The European Library: Project and service

1. The European Library: Project and service Online Information and Education Conference 2004, Bangkok Dr. Britta Woldering, German National Library Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

2. Overview • European national libraries • The TEL project • The TEL service • TEL Business Planning • Multilingual issues Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

3. European national libraries Conference of European national librarians (CENL) • 43 members from 41 countries • Annual meetings • Standing committee for projects (CoBRA forum) • Common web service: Gabriel Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

4. Gabriel • Web service of the European national libraries organised in the CENL (http://www.kb.nl/gabriel/) • The mission of Gabriel is to provide information about Europe's National Libraries, their collections and their services in order to facilitate access to them, and to foster the development of new services based on a shared infrastructure. Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

5. Gabriel II Characteristics of Gabriel: • uniform presentation of all information about the National Libraries; • support of multilingualism; • a geographical guide and a systematic guide to the services of the National Libraries; • a shared search engine for the WWW services of the National Libraries; • a survey of partnerships and projects in which the National Libraries are involved. Enhancement of Gabriel: the TEL idea Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

6. The TEL project • Aim: investigate feasibility of a new pan-European service of national libraries • 36 months, completed January 2004 • Partly EC-funded • National libraries of Germany, Finland, Italy, Netherlands, Portugal, Slovenia, Switzerland, UK • ICCU, CENL Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

7. Strategic fit with Europe’s national libraries • The European Library project • Improved access for citizens to Europe’s repositories of cultural and scientific knowledge • Mission of national libraries • Access / collection building • European Co-operation • Shared aims / common standards Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

8. Key issues faced by the project • Need for consensus building • Engagement with potential users • Rapid technological change • Limited funding for development Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

9. Successes of TEL • Consensus achieved • Mission • Metadata standards • Business model • Pragmatic approach to technical development • Commitment to operational service Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

10. CENL Resolution • CENL members support the vision for the planned European Library service • Gabriel will be migrated to The European Library • All CENL members are becoming part of the European Library from its inception as basic participants, included in CENL membership • All CENL members are eligible to become full participants by paying an additional annual subscription Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

11. The European Library service • Integrated access to the combined resources of national libraries • Cross-collection searching • Collection level searching • Integrated results • Digital and non-digital resources • Information about CENL libraries Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

12. Homepage Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

13. Simple Search Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

14. Advanced Search Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

15. Results List Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

16. Result Data Set Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

17. Web Exhibitions of Partners Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

18. Guide to all CENL Libraries Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

19. Information on the Library Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

20. Business Planning • Different organisations, different countries, different business aims: Reconciliation of polices and services • Mapping of present digital services • Requirements for the TEL service • Identification of congruences and conflicts • Proposal of a harmonised approach Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

21. Business Planning II The Business Plan seeks to answer some fundamental questions: • What is the nature of the service? • What is unique about it? • Who is it for? • How will it be achieved? • How much will it cost? • How will it be funded? • How will it be managed? • What benefits will it bring to its investors / stakeholders and users? • What are the risks? Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

22. Who is the Service aimed at? • The “informed citizen” • The researcher • A way into European cultural resources Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

23. How will the service be achieved? • Options evaluation carried out • Issues • Robustness of solution • Scalability • Wide Accessibility • Costs Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

24. Preferred Technical Option • SRU Portal • New web technology (successor to Z39.50) • Good match to requirements • Low cost • Flexibility • Scalability • Low risk • Solution proposed for launch of service • Solution was subject to independent review • Solution subsequently endorsed Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

25. How much will the service cost? • Dependent upon technical solution and available funding • Key elements • Hardware • Software • Database build and maintenance • Support staff • Minimum of 270.000 € pa Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

26. How will the service be funded? • By Subscription • Potential for new members in due course • Commitment of almost € 1 million over three years Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

27. How will the service be managed? • CENL – legal entity • Ownership • Commitment from partners to CENL • Agency for subscriptions • Contract between CENL and the service provider Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

28. How will the service be managed? cont. • Management Board • Executive Group • European Library Office • Technical Working Group • Languages Working Group • Contacts Group • Koninklijke Bibliotheek, National Library of the Netherlands • Staff / Development / Support Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

29. What are the risks? • Overall risk is low-to-medium • Financial • Political • Technical • Need for risk management strategy • Need for performance management strategy Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

30. Multilingual Issues • CENL: 43 members from 41 countries with 36 official languages; working language English (not sufficient) • Gabriel: multilingual service, English, French and German; native speakers as language editors • TEL: English, French and German for information part; eight languages for search part; 36 languages for the logo Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

31. Multilingual Issues II Problem: multilingual search • At launch only Latin script but many differences regarding diacritics, e.g. Löschzüge, événement, knjižnica • In the future integration of Greek and Cyrillic script necessary • Variations in personal names • Special problem: multilingual subject access Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

32. Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

33. Multilingual Issues III • Subject indexing: classification or subject headings • Subject headings: language dependent • Project: Multilingual Access to Subjects (MACS) Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

34. Doc. in Russian Doc. in German Doc. in English Doc. in French Indexer German SH Italian SH German SH French SH English ? ? ? user has to search in German User English Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

35. Doc. in Russian Doc. in French Doc. in German Doc. in English Indexer German SH Italian SH German SH French SH English user can search in English User English Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

36. The solution: MACS • Multilingual subject heading system • Built on existing systems • International co-ordinated approach • Successfully tested in the MACS project Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

37. Basic Principles of MACS • Equality of languages and SHLs (no pivot) with autonomy of each SHL (only local, MACS is an external link database) • Establishment of equivalences (no translation) between the SHLs involved (no new thesaurus) • Equivalence links conceived as concept clustersMACS = mappings and numeric identifiers • Consistency of results (goal = users retrieval) • Extensible to other SHLs Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

38. Search by SHL Click to view and edit Links established and maintained in the Link management interface, with mechanism for managing partial or complex links Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

39. Multilingual Issues: Outlook • The problems regarding multilinguality are identified • Some of them are already addressed in projects • The transfer into operational systems is still to be done • And finally the integration into The European Library Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

40. www.europeanlibrary.org Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004

41. Thank you very much for your attention! Contact: Britta Woldering: woldering@dbf.ddb.de Jill Cousins, Head of European Library Office: jill.cousins@kb.nl Britta Woldering, DDB Online Information & Education 2004