 Last
updated:
September 15, 2003
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Digital Library
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DEVELOPING THE CLAREMONT
COLLEGES DIGITAL LIBRARY: The Libraries focus considerable resources on improving access to our digital collections. To make it easier for students and faculty to find them, and to make instructional and research tools more readily accessible, a Libraries' team redesigned our main web site, which debuted in August 2003. Along with our web site, the Libraries' online catalog, Blais, is the primary access point for our electronic resources; however, a looming question concerns whether Blais is the best access point for digital collections. If yes, the Libraries must expand the online catalog's capabilities beyond its current focus on bibliographic indexing and library staff must be devoted to the cataloging of electronic resources. If the online catalog proves inadequate, then we must consider other means for our users to find and access digital material easily that will also allow us to manage every phase of digital collection implementation. One possibility is a digital access management system, such as Luna Imaging's Insight® or OCLC's CONTENTdm® (Exhibit D7) which would provide the tools necessary for digital collection management. In either case, we need to add cataloging staff trained in describing digital media in order to provide adequate, robust access to digital items that have a variety of characteristics different from books and journals. We have taken a significant step forward concerning web access for all users to our archival and manuscript collections. In Spring 2003, special collections staff began contributing encoded finding aids to the Online Archive of California, a core component of the California Digital Library (Exhibit D8). Electronic resources have had a considerable effect on the Libraries' Bibliographic Access Services unit (BAS), where acquisitions and cataloging activities, essential activities concerning access, are centered. While traditional acquisitions and cataloging roles are clearly established in BAS, dealing with electronic resources has complicated these roles. An increasing amount of time is spent troubleshooting problems, and often several staff members from across the Libraries are involved, including BAS, Libraries' Information Technology staff, and subject specialist librarians. BAS staff has primary responsibility for both cataloging electronic resources and maintaining the web links for those resources in the online catalog; subject specialist librarians select appropriate electronic resources and spend a significant amount of time maintaining contacts with providers. Our IT staff assists with maintaining connectivity to these resources as well as provides expertise with network and systems problems affecting our electronic resources. Our electronic journals have required an extraordinary effort in order to make users aware of the more than 12,000 titles that we provide. Recognizing that users are accustomed to searching Blais when looking for journals in the Libraries, we have purchased MARC cataloging records from Serials Solutions, Inc., that provide Blais access to ejournals subscribed via a publisher as well as those in aggregate databases containing full-text articles. We are investigating easier ways for users to link from citations in our subscription databases to full text and related material from a multitude of sources, where the library subscribes to both the database and the linked resource. The proposed OpenURL standard (Exhibit D9) will facilitate the process of getting users more direct access to full text and integrate more seamlessly the variety of available electronic resources. While continuing to acquire and catalog traditional library materials, BAS staff has taken on the negotiation of licensing agreements and contracts as well. As negotiators with vendors, both librarians and BAS staff deal with complex issues including defining "authorized user" and managing copyright legalities for the use of electronic titles for interlibrary loan and electronic reserves. A unique and problematic issue for these staff is clarifying the legal status of the Libraries, as a unit of the single entity named Claremont University Consortium, in relation to multi-institutional consortia, so that a publisher, determined to charge a higher consortium price for a resource, understands the Libraries to be a single site. Other trends in the electronic arena that the Libraries struggle
with includes purchased databases with content, interfaces, and
costs that are constantly in flux, especially as publishers are
bought and sold or cease to exist. Librarians monitor the databases
closely and change providers when necessary so that our users have
access to the best resources that we can afford and support. Uncertain,
too, is the archival life of commercial electronic resources. Some
vendors provide an electronic archive upon the cessation of a title,
but some do not, leaving libraries in the position of purchasing
access to information that likely has a finite existence, as well
as adding the burden of archiving the information in-house (if legally
able to do so). |