Toby Burrows

How the West was won: using VDX to redevelop cooperative document delivery services in Western Australia

The Western Australian Group of University Librarians (WAGUL) has a long history of successful collaborative ventures. A well‐established cooperative interlending agreement is one notable venture that has operated successfully for over 20 years. To further enhance this service, WAGUL decided to participate in the national local interlending and document delivery administration system (LIDDAS) project with the objective of implementing an automated system, using the VDX software, to manage document delivery activity. Since 2002, VDX has been used for the transmission of requests and documents between the WAGUL member libraries. The success of this project has largely been the result of the four libraries working together to share expertise and problem‐solving. This article discusses the process of working collaboratively across institutions ‐ and its benefits and difficulties – in the context of implementing an automated document delivery system.

Brave New World or plus ça change?: electronic journals and the academic library

ABSTRACTThe impact that electronic information technologies have had on scholarly communications and university libraries is assessed. Early predictions that the dominance of commercial publishers would decline and journal prices would fall have not been realised. The development of institutional repositories have had limited success in making the research output of universities freely available to the scholarly community.

DEVELOPING A DIGITAL REPOSITORY FOR A HUMANITIES RESEARCH NETWORK: THE PIONEER PROJECT

The Australian Research Councils Network for Early European Research (NEER) is a recent initiative aimed at broadening and deepening research in the field of medieval and early modern European studies. An integral part of the Network is its Digital Services Programme, which integrates a range of digital strategies designed to advance the Networks goals. Among these strategies is a project to develop a national discipline-based digital repository known as PioNEER. This paper looks at the issues that have arisen in the course of this project.

Personal electronic archives: collecting the digital me

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to show that nowadays much of an individuals life is recorded and documented in electronic form. This has major implications for manuscript and archival collections, which are explored in this paper. The records of significant individuals have always been collected by libraries and other cultural institutions. Until fairly recently, these records were largely paper‐based, and sophisticated approaches to their management have been developed over many years.Design/methodology/approach – There has been some previous work done on identifying the main issues relating to collecting personal electronic archives, but new forms of personal records are continually emerging. This paper surveys the current situation.Findings – This is an area which is rapidly growing in importance and complexity. It deserves more attention, particularly in a library setting. There is still a lack of practical investigations aimed at developing guidelines for best practice and procedures for han...

Electronic texts, digital libraries, and the humanities in Australia

The humanities are facing considerable difficulties and pressures in Australian universities, as staff numbers fall and research funds shrink. Despite this, various innovative projects, aimed at creating electronic versions of texts and other cultural materials, are currently in progress. A range of different cultural institutions is involved, though the university and state libraries are the most active participants. Funding for such projects is difficult to come by, and the future looks somewhat uncertain. If a more coordinated and coherent approach to building digital libraries is to succeed in Australia, researchers and cultural institutions will need to work together to establish the appropriate financial and organizational frameworks.

A machine for browsing: beyond the “single search box”

Purpose – This paper seeks to discuss the possibility of reviving browsing as an access framework in the midst of the “single search box” phenomenon.Design/methodology/approach – The paper provides an overview of recent trends in the implementation of “single search” products and contrasts this with the emergence of the Linked Open Data framework.Findings – The paper suggests that the Linked Open Data framework will provide an important platform for reviving browsing as an alternative to searching in information systems.Originality/value – The paper aims to stimulate further discussion about the relative importance of browsing and searching, as well as about the implementation of the Linked Open Data framework.

Identity parade: building web portals about people

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to look at the current state of initiatives to develop “people‐centred” portals by repurposing name authority data from union catalogues and similar sources.Design/methodology/approach – A range of current projects and services are reviewed and evaluated to identify common features and trends.Findings – Several recent efforts in this area are of considerable interest and promise, but there are elements of this kind of service that will need further development and experimentation.Originality/value – This is one of the first attempts to give an overview of this type of initiative and to suggest some directions for the future.

Discovering Early Europe in Australia: The Europa Inventa Resource Discovery Service

The ARC Network for Early European Research (NEER) is funded under the Australian Research Councils Research Networks programme. Its goal is to enhance the scale and focus of Australian research in this multidisciplinary field, and to build collaborative and innovative approaches to the way research is planned and managed. It has more than 350 individual participants, as well as eight industry partners, working across five major research theme areas and fourteen Research Clusters [1]. An integral part of NEERs vision is the development of a digital environment which provides a focus for the work of this national research community. This environment includes a collaborative Web work space (Confluence) [2] and a repository of research outputs (PioNEER) which will be launched in late 2008. This paper looks at the third major component of the digital environment: Europa Inventa, which will provide a resource discovery service for Early European objects, artworks and manuscripts held in Australian cultural heritage institutions.

Managing ILL - US Style [Book Review]

Review(s) of: Interlibrary Loan and Document Delivery: Best Practice for Operating and Managing Interlibrary Loan Services in all Libraries, by Lee Andrew Hilyer, Binghamton, NY: Haworth Information Press, 2006. 150 pp. US

Preserving the Past, Conceptualising the Future: Research Libraries and Digital Preservation

19.95 soft cover ISBN 0789031299 (also published as Journal of Interlibrary Loan, Document Delivery and Electronic Reserve 16, 1/2).