The Distributed National Electronic Resource and the Electronic Libraries Programme (eLib)

The Distributed National
Electronic Resource and the
Electronic Libraries
Programme (eLib)
UNC Seminar, Oxford, May 1998

Chris Rusbridge: Electronic Libraries Program (eLib) 27/09/2012 1

DNER/eLib overview: contents
 Background
 Services, collections, the DNER
 eLib outline: Phases 1/2 & 3
 Related activities
 MODELS
 Ramblings!


JISC Strategy
 Summary: Excellent access to relevant content
 eLib is core development
• stimulus to new information service developments
 CEI provides core content
• enriched distributed national electronic resource for
HE
 Related skills development
 Cultural change... slow process


eLib: background
 “Follett Report” of Libraries Review committee,
1993
• Buildings program (£30m?)
• Special collections & archives (£50M?)
• CURL OPAC (£0.5M)
• Pilot Site Licence Initiative (£4M?)
• Arts & Humanities Data Service (£1.5M)
• eLib Programme (£15M)


Value
 Greatly improved access
 Increased resource sharing
 Digital content
 Downward pressure on publishing prices
 Stimulating publishing change


CEI Services
 Data Centres (BIDS, Data Archive, EDINA,
MIDAS) & Information service (NISS)
 UKOLN, BUBL
 Mirrors (HENSAs?, Visible Human)
 Subject-based Gateways?
 Digitisation (HEDS)
 Coordinated by the Monitoring & Advisory Unit
(MAU)

CEI Collections
 Collections policy
 Data sets
• Bibliographic, numeric/statistical, full text, images, GIS
 OPACs
• COPAC, clumps?
 Electronic journals/full text: PSLI/NESLI, ILEJ etc?
 Image sets
• HELIX, MIDRIB, Fast track, JIDI

The Distributed National
Electronic Resource
 Fuzzy concept ... but useful
 Unification? + Specialised?
• geographic distribution: single failure, network load
• access points
• metadata... how do I know what‟s there?
• authentication... who am I? ... once!
• preservation implications
 Tailoring... information landscapes
• economy of attention

The eLib Programme
 A Programme of
“Collaborative partnerships between libraries,
academic staff, publishers and others, to promote
large scale pilot and demonstrator projects
focusing on the components of a future electronic
library service, and to provide stimulus to its
creation.”
» The Libraries Review


eLib: programme outline

 Funded by UK Funding Councils through the JISC
• Projects short term, 1-3 years
• Practical focus: achievable & off the shelf rather than blue
sky technology. What will help libraries, students and
academics?
• Phases 1 & 2: ~60 projects; £15 million
• Phase 3: ~20 projects; £5 million


eLib: phases 1 & 2
 Electronic publishing
 Access to resources
Document delivery
Web p ubl i shi ng

ANR

 Training & studies Do c Del

 Digitisation (text and Trai ni ng an d
stu di es
images) Di gi tisatio n

 Customised publishing Cu stomi se d
pu bl ishi ng

(e-reserve)


eLib: comparisons with DLi
eLib DLi
 60 projects, 3 years,  6 projects, 4 years, $24M
£15M  ASQ-not!
 Incremental change  Computer science
 Library & publisher orientation
orientation  Theoretical, research,
 Low technology? high technology
 Local service, user and  Low impact on academic
copyright issues processes


Evaluation comments
“The electronic library is attractive ... but is only likely to be
realised as an institutionally pervasive concept. That is, library
strategies cannot be divorced from the internal ... research,
teaching and learning strategies of individual HEIs.”
» Policy Mapping Study
“We can also observe ... actual mobilisation ... effects of the
programme - on researchers, publishers ... and individual
disciplines and HEIs.”
» Formative evaluation report


eLib: phase 3
 Exemplars of “hybrid
libraries”
 Large scale resource
discovery (“clumps”)
Hybrid L ib rari es

Cl umps
• Z39.50-based virtual Di gi ta l
union catalogues Preservati on
Proj ect Exten si on s

 Digital preservation
 Project extensions
towards services


eLib Phase 3 : Clumps
 Stress test for Z39.50?
• scaling issues
• holdings, serials, IPR
 3 regional virtual union catalogues (2 years)
• linked to regional computer networks (MANs) recently
created as part of national SuperJANET network
 Music virtual union catalogue project (3 years)
• libraries, commercial agencies, publishers
• multi-media: scores, performances, etc

Higher Education Resources ON
demand (HERON)
 Teaching & learning focus (Dearing etc)
 Consolidate eLib OD/ER results
 3 UK HE partners + Blackwell‟s
• Stirling, Napier, South Bank
 Create “critical mass” resource bank of copyright
cleared, digitised electronic materials for UK HE
 Return £ to rights owners (including HE!)


Phase 3++
 Hybrid library and clumps projects
• about access to information in all forms, whenever,
wherever
 Integrate with...
• document delivery
• DNER, NNDP (archives), museums
• preservation/conservation for local material
 Ecosystem not jigsaw


eLib Phase 3: Hybrid Library
 Assumes print and electronic media will coexist
 Seeks to integrate delivery of both from local and
remote sources via electronic access
 5 3-year projects varying in technical ambition
from almost none to sophisticated software
tracking individuals
 Varied scope: individual institution -> subject ->
customer groups

Agora
 UEA, UKOLN, CERLIM, FDI etc
 Open, standards-based platform for distributed,
mixed media information management
• link to MODELS Information Architecture; information
landscapes
• sequence of prototypes tested in partner institutions
• innovative strategy for disseminating results &
sharing experiences
• exploratory enabling infrastructure for the DNER

BUILDER
 Institutional project (Birmingham) but with partners
 Both teaching and research
• seamlessly integrate access to a wide range of printed
and electronic information sources,
• local and remote users and information,
• integrating library with other academic activities,
• through user-oriented information landscapes.
 6 modules & 6 subject areas


Headline
 LSE, LBS, Hertfordshire
 Integration of print and electronic
• beyond resource discovery to resource access
 Orientation to knowledge & preferences of user
• customisation of services
• user-oriented design
 Copyright issues addressed
 Tools and technology to be made widely available


HYLIFE
• Research possible new boundaries of libraries
• More user need driven than technological; focus:
Social, organisational, educational, operational
• Concerned with library management/strategy issues
• 6 customer groups: student, research centre, health
practitioners, business, community college students,
distance students - “the electronic subject librarian”?
• Overarching generic strand: identifies and feeds best
practise into implementations, builds results of testing
into final toolkit for interface design

MALIBU
 3 partners (KCL, So‟ton, Oxford)
• Humanities-based
• Oriented towards organisation & management issues
• Management of change issues
• Staff training and development; User documentation
and training
• Integrated hybrid resource catalogue, resource
discovery tools and integrated delivery strategies
• Not new tools: integrate existing & developing tools

Multiplying resources

Independent Independent Unified service/
Applications Applications/ Flexible
Unified presentation
presentation

5
MODELS 26

Generic Architecture - Helper Components

SEARCH

LOCATE

USER/ BROKER/
REQUEST
BROKER SUPPLIER

DELIVER

AUTHENTI SECURITY PAYMENT
CATION

HELPERS

12
MODELS 27

Service Example (Z39.50 Discovery Only)

End External Admin
User Z39.50 User
Client
Z39.50
Searches
HTTP SQL

Library Broker

Distributed Z39.50 Searches

Target 1 Target 2 Target 3 Target 4 Target 5 ...
14
MODELS 28

Extensibility - e.g. Clump Network

Network
Gateway 2
User Community
Gateway 1 Clump
User Community Gateway 2
Clump
Gateway 1

Clump
Gateway 3
Gateway 3
User Community

Target A
Target G

Target F
Target B
Target C Target D Target E

17
MODELS 29

Related activities
 Copyright-related: JISC/PA
 JTAP technology programme
• includes authentication & authorisation
 ?Other HEFC activities?
• TLTP, TLTSN, CTI, Anderson, LTDI, Talisman?


Dissemination
 Vital to make programmes worth while
 Needs specific planning; first to be dropped!
 Telling
• scholarly & popular articles, conferences, web, email,
 Helping
• assisted & supported take-up & implementation
• workshops, roadshows, summer schools


In a digital world, are libraries...
 irrelevant?
• no, but... “Don‟t do libraries!”
 necessary? vital?
• yes: print legacy, electronic info support, service & IPR
 sufficient?
• no: must recognise „external‟ non-library resources


In a digital world, are libraries...
 warm, social, supportive study & research
environments, giving access to the world‟s
knowledge?
• librarians self image?
 cold, authoritative, excessively complex,
ritualised, exclusive, devoted to the past?
• need for self-challenge?


Comments from ADL
 Advances in Digital Libraries conference
attendees remarks:
• “Libraries will increasingly hold data as well as
documents; substantial new challenges” (NLM)
• “This is now about leadership... the technology exists,
drive this thing through” (Palumbo)
• “Solutions will unfold organically over many years”
(Lucier)
• “We‟re beginning to move away from digital libraries
to knowledge management” (Freeston)

“Gateways to Knowledge” ed Dowler 1997
 “...librarians have too often bolted new technology,
programs and services onto existing library functions”
 “The gateway, like Janus, looks to the documentary
sources of the past, even as it looks in the direction of
electronic sources ... in the future” Dowler
 “The library I never go to is already one of the most
important places in my life” Appiah
 “The gateway library is ... a process that delivers
services to the user” Rockwell


“Gateways to Knowledge” ed Dowler 1997 (cont)
 “The gateway library is not a place ... [it] is as distributed
and decentralized as campus computing has become” ibid
 “Investments in people will be critical to success” ibid
 “Libraries can still make themselves irrelevant to the new
information age, by repelling all invaders from IT, by
allowing job protection strategies to dominate decision
making, or by failing to provide librarians with opportunities
for appropriate training and re-training” ibid
 “Every new database ... seems to generate more demand
for instructional support” Dowler

Service in Digital Libraries?
 “[There is] an emphasis on technology & information
resources, and a very noticeable lack of discussion of
the service aspects of the digital library” Sloan, UIUC
 “... high tech and high touch” Dwyer, Cal State Chico
 “Social interaction helpful in
• selecting information
• seeking informal information
• highly specific, contextual information
• socialising function” Ackerman via Sloan

eLib: more information
 eLib phase 3 information pack... June?
 Web pages maintained by UKOLN
http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/elib/
 Mailbase lists including
lis-elib@mailbase.ac.uk
lis-elib-tech@mailbase.ac.uk


The Distributed National Electronic Resource and the Electronic Libraries Programme (eLib)

More Related Content

What's hot (19)

Similar to The Distributed National Electronic Resource and the Electronic Libraries Programme (eLib) (20)

More from Chris Rusbridge (20)

Recently uploaded (20)

The Distributed National Electronic Resource and the Electronic Libraries Programme (eLib)