : 1927 - 1965; 1992 - 2002) 124,663 https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-title370
1578 The Catholic Advocate (Brisbane, Qld. : 1911 - 1934; 1936 - 1938) 3,913 https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-title1578
1776 The Jewish Post (Melbourne, Vic. : 1949 - 1966) 16,134 https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-title1776
1777 The Australian Jewish Post (St. Kilda, Vic. : 1966 - 1968) 3,662 https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-title1777
1801 Australian Army (National : 1959 -1980) 19,030 https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-title1801
1802 Army (National : 1980 - 2021) 32,157 https://nla.gov.au/nla.news-title1802

Total articles by publication state¶

Data about the number of articles by publication place (state) is available both from the main result API using the state facet, and from the newspaper API. As noted under Significant events, these totals don't always agree. I've included both below, so you can compare.

Number of articles by state of publication (via result API)¶

Number of articles by state of publication (via newspaper API)¶

Changes in the number of articles by state of publication (via result API)¶

  Current total Change since 25 Sep 2022 Change since 04 Sep 2022 Change since 19 Apr 2022 Percentage of total
ACT 3,296,997 0 0 0 1.398%
International 854,022 0 0 2,842 0.362%
National 532,922 0 59,550 80,178 0.226%
New South Wales 82,150,875 0 0 -748,798 34.826%
Northern Territory 409,433 0 0 0 0.174%
Queensland 41,105,021 6,476 6,476 15,085 17.425%
South Australia 24,685,441 6,667 124,663 122,586 10.465%
Tasmania 15,850,246 0 75 74 6.719%
Victoria 41,759,942 0 20,782 1,497,047 17.703%
Western Australia 25,247,083 0 0 557,281 10.703%

Changes in the number of articles by state of publication (via newspaper API)¶

  Current total Change since 25 Sep 2022 Change since 04 Sep 2022 Change since 19 Apr 2022 Percentage of total
ACT 3,296,997 0 0 0 1.398%
International 854,022 0 0 0 0.362%
National 533,103 0 80,944 80,944 0.226%
New South Wales 82,150,875 0 0 217,218 34.826%
Northern Territory 409,433 0 0 0 0.174%
Queensland 41,105,021 6,476 6,476 15,085 17.425%
South Australia 24,685,441 6,667 124,663 124,662 10.465%
Tasmania 15,850,246 0 75 74 6.719%
Victoria 41,759,942 0 22,185 430,684 17.703%
Western Australia 25,247,083 0 12,972 957,841 10.703%

Significant events¶

While the changes documented here generally reflect the addition of new articles and newspapers, the total numbers can also be affected by system configuration and optimisation events, such as rebuilding the index. It's difficult to highlight these sorts of anomalies in the charts above, but where I notice them I'll add a note here.

31 May 2022 – reindex?¶

Between the harvests on 29 May and 5 June 2022 there was a dramatic change in the distribution of articles by state (using the state facet). The number of articles from NSW decreased by 939,065, and the number of articles from Victoria increased by 961,387. There were also some smaller changes affecting other states. There was a scheduled maintenance window on 31 May, which makes me think that these reflect changes in the underlying search index, rather than the actual number of articles. Further evidence for this is the fact that the number of articles per state calculated by using the newspaper API endpoint were out-of-sync with the article totals until the end of May. Since then, both sets of article totals have remained in sync. So, in short, the number of articles returned by the state facet between 19 April 2022 (when my harvests started) and 31 May 2022 can't be trusted.


Created by Tim Sherratt for the GLAM Workbench. Support this project by becoming a GitHub sponsor.