Electronic Library and
Information Resources
Introduction and overview
Objectives
Participants will be able to:
• Describe the different types of e-resource
• Contrast their features and functionality
• Describe the different access routes for
electronic resources
• Identify some of the access options available
within developing countries
• Access scholarly electronic resources
What is an ‘electronic library resource’?
Any library or information resource that can
be accessed via computer, e.g.
1. Electronic journals
2. Scholarly databases
3. Information gateways
4. The Internet
Also e-books, reports, magazines, grey literature
1. Electronic journals
• Full-text—whole journal available
– Electronic version of print
– Electronic only
– Examples at www3.oup.co.uk/jnls/
• Partial full-text—selected articles only
• Table of contents or abstracts only
– Examples at www.ajol.info
Why use e-journals?
• Up-to-date
• Convenient: information at your desktop
• Value-added features: search facilities,
links to other databases, supplementary
information, graphics, etc
• Access to a wider range of material than
might be available through your local
library
2. Scholarly databases
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Bibliographic: references to published material
Numeric: e.g. statistical tables
Full text: complete publications
Audio: collections of music
Image: e.g. collections of slides
Multimedia: audio-visual, animation etc
• Examples:EBSCO Host
– licensed, range of electronic information
resources, huge volume of information
Why use scholarly databases?
• Provide information for a specific project
or topic
• Provide an overview of research activity
in a given area
• Up-to-date information on a specific
subject area through regular scanning
• Allow searching over large bodies of
data and academic type information
3. Information Gateways
• Subject Based Information Gateways (SBIGs):
– web sites that act as a gateway to other sites and
information resources.
• Rely on human creation of meta data
• Subject experts select, evaluate, describe,
classify
• Smaller, subject-focused databases
• Lower recall, higher precision
• E.g. PINAKES (information gateway gateway!)
Why use information gateways?
• High quality information – selected by
human subject experts
• Classification and description of
resources
• Subject-specific focus
• Good starting places that lead to other
quality resources
4. The Internet
• Huge information resource
– 3-6 billion pages of information
• Continually growing and changing
• No national, political, scientific barriers
• Efficient search tools allow relatively
easy navigation, e.g.
– www.google.com
– www.alltheweb.com
Electronic resources: strengths
• Huge range of information available
– >3 billion web pages
– >20,000 journals
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Timely, up-to-date information sources
‘Value added’ functionality (e.g. searching)
Additional skills development – ICT skills
Large volume of quality, free information
Electronic resources: weaknesses
• Technical barriers to use
– need computers, network connection, software, etc
• Infrastructural problems
– bandwidth and telecommunications issues
– unreliable electricity supplies, etc
• Skills and training requirements
• Costs can be high: technology and content
• Variable quality of information
How can we access resources?
• Most academic e-resources are feebased
– often very high costs (although variable)
– subscriptions to
individual/group/organisation/ nation/region
– pay-per-view models
• Growing movement of “open access”
• Authentication via username/password
or IP address
Preferential licensing agreements
• Publishers and development organisations
working together to enable access to
information to aid development
– restricted to specific organisations in low income
countries
• Range of initiatives, focusing on different
users, subjects, geographical areas, etc.
– HINARI, PERI, TEEAL, eIFL, AGORA, etc.
• Free at point of use
HINARI
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Health InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative
Led by the World Health Organisation
Over 2000 STM journals from major publishers
100+ eligible countries
Institutional level licensing
Free or heavily discounted access
• www.healthinternetwork.org/
PERI
• Programme for the Enhancement of Research
Information
• Led by INASP
• Over 17,000 full-text journals in all disciplines from
major publishers (countries select resources)
• 100+ eligible countries
• National level licenses
• Subsidised and/or heavily discounted
• www.inasp.info/peri/
TEEAL
• The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library
• Led by Cornell University
• Over 140 journals in the field of agrosciences
• CD-Roms
• 100+ eligible countries
• Institutional level licenses
• Heavily discounted access
• http://teeal.cornell.edu/
eIFL
• Electronic Information for Libraries
• Led by Open Society Institute/Soros
foundations network
• Negotiates affordable subscriptions on a
multi-country consortial basis
• 43 participating countries
• national level licenses
• www.eifl.net/
AGORA
• Access to Global Online Research in
Agriculture
• Led by UN Food and Agriculture Organisation
• Over 700 journals in food, agriculture,
environmental sci, related social sciences
• Around 70 eligible countries
• Institutional level licenses
• Free or heavily discounted access
• http://www.aginternetwork.org/en/
Open access initiatives
• Significant movement in academic community
that information should be “free” to all
• Access problems and costs are universal
• Author pays versus user pays
• Open archiving, pre-prints, open access, self
archiving, institutional archives or subject
specific archives
• Tends to be techno-centric at present
Open access examples
• PubMed Central – hard sciences
– www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/
• BioMed Central – medicine
– www.biomedcentral.com/
• DOAJ – all subjects
– www.doaj.org/
• Bioline – research from developing countries
– http://www.bioline.org.br/
Summary
• Range of electronic resources is huge + growing
• The type, quality and usefulness varies
enormously
• The strengths/weaknesses and support needs
must be considered for sustainable use
• Free and fee resources
• Many useful programmes and partners that can
help with access to resources
– (see list in handouts + INASP directory)
• Interesting developments in “Open access”
Thank you
Any questions?