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A SAMPLE OF VARIOUS
TYPES OF DIGITAL LIBRARIES
U.S.
sample
Academic Info
http://academicinfo.net/
"Gateway to
Quality Educational Resources." International in scope. Includes great many
academically oriented links, many not covered by other search engines.
Bartleby Library
- Great Books Online http://www.bartleby.com
"The preeminent
Internet publisher of literature, reference and verse providing students,
researchers and the intellectually curious with unlimited access to books
and information on the Web, free of charge. Our ever-expanding list of great
books—currently thousands of works by hundreds of authors—meets the needs
of students, researchers, and pleasure readers alike and forms the preeminent
electronic publishing enterprise of the twenty-first century." A great site
for original literature.
Library of Congress
http://www.loc.gov/
Provides entrance
to the catalog and a number of collections, projects and a large directory
of links. Among them are:
American
Memory: Historical Collection for the National Digital Library http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/ammemhome.html
American
Memory is the online resource compiled by the Library of Congress National
Digital Library Program. With the participation of other libraries and
archives, the program provides a gateway to rich primary source materials
relating to the history and culture of the United States. Now over 90
collections are online.
Library
and Informations Science Resources http://lcweb.loc.gov/global/library/
A rich directory of links to state and national libraries, and great many
other library resources.
The Collaborative
Digital Reference Service (CDRS) http://lcweb.loc.gov/rr/digiref/
Project
involving several institutions. " ... delivering answers to your
desktop now, when you need them." "CDRS will provide professional
reference service to researchers any time anywhere, through an international,
digital network of libraries and related institutions."
Los Angeles Public
Library http://www.lapl.org/kidsweb/
Example of
a digital library for & about children. Great fun!
National Geographic
Online http://www.nationalgeographic.com/
Example of
a magazine turned into a digital libray of rich sources, much more than
in the printed version. Excelent section for use in education. Galeries
- like one on tatoos.
The New York
Public Library - Digital Library Collection http://digital.nypl.org/
A rich site
mostly concentrating on digitized special collections of texts and images.
Among others, includes 'finding aids,' which are guides to archival and manuscript
collections; a set of photograph collections; and access to cooperative collections
such as Marriage, Women, and the Law, 1815-1914.
Rutgers libraries
http://www.libraries.rutgers.edu/
A long term
strategic plan for development of a digital library (also on the site). Various
electronic sources & numerous links. Includes information guides and sources
for various fields; e.g. for sources in library and information science go
to:Subject Research Guides; Social Sciences & Law; Library & Information
Science.
Tuffts University
- The Perseus Digital Library http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/
"Perseus is
an evolving digital library, engineering interactions through time, space,
and language." A most remarkable collection of sources dealing with culture
from antiquity to English renaissance to some pioneering American sources.
United States
National Library of Medicine (NLM) http://www.nlm.nih.gov/hinfo.html
NLM is the
world’s largest medical library and online system. Includes MEDLINE, MEDLINEplus,
and links to numerous other health-related resources, including to research
programs for computational biology and medical informatics.
University of
California, Berkeley http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/
Maintained
by the University of California and Sun MicroSystems. Renowned for its wealth
of digitized collections, its breadth of information and aides for the digital
library designer.
Also contains
Libweb, http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/Libweb/,
a directory of library servers on the Web "currently listing over 4,000
pages from libraries from over 100 countries." Excellent entry for finding
other libraries on the Web.
University of
California Digital Library http://www.cdlib.org
Digital library
for the nine universities in the University of California system.
University of
Michigan: Internet Public Library http://www.ipl.org/
Started at
Michigan Library School. Has a service Ask a Question at the IPL Reference
Center- answered by students, librarians etc.
University of
North Carolina, Chapel Hill - Ibiblio the Public's Library and Digital Archive
http://www.ibiblio.org/
Constructed
and maintained by collaboration of Center for Public Domain and University
of North Carolina - Chapel Hill. "Welcome to ibiblio.org - the Public's Library
- home to one of the largest "collections of collections" on the Internet.
ibiblio is a conservancy of freely available information, including software,
music, literature, art, history, science, politics, and cultural studies."
International
sample
Bibliothèque
Nationale de France - National Library of France http://www.bnf.fr/
Includes a
version in English. In addition to catalogues, includes a number of virtual
exhibitions (such as on short photographic poems), Gallica digital library,
and cultural events.
Cambridge University
Library, U.K. http://www.lib.cam.ac.uk/Digital
A number of
interesting and rare collections such as: images of a verse on the life of
King Edward the Confessor (written probably in the later 1230s or early 1240s).
and the "Taylor-Schecter Genizah Research Units." (Taylor and Schecter are
two scholars who added significant discovery contributions to the collection
of rare Judaica and Hebrew documents). The networked electronic services supported
by the library include references to books, articles, dissertations, reports,
and electronic journals.
Die Deutsche
Bibliothek - National Library of Germany http://www.ddb.de/
Includes a
version in English. Catalogs and databases in a number of national collections
and in museums. Not very impresive in comparison to Library of Congress
digital presence.
Oxford University,
U.K. - Bodley Library, http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/welcome.html
Bodley (one
of the most prestigious academic library in the world) has developed a site
of digital resources, images, and full-text journals dating back from the
16th century. Among others, content includes CJK allegro Catalogues,
the Internet library of early journals covering journals of 18th
and 19th century, Bodley Library Broadside Ballads Projects with
30,000 ballads of which the original printed materials range from the 16th
to the 20th century, an Image Catalogue, and many other resources.
Strathclyde University,
U.K. - Centre for Digital Library Research - BUBL Information Service
http://bubl.ac.uk/
"A national
information service for the higher education community." A rich site including
among others, access to over 200 journals, a catalogue of 12,000 selected
Internet resources organized by subject, links to collection development tools,
and more.
The New Zealand
Digital Library http://www.nzdl.org/
Includes several
demonstration collections—computer science technical reports and bibliographies,
literary works, humanitarian and development information, magazines, newspaper
links from throughout the world etc. It also provides digital library software
that they developed free of charge.
Toronto Public
Library - Canada http://vrl.tpl.toronto.on.ca/
A good example
of public library efforts.
Virtual Library
- Switzerland, US, UK & other countries http://vlib.org
"The VL is
the oldest catalog of the web, started by Tim Berners-Lee, the creator of
html and the web itself. Unlike commercial catalogs, it is run by a loose
confederation of volunteers, who compile pages of key links for particular
areas in which they are expert; even though it isn’t the biggest index of
the web, the VL pages are widely recognised as being amongst the highest-quality
guides to particular sections of the web." Yes, this is an accurate statement!
