Gateways logo

ISSN 1039-3498 | no. 44 | April 2000


eLib Programme Director visits National Library

Chris  Rusbridge, Programme Director of eLib

Chris Rusbridge, Programme Director of eLib, speaking in the NLA theatre

In February, the National Library was host to Chris Rusbridge, Programme Director of the U.K. Electronic Libraries Programme (eLib). eLib is an ambitious three-phased initiative by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) to ‘transform the use and storage of knowledge in higher education institutions’ (from the eLib statement, http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/services/elib/). eLib was established in 1995 by JISC with the aim of engaging the British higher education community to help develop and shape the implementation of the national electronic library.

Chris recently established the JISC/NSF (U.S. National Science Foundation) international program, which aims to foster joint research projects between U.S. researchers and research teams in other countries to help develop digital libraries. Chris has also played a key role in the development of new strategic frameworks for future programs, including initiatives that will contribute to the Distributed National Electronic Resource (DNER) (http:www.jisc.ac.uk/pub99/dner_desc.html).

Chris met with National Library staff and representatives of the Australian higher education and research sector to discuss common issues concerning the provision of services to the information and research community. Early eLib projects addressed issues such as document delivery, access to network resources, electronic journals and digitisation. More recent eLib projects concentrated on large-scale resource discovery, or clumps; digitisation and preservation activities; and the development of hybrid libraries projects (where print and electronic information are combined) in the UK. The outcomes of these projects have strong relevance to the Australian higher education and research sector.

In a public lecture given at the National Library, Chris described in detail the challenges surrounding the provision of content, including the diversity of web interfaces (even for the same type of data), data types, usage and the skill levels required for access. The large range of data currently being researched by eLib to help improve accessibility includes census data, satellite data, commercial electronic journals, digitised ordinance survey maps and the combined bibliographic resources contained in catalogued clumps (see http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue22/distributed.distukcat2.html).

While visiting the Library, Chris also participated in a meeting of the Australian subject gateway projects and services, described in an article on page eight of this issue.

| Contents list for this issue of Gateways |

Please address any comments and enquiries to The Editor, Gateways: tford@nla.gov.au

Gateways logo