1. OU Digital Library development project Liz Mallett – Project Manager James Alexander – Project Developer 25 January 2012

2. Overview of session • What is a Digital Library? • What is the OUDL development project? • What have we done so far? • Next steps • Demo • Your suggestions and questions

3. What is a digital library? (and don’t we already have one?!) “Digital libraries are organizations that provide the resources, including the specialized staff, to select, structure, offer intellectual access to, interpret, distribute, preserve the integrity of, and ensure the persistence over time of collections of digital works so that they are readily and economically available for use by a defined community or set of communities.” – Digital Library Federation http://www.flickr.com/photos/wingedwolf/5471047557/sizes/s/in/photostream/ In other words……

4. A Digital Library: • Stores or provides access to digital content • The content is usually owned by the organisation • Content is either “born digital” or has been digitised • May offer access to collections stored in various locations • Preserves the content for future access and use • Provides pathways into the content, e.g. searching and browsing • Provides special services

5. Isn’t that the Library website? • The library website is a gateway to a number of library products and services • Most of the content the website offers access to is third party e.g. full text journal articles, eBooks, databases, etc. all bought from publishers (or are freely available). • The OUDL will include a set of OU owned content which can be searched via the EBSCO Discovery Service (eventually!) • It will contain digital, archived copies of OU course material (print), eBooks, VLE material, images, audio and video.

6. Some examples of digital libraries

14. What is the OU Digital Library Development Project?

15. http://www.flickr.com/photos/8445571@N02/4505555949/ • A two year project running from August 2011 to July 2013 • Goal is to build the foundations for the OU Digital Library • Build a repository for storage and preservation of OU content • Digitise selected content • Create an interface • Build the technical infrastructure (servers, storage etc.) • Cost out and propose digital library services.

16. What have we done so far? • Built a first iteration of the interface • Imported some content • Prepared content for digitisation • Proposed the infrastructure • Proposed some services

17. Content • Video (from AVA project) • 100 historical images from OU cumulus database Coming soon: • S100 foundation science course from 1971 • 40 radio programmes • Corresponding transcripts http://www.flickr.com/photos/safari_vacation/5842069535/sizes/l/in/photostream/

18. DL Project management DL Technical consultancy Metadata advice and management Digital curation Digital preservation Research data management DL Training DL Advocacy Operations, Research and development Services Content Consultancy Support Services Model draft v1.00 December 2011

19. Next Steps • Lots more work to do on the interface and repository architecture, e.g. accessibility testing • Building the system in PHP instead of Drupal • Negotiating born-digital content • More digitisation work • Linked data and the STELLAR project. • Thinking about how it fits with Integrated Learner Exp. http://www.flickr.com/photos/question_everything/4841519331/sizes/z/in/photostream/