1 Ariadne and Exploit-Mag: Web Review and European Library Telematics Philip Hunter UKOLN University of Bath Bath, BA2 7AY

2 UKOLN Background UKOLN (The UK Office for Library and Information Networking) provides awareness, research and information services and has the following goals:  To promote awareness of emergent issues at technical, service and policy levels  To provide a focal point for research, development, and performance measurement  To influence policy makers and service providers in the interests of the communities it serves  To demonstrate high-quality information services

3 UKOLN Project Involvement UKOLN is represented on many national committees and initiatives and works to influence practice and policy It provides support to the UK Electronic Libraries Programme, and to the Libraries and Information Commission It maintains research and awareness programmes in distributed library and information systems and in public library networking UKOLN has also established itself as a central source of expertise in the area of metadata

4 UKOLN Project Involvement BIBLINK (EU - Telematics for Libraries) - project led by the British Library looking at the transmission of metadata between electronic publishers and national bibliographic agencies DESIRE (EU - Telematics for Research) - large project looking at aspects of Web-based information management ROADS (UK Electronic Libraries Programme) - project creating a distributed standards based system for subject information gateways NewsAgent (UK Electronic Libraries Programme) - project creating a systems framework to provide a current awareness service

5 UKOLN and eLib UKOLN is funded by JISC, the British Library Research and Innovation Centre, the Electronic Libraries Programme, and the European Union UKOLN hosts and maintains project pages on behalf of the eLib programme

6 UKOLN and eLib Electronic Libraries Programme (eLib) established in 1994 Initial budget of 24 million US dollars over 3 years Objectives include the use of IT to improve delivery of information through increased use of electronic library services and to encourage new methods of scholarly publishing Ariadne is an eLib project

7 Ariadne Bi-monthly newsletter in parallel hard copy and electronic format Originally aimed primarily at academic libraries Describes and evaluates sources and services available on the Internet of potential use to librarians and information professionals Reports to the library community on eLib

8 Ariadne Ariadne registered well over a million hits in its first year (founded in January 1996) and, a search on Alta-Vista in March 1997 found that about 500 sites link to Ariadne Ariadne has become a central part of the UK's information landscape, and an important international resource

9 Ariadne Ariadne is moving towards a greater concentration on the reporting, discussion and evaluation of technical issues arising from information networking The fluidity of the Internet as a communications and publishing medium created an urgent need among academic librarians for an authoritative publication

10 Ariadne & Exploit-Mag Exploit-Mag is to provide unified access to information concerning European and national library projects Editorial board drawn from the Exploit consortium Experience of Ariadne with UK eLib Programme is directly applicable to Exploit-Mag and the EU Telematics for Libraries Programme

11 Exploit-Mag Few genuine pan-European communication and dissemination vehicles in existence Exploit-Mag is intended to promote the development of effective mechanisms for the exploitation of results emerging from the Telematics for Libraries Programme Envisaged that it will promote the transfer of know-how in this area to those CEE countries which have applied for accession to the EU

12 Exploit-Mag & Technical Development Both Ariadne & Exploit-Mag will be managed with the aid of site tools Production of Exploit-Mag will be automated, allowing the reuse of common materials from a central database Exploit-Mag will be produced using Cascading Style Sheets

13 What you can do The idea of Exploit-Mag is to service the requirements of the European Union Libraries Telematics Programme. Exploit-Mag would be happy to receive suggestions about ways in which the magazine might be tailored and adapted to its precise environment: (UKOLN home pages) (Ariadne home pages)