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Current Cites
Volume 12, no. 5, May 2001
Edited by [2]Roy Tennant
The Library, University of California, Berkeley, 94720
ISSN: 1060-2356 -
http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/CurrentCites/2001/cc01.12.5.html
Contributors: [3]Charles W. Bailey, Jr., [4]Margaret Gross, [5]Terry
Huwe, [6]Leo Robert Klein, [7]Eric Lease Morgan, [8]Margaret Phillips,
[9]Roy Tennant
[10]"At the Library, Cataloguing the Missteps" [11]International
Herald Tribune, (May 3, 2001)(http://www.iht.com/articles/18731.html).
- Less than flattering appraisal of the new French National Library
condemned for everything from being too colossal to being in the wrong
part of Paris. "...A library is its collections," says one critic
intimating that perhaps French officials got their priorities wrong. A
library is also the people it serves and apparently the planners got
that wrong as well. - [12]LRK
Baker, Nicholson. Double Fold: Libraries and the Assault on Paper New
York: Random House, 2001. - Those of you familiar with Nicholson
Baker's previous diatribes against libraries jettisoning the card
catalog in favor of automated library systems will not be surprised by
this book. Only now his jeremiad is about how libraries and archives
microfilmed newspapers and then discarded or pulped the originals. We
can take Baker to task for some of his conclusions, intimations of
conspiracy, and illusions of bad intent, but at their root the facts
are difficult to dispute. Libraries did microfilm newspapers, and they
did throw away the originals. Libraries must look carefully at the
actions of the past and consider their ramifications regarding their
collections now and in the future -- particularly as digitization
takes hold in many institutions. Unfortunately, calm consideration of
the issues is difficult when the depictions and descriptions he uses
are meant to inflame more than inform, and to advocate rather than
enlighten. His audience is the general public, and in trying to hold
their attention he tends toward hyperbole and theatrical tricks, when
libraries are all just trying to do the best they can for their
particular audiences, given the resources they're given to do it. -
[13]RT
Black, Alistair and Rodney Brunt, [14]"MI5, 1909-1946: An Information
Management Perspective" Journal of Information Science 26(3) (2000):
185-197.
(http://www.thenutshell.co.uk/content/secure/E-Journals/PDFs/ji260308.
pdf); Newman, Niles C., Alan L. Porter and Julie Yang, "Information
Professionals: Changing Tools, Changing Roles" [15]Information Outlook
(March 200): 24. - In judging the titles, one could assume that these
two articles are disparate, in sharp contrast, and even
contradictory. Black and Brunt of Leeds Metropolitan University, U.K.,
present the foibles and pitfalls of information management in the slow
paced past, while Newman et. al. attempt to forecast future
information management practices, within the context of rapid change.
They state that the information professional may become intimidated
and feel threatened. The common theme which permeates both articles is
the value and importance of effective information management. As such,
those managing information must combine several key skills: 1.
negotiate exponential growth and increased demand, 2. provide value
added interpretation and analysis of data, and 3. communicate these in
a timely manner. All of the preceding are pivotal to the
decision-making process. As we are in the present, positioned between
the past and a rapidly changing future, it is reassuring, validating,
and even comforting to know that these challenges are neither novel,
nor radical. Information management techniques and practices may be
evolving, but are an intrinsic component of the continuum of the
intelligent decision process. As technology evolves, we are not
reinventing the wheel, just improving it. MI5 is Britain's leading
counter-intelligence agency. Shortly after its inception in 1909, it
became evident that in order to succeed in its mission, the
establishment of an efficient system for information gathering,
storage, retrieval, analysis, and interpretation was paramount. Using
recently declassified documents in the Public Record Office, Black and
Brunt demonstrate that the value of information management was
recognized long before the advent of the computer. In tracing the
history, they note that despite the critical value of information,
there were times when it was allowed to degrade. The hierarchy of
priorities was determined largely by the inward focus of MI5's
charismatic leaders. Thus the quality and timeliness of intelligence
information deteriorated between world wars. Lacking evidence to the
contrary, the authors conclude that the degradation resulted from an
absence of information management practice based on widely accepted
business and library science standards. During the second world war,
needs dictated that information management, integral to decision
making, be once again accorded primacy. Black and Brunt's article does
not read like a cloak and dagger novella. Rather it is a scholarly
study of the benefits of systematic information management within an
organization, albeit one dealing with espionage. Newman et. al.
propose that the convergence of new technologies will radically alter
the role of information professionals. The information professional's
principle objectives are the management and rapid distillation of
information to reinforce the decision making process. Information
management will assume a new dimension as new skills are acquired, and
new intelligent tools are utilized. The authors present four trends,
the drivers behind each trend, as well as how these will impact the
information professionals' skills and roles. After reading both
articles, it becomes clear that expert tools, research profiles,
scripts and macros are indeed propelled by new technology. The
practical aims of information management, however, remain constant. -
[16]MG
Brown, Michael, et. al. "Building Large-Format Displays for Digital
Libraries", [17]Communications of the ACM 44(5) (May 2001): 57-59. -
When considering weak links in the chain of distribution for online
media it's rare that 20 inch monitors are singled out as inadequate
but that's precisely what the authors in this article do. The problem
as they see it is that even a 20 inch monitor will hardly do justice
to objects -- say, the ceiling-scraping David by Michelangelo -- which
are far larger. Their solution is to run a string of inexpensive
projectors in parallel against a large wall in a vision of "immersive"
displays which currently may only be available at planetariums or IMAX
cinemas. - [18]LRK
Cattagni, Anne and Elizabeth Farris. [19]"Internet Access in U.S.
Public Schools and Classrooms: 1994-2000. National Center for
Education Statistics, U.S. Dept. of Education. (May 2001)
(http://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=2001071). - This
study of internet access in U.S. public schools finds that "almost
all" schools now have access to the net. Access has gone from 35% to
98% in the period 1994-2000. Access is not equal for all types of
schools -- the study points to disparities based on income and race
though there are improvements here as well. The study also looks at
the type of connection and connection speed, hours of availability and
methods used to prevent student access to inappropriate material. -
[20]LRK
Cover, Robin. [21]SGML/XML Bibliography
(http://www.oasis-open.org/cover/biblio.html). - There's a reason why
I don't provide extensive coverage of SGML/XML and related topics in
my [22]Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography. I admit it: I
don't want to compete with Robin Cover, author of the frequently
updated and all-inclusive SGML/XML Bibliography. This annotated
bibliography is definitely the place to go if you want in-depth
information about these key standards, complete with links to the
literature (if available) and related links. Yeah, it would be nice if
the newer updates to the bibliography about XML were integrated into
the base document, which has references to over 2,000 works as of
1998. But, given the amount of work that has gone into this document,
who can really complain? Did I mention that the bibliography is only a
part of a much bigger Web site called [23]The XML Cover Pages
(http://www.oasis-open.org/cover/sgml-xml.html), edited by Cover? Want
news, overviews, archive sites, publications, user groups, event
listings, mailing lists, software tools and much more about an
alphabet soup of markup language standards? You got it. Give yourself
plenty of time to read it. - [24]CB
Cranefield, Stephen. [25]"Networked Knowledge Representation and
Exchange using UML and RDF" [26]Journal of Digital Information 1(8)
(February 2001)
(http://jodi.ecs.soton.ac.uk/Articles/v01/i08/Cranefield/). - This
article describes how UML (Universal Modeling Language) can be used to
encode the "knowledge" represented by Web pages. It does this by
describing the strengths and weaknesses of UML and [27]RDF (Resource
Discovery Framework), and then describes an online process for
exchanging the two through XSLT (Extensible Stylesheet Language
Transformations). Cranefield notes the process is not perfect. The
term "knowledge" is used in a philosophically very informal way, but
the text demonstrates how information can easily be converted from one
format to another for the purposes of extracting and possibly
representing meaning. - [28]ELM
Fox, Edward A. and Gary Marchioni, guest editors. "Digital Libraries"
[29]Communications of the ACM 44(5) (May 2001): 31-68. - This
collection of articles, short pieces, and sidebars continues CACM's
tradition of revisiting digital library research on a periodic basis
by devoting the bulk of an issue to the topic. As usual, it is a bit
of a mixed bag, but nearly all the pieces are devoted to the findings
of DL research -- research that may never result in actual,
functioning digital library services. A stand-out in this crowd is the
piece from the Perseus Project ("Drudgery and Deep Thought"), which is
not only tackling infrastructure issues but is also a destination that
has a large amount of interesting content. A short piece from
Christine Borgman reminding everyone that library services from human
beings are still needed in this brave new world, and another from the
New Zealand Digital Library on their Greenstone software that they are
using to provide access to a large collection of content, are worth
the few minutes required to read them. Another short piece is cited
elsewhere in this issue of Current Cites. - [30]RT
Glanz, James. "The World of Science Becomes a Global Village: Archive
Opens a New Realm of Research." [31]The New York Times (May 1, 2001).
- Founded more than 10 years ago by physicist Paul Ginsparg, the
[32]web-based archive at Los Alamos National Labs (http://arXiv.org/,
known variously as the Los Alamos pre-print server, electronic archive
or database of physics papers and, quaintly, the Los Alamos electronic
bulletin board) no longer qualifies as breaking news in the world of
information technology. This article focuses on how the archive has
changed physics by encouraging multinational collaboration and erasing
geopolitical boundaries. Researchers in resource-poor institutions now
have free access to the latest reports in their field. At the same
time, a physicist from, say, a small research institute outside of
Tehran can engage in scientific dialogue with researchers from major
institutions in the US and Europe. - [33]MP
Helton Rennels, Diana, and Fairhurst Taylor, Jill. [34]"Teacher's
Palette" [35]First Monday 6(4) (April 2, 2001)
(http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue6_4/rennels/). - In 1998, the
Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) University
Library received a grant from the Institute of Museums and Libraries
(IMLS) to study the uses of digital technology in art education. As
part of the program, twelve teachers became part of a pilot program to
integrate digital resources into a classroom teaching environment.
This article describes their experience, and the graphic elements the
authors include capture the delight of introducing art to children and
seeing what they create. It also sounds a promising note for
successful implementations of digital technology in the classroom,
which is notoriously unforgiving on hardware, software and curriculum
planners. - [36]TH
Hunter, Jane. "MetaNet -- A Metadata Term Thesaurus to Enable Semantic
Interoperability Between Metadata Domains" [37]Journal of Digital
Information 1(8) (February 2001)
(http://jodi.ecs.soton.ac.uk/Articles/v01/i08/Hunter/). - Mapping
terminology and cross-walks are all the rage when it comes to
gathering and homogenizing sets of XML data. The problems of mapping
(exact matches and semantic mappings) are articulated, and the use of
a thesaurus -- MetaNet -- is posited as an alternative solution.
Instead of "hardwiring" ontologies between data, terms looked up in a
thesaurus with the usual characteristics in order to build mappings
and crosswalks. This is interesting because what is old is new again;
take note of how a age-old library tool is being used in a new
environment. - [38]ELM
Maly, Kurt and Mohammad Zubair and Xiaoming Liu. [39]"Kepler - An OAI
Data/Service Provider for the Individual" [40]D-Lib Magazine 7(4)
(April 2001) (http://www.dlib.org/dlib/april01/maly/04maly.html). -
This article describes a simple [41]Open Archives Initiative
repository tool called [42]Kepler. By using this application
individual researchers can participate in the OAI with a minimum of
effort. Kepler is a bit different from other OAI repository tools.
First, it uses a file system to store its data, not a database.
Second, and more importantly, Kepler works in conjunction with a
"registration" server. This registration server is modeled on the idea
of peer-to-peer networking schemes such as Napster. If used in the way
it was designed, Kepler can facilitate wide-scale dissemination of
scholarly papers and information. No fuss. No muss. - [43]ELM
Mann, Charles C. [44]"Electronic Paper Turns the Page." [45]Technology
Review 104 (March 2001): 42-48
(http://www.technologyreview.com/magazine/mar01/mann.asp) - The
problem with current e-book readers is that they are not books. It's
hard to read text on those little screens, especially in strong light,
and you lose the navigation capabilities, broader context, and
mnemonic qualities that flipping pages provides. Sure you can do neat
stuff like searching, but what are you going to take to the beach?
Enter e-paper--flexible plastic sheets that conduct electricity and
are stamped with circuits that control a layer of e-ink to create
black-and-white characters and images. In the future, take a few
hundred sheets of e-paper and add a hard cover plus an electronic
spine crammed with a cpu, a storage device, and a wireless board.
Result: an e-book that looks like a book and works like a book, but
stores countless works and supports searching, linking, and dynamic
updating via the Internet. How far in the future? Maybe a few years,
maybe a decade. Still, this is a technology to keep an eye on. -
[46]CB
[47]Proceedings of the 10th National ACRL Conference, Denver, CO,
March 15-18, 2001 Association of College and Research Libraries,
American Library Association, 2001
(http://www.ala.org/acrl/protindex01.html). - These wide-ranging
papers touch on a variety of topics relating to academic libraries. If
you're an academic librarian, there's probably something of interest
to you here. The problem is that you will have a hard time finding it.
Since papers are listed alphabetically by title or by author, there is
nothing to do but scan the titles from A to Z looking for papers of
interest. They are in Adobe Acrobat format only, and no searching is
provided. However, there are gems here worth the trouble, so be
persistent. - [48]RT
Scigliano, John A. [49]"John A. Scigliano interviews Allan B. Ellis"
[50]The Internet and Higher Education 3(1-2) (1st Quarter-2nd Quarter
2000): 125-139.
(http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6W4X-430XMJH-9/1/d33a5e
e8a2b0 146f880eeee8b31ba10b). - That old time religion is what seethes
through this interview with computer and automation pioneer Allan
Ellis as he recalls early efforts while at Harvard in automating
various functions of the local school system. Ellis recalls the
vision, widely held at the time, that not only was the computer going
to speed things up but that it would allow us -- nay, require us -- to
rethink much of what we do. "Thinking about computers in education
does not mean thinking about computers," Ellis says quoting himself
from an earlier age, "it means thinking about education." - [51]LRK
Wiggins, Richard. [52]"Digital Preservation: Paradox & Promise"
[53]NetConnect A supplement to Library Journal and School Library
Journal (Spring 2001): 12-15
(http://www.libraryjournal.com/digital_preservation.asp). - In his
usual interesting and highly-readable style, Wiggins takes on a
familiar topic but brings a new perspective. Citing the overnight
disappearance of a large collection of government content during the
recent presidential transition (at least some of which may yet become
available again, albeit in a different place), Wiggins outlines modes
of "digital death" (let me count the ways...), or the ways in which
digital information can disappear. There are many, and they lean
toward the mundane and trivial (e.g., the information provider loses
interest) rather than the dramatic (e.g., disaster). If digital data
goes into that dark night, he seems to assert, it will mostly go
quietly. A sidebar on the ironic disappearance of an archive that set
out to preserve digital serials provides a tragic example of how
commitment means almost everything in digital preservation, with any
other issue being a far, far distant second. - [54]RT
Wilhelm, Anthony G. [55]"They Threw Me a Computer -- But What I Really
Needed Was a Life Preserver." [56]First Monday 6(4) (April 2, 2001)
(http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue6_4/wilhelm/). - This is the
keynote address of "Web-Wise: The Second Annual Conference on
Libraries and Museums in the Digital World", and the author uses his
pulpit to speak earnestly about the vital roles that information
professionals play in bridging the digital divide. He identifies four
attributes of the digital divide -- literacy, access, content and
training -- and explores the record of libraries and museums in
addressing the ongoing challenge of meeting end users on their own
terms. It will not come as a surprise to public service providers that
he builds a strong case for the importance of "people"
skills-emphasizing human interaction alongside technology. He argues
that a personal touch is all the more needed to move the truly
disadvantaged into the digital arena. - [57]TH
_________________________________________________________________
Current Cites 12(5) (May 2001) ISSN: 1060-2356
Copyright <20> 2001 by the Regents of the University of California All
rights reserved.
Copying is permitted for noncommercial use by computerized bulletin
board/conference systems, individual scholars, and libraries.
Libraries are authorized to add the journal to their collections at no
cost. This message must appear on copied material. All commercial use
requires permission from the editor. All product names are trademarks
or registered trade marks of their respective holders. Mention of a
product in this publication does not necessarily imply endorsement of
the product. To subscribe to the Current Cites distribution list, send
the message "sub cites [your name]" to
[58]listserv@library.berkeley.edu, replacing "[your name]" with your
name. To unsubscribe, send the message "unsub cites" to the same
address.
References
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