One of the toughest challenges in an academic library systems office is how to manage and present the extensive selection of electronic resources from a variety of vendors. At York College of Pennsylvania, the authors participated in an admissions-driven web revision cycle and used a campus-provided CMS for 8 years. During this time, they tried…

This report draws on the results of a survey and case studies of Digital Library Federation (DLF) members (Council on Library and Information Resources - CLIR). The survey was intended to document how DLF member libraries are focusing their digital library programs: how and under what circumstances their programs were initiated; the influences…

The appearance of revolutionary information technologies must elicit equivalent responses from the library profession. Creating local online databases--information dropshipping--is an activity that public and academic libraries can implement. Through technology, libraries can create a new domain on the production side of knowledge and information.…

Discussion of the World Wide Web and the role of academic librarians as online system developers and designers focuses on usability testing. Usability evaluation at OCLC and at the University of Arizona is described, and the integration of the results into their Web and online product designs is discussed. (Author/LRW)

Vendor-provided electronic resource usage statistics are not currently standardized across vendors. This study investigates the feasibility of using locally collected data to check the reliability of vendor-provided data. Vendor-provided data were compared with local data collected from North Carolina State University (NCSU) Libraries' Web…

Explores library-user infatuation with electronic resources, the rapid growth of electronic resources and their impact on traditional reference services, and reference services in an electronic society. Discusses a survey of 200 academic libraries investigating electronic resources and their impact on library personnel, especially on…

Discusses protection of intellectual property and the fair use of information from the academic library perspective. Comments on several factors related to intellectual property: politics, economic and cultural contexts, time constraints, and software and online systems. Suggests developing new laws for online environments. (AEF)

Describes JSTOR, a non-profit organization that creates, maintains, and provides online access to important scholarly journals. States that the JSTOR archive contains the complete back-runs of 169 journals and is available at more than 1,100 libraries across the world. (NB)

The Institute of Physics Publishing (IPP), a subsidiary body of the Institute of Physics (IOP), has used electronic publishing on the Internet as a major means of improving the speed of dissemination of physics information. The development of the Comprehensive Electronic Journals service is described along with recent enhancements and other…

This research is concerned with the pragmatic performance characteristics of competing information technologies (ITs) and services in the university research center, as measured by user demand and choice. Technologies and services studied include: (1) mediated search service operating at cost recovery, open to all; (2) end-user service collecting…

This research examines change agents' and opinion leaders' perceptions of CD-ROMs, online databases, and print sources in the academic library environment. The change agents and opinion leaders are librarians who advocate and influence the purchase decisions regarding computerized information systems. From a survey of librarians' perceived…

The rapid expansion of online publications has raised some concerns about the use of online databases in comparison with using traditional print publications. To determine the opinions of end users about using Dialog online databases versus their corresponding print versions, three libraries in Atlanta, Georgia--Atlanta-Fulton Public Library,…

Various aspects of the Integrated Academic Information Management System (IAIMS) initiative sponsored by the National Library of Medicine are explored in 10 articles. An overview of the program, the technologies involved, examples of implementation, approaches to integrated information systems, and the future of the program are discussed. (CLB)

Reports prepared by the Louisiana State University (LSU) Libraries Task Force on Electronic Services examine the present level of automated services at the LSU libraries and make recommendations for both long- and short-term plans to handle information in electronic format. The reports, each of which is followed by a list of recommendations, focus…

The University System of Georgia and the Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) built the innovative electronic library GALILEO (GeorgiA LIbrary LEarning Online system). This article describes the cooperation, leadership, and technology that made GALILEO possible; the proposal; planning and implementation; governance; current status; and future…