Developing digital libraries
The Authors
Howard Falk, columnist based in Bloomfield, New Jersey, USA.
Abstract
Looks as the long-term implications of library digitization and suggests that the changes thus far may be merely an introduction to a much greater transition that lies ahead. Refers to the experiences of academic libraries, where there has been a sweeping transition to electronic journals and growth in the availability of other digital collections. Wider access to rare and special collections is offered by digitization and steps to achieve more universal access to international repositories are under way. Also examines the experience to date of digital library operations beyond academia – public libraries, and schools – and the growth of online library reference services. Feels that as digital library resources increase, the importance of the library as a physical setting where patrons go to find information and borrow books appears to diminish and increased reliance on digital collections is leading to a decline in the importance of collections of printed materials.
Article Type: Case study
Keyword(s): Academic libraries; Public libraries; Library services; Online retrieval; Digital libraries.
Journal: The Electronic Library
Volume: 21
Number: 3
Year: 2003
pp: 258-261
Copyright ©MCB UP Ltd
ISSN: 0264-0473
Libraries have started down the path of working with digital materials. Many are using the Internet and offering some e-books. Catalogs and library business operations have become electronic, and library entrances have been augmented by welcoming Web sites. Publishers and librarians are discovering great advantages in providing periodicals online. Library reference services have also begun to go online.
At first, these developments seemed to be helpful new techniques to be absorbed into existing library operations. However, some of the long-term implications of library digitization are beginning to become clearer. Changes thus far may be merely an introduction to a much greater transition that lies ahead. In the past, libraries have been organizations with shelved collections, providing services to support those collections. Now, it seems they are on their way towards a very different future.
Some of the most revealing insights about the digital future come from experiences of academic libraries. Here, where scholarly journals play a central role, there has been a sweeping transition to electronic journals, and the availability of other digital collections is rapidly growing. In many cases these collections are not housed at the library itself, but are available via remote access from other libraries and organizations. As a result, the overall scope of materials that academic library users can access online has expanded tremendously.
Greatly expanded access
Growth of university digital repositories is exploding. These online collections contain the intellectual work of faculty and students, including research and teaching materials as well as experimental and observational data. For example, MIT’s DSpace digital repository ( is now available to the public. To retrieve documents, users enter a search phrase, or they can browse the collection by title, author or document date. The initial set of documents is supplied by MIT’s Department of Ocean Engineering, the MIT Center for Technology, Policy, and Industrial Development, MIT’s Laboratory for Information and Decision Systems, and the Sloan School of Management. Each contributing source uses its own methods to format and submit material. To preserve all documents, DSpace maintains a list of supported formats that are to be kept available and readable for the future. For documents with non-supported formats, the ones and zeroes of the original documents are stored. If software to read these documents should ever become unavailable, programmers will still be able to design new access software. To handle updates to prepublication versions of documents, DSpace uses tombstone markers to indicate that the earlier versions still exist within the system, but are no longer available for public access. The system has served as a model for many repositories at other institutions.
Rare and special collections are being digitized, not only for preservation purposes, but as a means of encouraging wider access to those materials. For example, the collection of online materials at the Perseus site ( includes classical Greek, Latin, and archaeological items, as well as papyri from the Duke Data Bank. English renaissance materials provide the complete works of Shakespeare and Marlowe. There is a collection on the history of London, one on Tufts University history materials, and another on the work papers of Robert Boyle. At the University of Utah, the J. Willard Marriott Library has digitized 30,000 pages from three weekly Utah newspapers from the period of 1889-1922 and made the collections freely available on the Internet ( The digitized newspapers can be searched full text or browsed by issue. With the recent award of a new grant, another 100,000 pages from an expanded selection of newspapers are slated for digitization in 2003.
Access to institutional repositories by the public and interconnection of repositories with one another are technologically feasible and steps to achieve more universal access are under way. The importance and scope of academic library online portals has also been growing. For example, over 200,000 students and faculty at seven academic institutions were given access to local and external information resources through a unified Scholars Portal in the third quarter of 2002. The Portal gives users a direct means of fulfilling their information needs without having to use several different tools and applications. The aim is to reduce frustration from lengthy search processes. The initial focus of the Portal project is to deliver cross-domain searching of licensed and openly available content in a range of subject fields from multiple institutions. The portal aggregates the results of the search, and supports delivery of the content to the user.
The Scholars Portal is a project of the Association of Research Libraries (ARL), a not-for-profit organization that represents 123 academic and research libraries in the USA and Canada. Participants in the initial trial of the Portal are the University of Southern California, the University of California-San Diego, Dartmouth College, University of Arizona, Arizona State University, Iowa State University, and the University of Utah.
Many universities have invested large sums of money in e-journals or in access to electronic resources, only to find that users turn to less accurate and less timely information because it is easier to access. The Scholars Portal hopes to overcome this problem by giving users easy entry to licensed and restricted-access information resources as well as unrestricted resources. In the future, the Scholars Portal project plans to add services such as integrating the Portal with local online course materials and linking the Portal to consultations with reference librarians.
In Europe, the concept of a single, virtual European Library that will allow users to search and access collections from participating national libraries has moved a step closer to becoming a reality. TEL, a 30-month cooperative project ( involves national libraries in Finland, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Slovenia, Switzerland, The Netherlands, and the UK, as well as the Conference of European National Librarians.
University libraries are discovering that new digital resources are sometimes accompanied by new problems. For digital materials that originate on-campus, these libraries are able to retain primary responsibility, and to control content and access. But the bulk of electronic journals typically come to the libraries through licenses, and the ability to ensure long-term access to the journal files often remains in doubt. Many of the new resources that libraries are providing to their patrons consist of electronic content the libraries neither own nor manage. This is true of online databases, which are subject to changes in content and deletions of material by providers. Vendors control the storage, presentation, and longevity of many e-book collections. Through bundling practices, vendors effectively limit the ability of libraries to stock economically electronic journals of their choice.
Digital libraries beyond academia
University advocates of digital repositories have speculated that public libraries might join forces with local government, local historical societies, local museums and archives, and members of their local communities to establish community repositories. At present, only about a quarter of all public libraries in the USA are involved in converting materials in their collections into digital files. Those libraries that do digitize use this capability to preserve photographs and fragile documents and to make those materials more accessible to patrons. State organizations, such as the Library of Virginia, tend to be more involved with digitization than local libraries. According to a survey recently conducted by the Institute of Museum and Library Services, lack of money and patron enthusiasm, as well as limited on-site expertise are cited by libraries as reasons for not engaging in digitization. In a report based on the survey, the Institute called for adoption of digital material selection and preservation policies by libraries. Registration of digitized materials in central locations such as the Digital Initiatives Database (at the Association of Research Libraries) was recommended by the report.
Improved means for providing e-books continue to become available to libraries. Patrons in northeast Ohio are being offered a new service that lets them borrow electronic versions of popular books over the Internet. The service is sponsored by the Cleveland Public Library and 30 other northern Ohio libraries. It allows patrons to download text from library Web sites. In some cases, users can change the format of the e-books to run on their home and handheld computers. Borrowed e-books automatically expire in the borrower’s computer at the end of their lending period. The e-book lending system uses a series of secure codes to ensure that each copy of titles purchased by the Ohio libraries is available to only one reader at a time. The service became available in March 2003, offering about 1,000 titles. Access to the e-books is managed by OverDrive, ( a distributor of e-books, digital periodicals, and other media from publishers and content suppliers. More than 35,000 e-book titles are now available for downloading by library patrons, based on services from OverDrive. The company uses techniques, based on Adobe Content Server software, to limit the number of times an e-book file can be copied. The time period during which an e-book can be viewed by a user can also be limited. With such controls in hand, OverDrive has obtained permission from publishers to sell e-books that libraries can allow their patrons to download. Over 400 publishers have made agreements with OverDrive to make their copyrighted e-books available.
Elementary and high schools are also being drawn into digital library operations. A new licensing arrangement offers schools the right to distribute, internally, unlimited copies of e-books from a collection of classical titles. The license, offered by Palm Digital Media, ( covers up to 500 e-book titles such as “The Red Badge of Courage,” by Stephen Crane, “Little Women,” by Louisa May Alcott, “Night and Day,” by Virginia Woolf, and the works of William Shakespeare. Collections of 250 titles for $499, or 500 titles for $750, are offered. Schools will receive the Classics Collection on a CD. If the school has a Web site the e-books can be listed on that site by title and author. Schools without Web sites can get a hosted service for an added fee. Users will be able to click to make their title selection and download the e-book copy in less than a minute to their own computer. Download versions will be available for Palm handheld computers, Pocket PC devices, Mac and Windows desktop and notebook computers, and Microsoft Tablet PCs.
The importance of online library reference services continues to grow very rapidly. Many library systems in the USA are operating such services, some on a 24 hour-a-day basis, and similar services have been set up overseas. Using the AskNow! Service, Australian librarians answer questions via the Web site. At the site, users type in their name and e-mail address, then enter their question into a text box and click on Connect. After confirming their e-mail address, users click on Continue to start interacting with a reference librarian. The dialog takes place in real time using chat software, and the service is available to anyone with Internet access. Librarians can open Web pages on users’ PCs, so both user and librarian view the same pages. AskNow! is available Monday to Friday 9 a.m.-8 p.m. AEST (Australian Eastern summer time), 8 a.m.-7 p.m. AEST, 8.30 a.m.-7.30 p.m. (ACST) Australian Central summer time, 7:30 a.m.-6:30 p.m. ACST and 6 a.m.-5 p.m. Australian Western summer time.
A service not a place
Libraries have been places where individuals and information can interact. At the library, users look through the collections or turn to library staff for help in finding the information they want. The ability to browse and to experience the combined effect of the many information resources available at the library has been an important aid to inquiry. The physical experience of books, maps, and manuscripts has also been important for many library users. In addition, library facilities have provided a place for users to interact, and a neutral environment for diverse individuals to come together.
As digital library resources increase, the importance of the library as a physical setting where patrons go to find information and loan books appears to diminish. A study sponsored by the Digital Library Federation found that undergraduates now spend only a third of their study time in the library, while half of their study time is spent at home. Faculty members said only 10 per cent of their work time is spent in the library while 85 per cent of their work is done in their office or at home: and 35 per cent of respondents said that they use the library significantly less than they did two years ago; and that figure was 43 per cent among faculty members. The University of Washington’s ongoing survey of users finds decreased use of library physical facilities by faculty and graduate students, and a modest increase in use reported by undergraduates. Washington has a 24-hour undergraduate library facility and well-established computer facilities within libraries, which the survey data indicate are heavily used.
Increased reliance on digital collections is leading to a decline in the importance of collections of printed materials. During the past two years the library at the University of Massachusetts spent more on electronic documents then on printed books and that trend is continuing. The library Web site ( offers online access for students, faculty, and staff. The most popular electronic resources are online databases and journals and these receive almost 60 per cent of all traffic to the library Web site. An online reference service allows students and faculty to talk to a librarian 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Professors can post course packets and outlines for their students, using an e-reserves feature. Last semester, over 11,000 students used this feature. Online library users can renew and reserve books, search the library catalog, and request interlibrary loans. The library plans to add open linking which allows users, when they find a citation for a desired journal article, to click on a link and display the full article text.
Academic libraries are also moving to reduce redundant print copies. For example, nine campuses of the University of California have canceled print editions of selected journals, retaining print copies only in selected campus libraries or shared storage facilities. In the Midwest 11 university libraries are beginning to use the Center for Research Libraries in Chicago as their archive for print journals. Similar approaches are being explored for other materials.