As the need for digital content increases almost daily, preserving this content for university libraries, especially in the least developed and developing nations, becomes a challenge, resulting in the loss of this data. Even though most of these libraries are automated and adopt one digital preservation strategy or the other, library users need…

Recent surveys indicate that many colleges and universities have reached a pivotal moment in assessing the function and future development of their institutional repositories. Other surveys convey that archivists are participating in the development and implementation of institutional repositories at a variety of levels and have contributed to the…

This article describes the roles of librarians in a research library, particularly in the digital era. Librarians' roles vary from the custodian of resources to providers of a diverse nature of activities ranging from collection development, organization of knowledge, information services, preservation and conservation, and management. Librarians…

This report is the third in a set of three reports from the project, "Issues in Library Research: Proposals for the 1990s," which was launched in September 1986 to investigate library and information science issues in order to assess the current state of the profession and identify a research agenda to lead into the next decade. This…

Presents four challenges faced by libraries and proposes research designs to address each of them. The challenges involve: invisible infrastructure; content and collections; preservation and access; and institutional boundaries. Proposes a mixture of research methods that includes surveys, case studies, documentary analyses, and policy analyses.…

This document presents the program and proceedings from the 68th International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) Conference held in Glasgow, Scotland, August 18-24, 2002. Topics of presentations include: library services for parliaments; needs assessment; the effects of September 11th on information provision and privacy;…

This report summarizes a collection of nine essays addressing the future of libraries that were an outgrowth of a study conducted by the Office of Library Programs to develop a research agenda. The study is described in the first of three sections of this report, and abstracts of the essays are presented in the second section. Areas of concern…

The United States Department of Education invited leading professionals who work in the library field in federal agencies, universities, associations, and foundations to a meeting in Washington, DC to explore the need for national focus on library research. Each participant suggested a research issue of particular concern to their organization and…

This collection of nine essays is an outgrowth of a study which was conducted by the Office of Library Programs to identify researchable issues that could help librarians fill a position of leadership in the information society. An introduction to the collection describes the study and includes a list of the 10 major issues identified by…

"Research Library Issues" ("RLI") is a bimonthly report from ARL (Association of Research Libraries), CNI (Coalition of Networked Information), and SPARC (Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition). This issue includes the following articles: (1) Removing All Restrictions: Cornell's New Policy on Use of Public…

Describes ways in which collection development at the Smithsonian Institution Libraries has been affected by the libraries' position within a museum context. The discussion covers the adoption by the libraries of a nomenclature that applies to management of museum objects collections and their capitalization on allied interests in such areas as…

This report is based in part on an analysis of current preservation practices and of the 1988-89 Association of Research Libraries (ARL) Preservation Statistics. It includes discussion of the 10 components of a comprehensive preservation program to which library administrators must give attention. Organizational models for mature preservation…

Discusses the cost of access to research information and suggests that lower staff costs in a digital library setting are a key to providing more affordable access. Topics include equivalent library services; quality of service; differences between disciplines; archiving and preservation; citations, hyperlinks, and reference linking; metadata;…

Six papers from a seminar on special collections in research libraries address special collections and the scholarly community; the function of special collections in research and education; services and development issues; the evolving character of special collections; special collections in emerging information delivery programs; and the…

These proceedings contain 21 research reports and 56 position papers as well as capsule descriptions of 32 workshop forums, panel presentations, and group discussions that took place at the conference. The papers are organized into nine broad subject areas: (1) academic and research librarianship (recruitment, technology and change, faculty…