Volume 14, Issue 1

To date, systematic approaches to the provision of and infrastructure of digital library knowledge services have not been able to model accurately the communication, protocols, and discourse practices in science disciplines. On one hand, there is a growing need for collocation and retrieval of scientific works online and not merely for services based on known-item identification. On the other, infrastructures for collection, such as the web service, ontologies, or the semantic web, need specialized knowledge. We argue that these infrastructures are not only limited to the web; they have also introduced new systematic contextures constraining communication in scientific communities. To assist the process of developing a better contexture for such types of knowledge, we report the lessons learned from the Alexandria Digital Library project and use water resources management as a given domain of geo-referenced knowledge to understand and develop library-user scenarios. This research is a pre-requisite for the development of knowledge services in a problem-solving environment.

This study describes the availability of quality journals held at the University of Malaya Library (UML) in the field of computer science and compares this to the availability of journal collections in four other university libraries: Science University of Malaysia (USM), University of Technology Malaysia (UTM), National University of Malaysia (UKM), and University Putra Malaysia (UPM). All the universities included in the study have been established for more than fifteen years and offer degree programmes in computer science. Quality journals refer to the 301 titles with impact-factor scores listed in the Journal Citation Report 1999 (JCR) in the field of computer science. The study also investigates the degree of journal overlap among the five university libraries. The UML was taken as a case study to show how overlap titles are ascertained and costs calculated. The results indicate that (a) UML holdings of quality journal titles is poor and that a similar pattern is indicated in the other university libraries (34.22% by UML, 40% by UTM, 16% by UKM, 31% by USM, and 23% by UKM); (b) for the five libraries, out of the 301 titles, 115 (38.2%) overlap, 96 titles (32.23%) are singly-held titles, and 84 titles are not subscribed to; (c) the percentage of overlap is related to the size of title availability; (d) the cost of journal title overlap for UML is estimated to be about U.S.$79,650.40, and the cost of the titles not subscribed to is U.S.$41,440.32. It is proposed that cooperative subscription ventures would help reduce costs and release monies to cover the other quality titles not subscribed to by any of the libraries.

n 1998 this statement sparked the creation of the Independent Library Movement in Cuba, a movement that quickly grew from one library to more than one hundred libraries. In spite of the fact that there already existed a well developed library system in Cuba, these libraries claimed as their mandate that they would supply the Cuban people with material not available in the national system. In essence they were putting Castro’s conviction, that there are no censored books in Cuba, to the test. Over the years since their opening, the independent libraries have reported various instances of harassment from the Cuban government, and most recently, in the spring of 2003, fourteen independent “librarians” were sentenced to long prison terms. I put librarians in quotation marks as the individuals running the independent libraries are not certified librarians. According to John Pateman of the Cuban Libraries Solidarity Group, “[a]ll of the main people involved in the project belong to ‘independent press agencies’ and ‘oppositional political parties’. None of them are qualified librarians or members of the Cuban Library Association (ASCUBI)” (2000, p.1). The sentencing of the “librarians” was a result of “…a major government crackdown on dissidents in the country. Cuba says the dissidents were arrested for accepting U.S. government money, a charge U.S. officials deny” (McClelland, 2003, p.3). This statement highlights the key element of the controversy surrounding the Independent Library Movement in Cuba: are they revolutionaries trying to overthrow the Cuban government or are they persecuted librarians taking a stand on intellectual freedom? This essay strives to present the major issues involved in this controversy by examining the current political and economic situation in Cuba, the state-run “official” libraries, the independent libraries, the groups that support either side of the debate, and the response from the Canadian Library Association (CLA) and American Library Association (ALA), as well as the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA).

Today there are more than 160,000 Hmong living in the United States. Significant Hmong populations can be found in California, Minnesota, Wisconsin, North Carolina, Michigan, and Colorado. From personal observation and experience, the Hmong do not seek any information from the library like other new immigrants. This paper offers some insights and recommendations to assist public librarians to add the Hmong-Americans to their list of library users and supporters.

No abstract available.

“Course-related instruction is the most effective approach to meeting the objectives of library instruction, thereby making faculty-librarian collaboration all the more significant.” (Farber, 1999, p. 231). This observation has been demonstrated by the collaborative efforts of an Ethnic Studies librarian and instructor through the development and integration of library technology–class web pages—into course curriculum. In the process of creating this technology, there are certain things for which one may and may not expect class web pages to do. Class web pages can be an efficient and effective tool in the assignment completion process, provide learning opportunities through several formats and media, present extended learning opportunities that are initiated by the teacher. Class web pages cannot be a substitute for the teacher or librarian be effective or efficient unless they are integrated into the curriculum, be effective or efficient if their utility does not complement the course’s learning objectives.

No abstract available.