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The Information System of Estonian Museums is developed to create a system meeting the needs of Estonian museums, provide a comprehensive overview of museum collections and allow tracking down collection items in and outside museum(s). As a final outcome of the project, the creation of a data bank of Estonian cultural heritage has been envisaged, providing Internet access to all those interested. The present system (KVIS – Information System of Cultural Heritage) is currently restructured (into MuIS – Information System of Museums). Ten Estonian museums are currently using the KVIS-system.

Another purpose of the new information system is to standardize the documentation and description of different types of cultural heritage. The process of standardization involves the following levels:

Compatibility with international standards – Information System of Estonian Museums is worked out according to CIDOC (International Committee of Documentation) standards on data groups and categories.

Standardized data model – the principle of object oriented i.e. the O-O model is applied, to work out a data model for the Information System of Estonian Museums, which is a new trend in the development of data models for museum information systems, introduced at the CIDOC97 conference in Nuremberg.

National standards - glossaries, enabling the description and classification of different museum collections. Standardized terminology will not only facilitate the documentation of collection items, but also the development of the Estonian Cultural Heritage Central Database.

The Information System of Museums supports the following museum functions:

• Administrative object management in and outside museum(s).
• Cataloguing and classification of museum collections.
• Putting together exhibitions.
• Performance of queries from different users, statistical administrative queries, and complex queries for research work.