Progress and Prospects for European Digital Libraries Ron Davies [email protected] Access, Oct. 12, 2006 The opinions expressed in this presentation are those of the author and do not express the opinion of the European Commission
Jan 29, 2016
Progress and Prospects for European Digital Libraries
Access, Oct. 12, 2006
The opinions expressed in this presentation are those of the author
and do not express the opinion of the European Commission
Progress and Prospects
• Current initiatives and future prospects– European Union – Member states
• Progress in infrastructure for interoperability and multilingual access– The European Library (TEL)– MACS / BS 8723
European Union• 25 Member States, 20 languages
• European Commission has supported enabling activities through research and Info Society programmes encouraging:– Interoperability, ensuring access across
borders and between different domains– Multilingual access, to ensure accessibility,
preserve cultural diversity
• Recent enhanced interest in digital libraries
EU chronology
• Dec. 2004 Google Print announcement• Apr. 2005 Letter from Pres. Chirac and five
leaders to Commission/Council• May 2005 Statement by Pres. Barroso• Communications from the Commission
– Sept. 2005 - i2010 Digital Libraries Initiative – Mar. 2006 - Step up efforts to create European
Digital Library– Aug. 2006 - Digitisation, online accessibility and
preservation
i2010 Digital Libraries Initiative• Vision to make European cultural
heritage easier to access and use in an online environment– All types of material (books, films and other
AV material, photos, archival documents)– Digitised and born digital materials– Different types of cultural institutions
(libraries, archives, museums)
• Make available by 2010 at least 6 million books, documents and other works
European Digital Library
• Online public consultation (225 replies): – Decentralized model with a visible portal– Interoperability based on standards– Harmonisation in copyright exceptions
• High level expert group to advise on key challenges (20 members)
• Digitisation responsibility of MS; EC to coordinate digitisation techniques, preservation, copyright, legal deposit
eContentPlus 2005-2008(Information Society)
• Create conditions for creation and access to digital content incl. cultural, educational and scientific content– Achieve interoperability through common
standards; facilitate access and use in a multilingual context
• 60 million € over 4 years (2005-08)
• In 2005, 19 projects supported out of 238 proposals
Research programme (IST component)
• Since 2000, 20 projects worth 54 m € have addressed dig lib issues, e.g. – PrestoSpace - standardised practices for
preservation and archiving of AV materials
– BRICKS - OS software for building and sharing distributed heritage collections
– Calimera - Knowledge sharing network for local cultural heritage institutions
• Likely increase in 2007-2013 (FP7)
Activities in Member States
• Digitisation in member states
• Different approaches in different countries– E.g. Microsoft - British Library agreement
to digitise 100,000 public domain books (25 million pages)
France - Initiatives
• Dec. 2004 - Google Print announcement
• Mar. 2005 - Statement by President Chirac
• July 2005 - Creation of steering committee (government and industry representation)
• Mar. 2006 - White paper setting forth French proposals and actions
France - White Paper
• Set out French activities in the near term– 80% of Gallica converted to text format– 300 - 400 K additional documents digitised– Develop mass digitisation procedures– Develop dissemination platform for
copyright and public domain works– Platform prototype currently in
development
Progress : Infrastructure for interoperability and multilingual access
The European Library (TEL)• Cross-searching of collections in
European national libraries (incl. digital collections)
• Development funded through EU and Council of European National Libraries (CENL)
• Based at the Dutch national library
• “Portal in the browser” -- low cost, low barrier technical solution
Gateway
SRU
Distr. dbs
OAI index
XSLT stylesheets
JavascriptSRU
Z39.50
Z39.50
XML
XML
Collectiondescriptions
TEL ‘model’ for the European Digital Library
• Very largely decentralised architecture
• Visible single portal
• Based on standards
• Project led to operational system– Over 11 million records including 500,000
digital documents– More than 25,000 users
TEL issues• “Portal in the browser” means results always
grouped by resource, no possibility to merge, rank
• Alternative models of federated search / central index of harvested data
• Resource selection problem (choosing a reasonable number of relevant resources)
• Multilingual interface via stylesheets, virtual keyboard but not multilingual subject access
EDLproject (TEL phase 3)
• Funded by eContentPlus (2005 call)
• Announced Sept. 2006
• Managed by German national library– Extend TEL to additional EU/EEA countries
(BE, GR, ES, IE, SE, LU, NO, IS, LI)– Extend multilingual capacity in interfaces
and advanced search mechanisms– Support future planning and cooperation
with other DL activities in EU
Multilingual Access to Subjects (MACS)
• Joint project of national libraries (BL, BnF, DDB, SNL -- CENL)
• Mapping between subject headings (SHL) in three different systems– Library of Congress Subject Headings (en)– Rameau (fr)– SWD (de)
• More than 30,000 headings mapped, 3,000 between all three SHLs
MACS principles
• No central editor
• SHLs are equal - no pivotal language
• Partners are responsible for validating links
• Link management interface / user interface
• Links are managed separately from partner databases but accessible for users via web
Issues in mapping SHLs• Use base headings in schedule,
enumerated headings in schedule or all enumerated headings formed by adding standard subdivisions, etc. ?
• Mapping from/to schedules (SHL in abstract for any number of applications) or from headings used in a particular catalogue (MACS approach)?
BS 8723 Structured Vocabularies for IR
• Revision of UK/ISO standards for thesauri, replaces existing mono- / multi-lingual thesaurus standards
• Includes guidance on mapping between different structured vocabularies including classifications, subject headings, taxonomies, ontologies as well as thesauri
• Will provide advice on exchange formats and protocols for interoperability
Key future events
• EC Communication on scientific and scholarly aspects of the European Digital Library (end of 2006)
• Announcements of funding for eContentPlus programme (second half 2006, early 2007)
• Publication of Parts 3-5 of BS 8723 (early 2007)
References
i2010 Digital Libraries Initiative
http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/digital_libraries/index_en.htm
French initiatives
Actualités -- Bibliothèque numérique européenne
http://www.bnf.fr/PAGES/dernmin/bnue.htm
Résumé du Livre blanc du Comité de pilotage http://www.bnf.fr/PAGES/dernmin/pdf/bnue.pdf
The European Library (TEL)
http://www.theeuropeanlibrary.org/portal/index.html
Van Veen, T.; B. Oldroyd. “Search and Retrieval in The European Library” Dlib 10:2 (Feb. 2004) http://www.dlib.org/dlib/february04/vanveen/02vanveen.html MACS
Landry, Patrice. “Multilinguisme et langages documentaires: le projet MACS en contexte européen” Documentation et bibliothèques 52(2): 121-128.