NSF -CONACyT -ISTEC Digital Library
Wkshop
Mexican Digital Library Report
Report on NSF Grant no. IIS-9907293:
Digital Libraries Workshop
Supported by funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF), el
Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología (CONACyT, México) and the
Ibero-American Science and Technology Education Consortium (ISTEC), with
special participation of the Organization of American States (OAS).
INTRODUCTION
The NSF/ CONACyT /ISTEC Workshop on Digital Libraries was held in
Alburquerque, N.M. from July 7-9, 1999. The purpose of the workshop was
to bring together United States and Mexican Digital Library Researchers to
exchange ideas, and particularly to foster joint grant writing activities.
The format of the workshop was chosen to allow opportunities to hear from
the best of the current projects under development at US DL programs as
well as to highlight a representative sample of current DL project
underway in México. The morning sessions were devoted to the leading edge
US (and one European) presentations. The afternoon sessions were devoted
to short Mexican project descriptions which augmented Posters provided
throughout the meeting, as well as to group brainstorming sessions. The
workshop closed with a reporting session from groups formed around major
project areas.
Summary of outcomes: Digital Libraries have been identified
in various countries as a national challenge and an area with potentially
wide impact on their citizens' wellbeing. Ambitious programs have been
launched by different entities with the aim to produce dramatic advances
in areas that may impact the rapid development of Digital Libraries.
During this workshop we have worked towards creating:
- a common understanding of the importance and complexity of creating
national digital library initiatives
- a network of Mexican and US experts that can create and continue future
joint DL initiatives
- the framework for a Mexican National Digital Library
- a plan for future DL workshops in México and similar outreach projects
in South and Central America.
We have been successful in reaching all of these goals, as our follow-up
initiatives, summarized later, will confirm.
THE WORKSHOP
The workshop was held in the Dane Smith Center at the University of New
Mexico. Access was provided to a complete array of electronic services and
speakers could utilize real time demonstration technologies.
The program is available at
http://www.istec.org/Digital Library Linkages/jerome/dlform.html and summarized below:
NSF - CONACyT - ISTEC Digital Libraries Workshop
Alburquerque, New Mexico, USA, July 7-9, 1999.
Wednesday, July 7, 1999.
9 - 9:30 REGISTRATION, Student Union Building North
Ballroom
9:30 - 9:35 Orientation
9:40 - 9:50
Welcome to UNM. Provost F. Chris García
9:50 - 10:10
Welcome from CONACyT (Felipe Bracho) - from
NSF (Rita Rodríguez) - from ISTEC
(Ramiro Jordán)
10:10 - 10:30 Break
10:30 - 11:30
Keynote: Héctor García-Molina "Stanford
InterLib Technologies: An overview of the
new Stanford Digital Libraries Project"
12:00 - 1:00
LUNCH Student Union Building North Ballroom
(after lunch MOVE to DANE SMITH
HALL 123 & 231
1:30 - 2:10
VxInsight talk and Demonstration, David
Johnson, Sandía National Laboratories
2:10 - 3:10
OVERVIEW of National Mexican Digital Library
Program (Alfredo Sánchez)
3:10 - 3:30 Break
3:30 - 4:30
Speaker- Larry Carver, "Alexandria Digital
Library:Past, Present and Future"
4:30 - 5:30
Speaker- Sayeed Choudhury, "Lester S. Levy
Sheet Music Collection, Phase Two and the
Comprehensive Access to Print Materials (CAPM)"
6:00 - 7:30
RECEPTION in Zimmerman Willard Reading Room
Welcome: Gil Merkx, Director of the Latin
American & Iberian Institute
Thursday, July 8, 1999.
9-9:15
NSF/CONACyT Grant writing opportunities (Rita
Rodríguez)
9:15-10:15
Keynote: Edward Fox "From Theory to Practice in
Digital Libraries: 5S and Educational
Applications (NDLTD, CSTC)"
10:15-10:40 Break
10:40-12:00
Keynote: Rick Luce -- "Communicating Science in
the Next Generation: New Implications
for the Digital Library"
12:00-1:30 LUNCH & POSTERS on view.
1:30-2:30
Keynote: Rick Furuta "Building Digital Libraries
with Content of Multi-national Interest"
3-5 Mexican Digital Library Program
- Traditional libraries going digital:
Juan Voutssas,"Towards an academic coordinated
digital library
scheme in México"
- Geographic Information Services:
David Sol, Geographic Services in a Digital
Library"
- Digital Theses, Dissertations and Course
Materials:
Acosta, Ayala, David Garza Salazar, "The
Phronesis System A
Practical and Efficient Tool for the Creation of
Distributed Digital
Libraries on the Internet"
- Information retrieval mechanisms:
López, Homero Ríos, "Content retrieval for
images in digital
libraries of biodiversity"
- User Interfaces: Sánchez
- Infrastructure/General: Molino, Guerra
Friday, July 9, 1999.
9-10:10
Herbert Van de Sompel "Dynamic Linking"
10:15-10:45 Break
10:45-11:30
Speaker- Ramiro Jordán, "ISTEC Digital Library Linkages Digital
Library"
11:30-12:30 LUNCH @ Duck Pond
12:30-3
Mexican Digital Library Program
Group Discussion
3-3:30
Wrap up with Panel
(Héctor/Ramiro/Rita/Felipe/Alfredo/Johann)
ATTENDANCE
The NSF grant funded local arrangements as well as travel and
accommodation for keynote speakers from the US and México. Travel and
accommodation for participants from México was funded by CONACyT. The OAS
funded 5 observers from South and Central America.
There were 57 registrants, including the speakers. These represented:
17 from México
2 from Costa Rica (OAS Observers)
1 each from Spain, Belgium, and Korea
2 from Argentina and 1 from Venezuela (OAS Observers)
5 from the OAS and 2 from the NSF
The rest were individual registrants and speakers from the US.
The registration list is attached.
OUTCOMES
Outcomes at the Workshop:
By all accounts, including e-mail feedback, the workshop was a huge
success. The keynote speakers were informative and worked with the Mexican
participants on the final day to develop plans for a Mexican National DL
project. The keynote talks have been collected on a Proceedings
page at
http://www.istec.org/Digital Library Linkages/jerome/dlpapers/dlayo.html and the Mexican
talks have been cumulated in printed proceedings prepared by the
Universidad de las Americas, Puebla, México, and is attached.
The plans for a Mexican National DL Project were developed on the final
day by teams focusing on specific areas. The goals for the MNDL project
were created and summarized by Alfredo Sánchez (UDLA) as:
· To support projects focusing on the development of digital collections
and associated services for utilization by wide user communities
· To promote DL R&D in key areas for national development
· To foster the generation of digital collections that promote Mexican
science and culture nationally and internationally
· To fully utilize the Internet2 infrastructure and to provide a testbed
for its applications in México
· To provide a general framework for new DL projects through the
definition of a research agenda and a general model for DLs.
A group was charged to create a document entitled: "Key Areas for
Development". This group consisted of Miguel O. Arias Estrada,
INAOE; Ismael Esquivel, Universidad Cristóbal Colón; Clara López Guzmán,
DGSCA-UNAm; Yolanda Martínez Treviño, ITESM Campus Monterrey; Fernanda
Meraz, UNAM; Alvaro Quijano, Colegio de México;David Sol, Universidad de
las Américas-Puebla; and Juan Eduardo Vargas, University of South
Carolina. This summary follows below.
DL Content Examples
o Develop emergency action repositories to disseminate information during
earthquakes, hurricanes, etc.
o Develop DLs to provide businesses with info on market & economic trends,
intra-organizational tools, etc.
o Develop DLs in support of small and emerging businesses
o Develop DLs to provide public access to law libraries and legal
procedures
Promotion of DL R&D
o Definition of open source standards: Protocols, technologies, tools,
procedures, formats, to promote library interoperability
o Organize workshops, conferences, seminars, involving academic
institutions, industry, service sector, and government.
o Design a world-class National DL website
o Promote the concept of DL as a didactic tool, as calculators are to
engineering
Human Resources Development
o Virtual courses focusing on tools, how to create and use DLs
o Organize workshops, conferences, and seminars targeting students.
Promote undergraduate and graduate DLs programs as first as minor tracks
within already established curricula (Computer Science, Lib. Sciences,
etc) then as programs of their own
Forum Suggestions from Ed Fox:
o Translate books (e.g. Lesk's Digital Libraries) into Spanish
o Have DL courses at universities, on-line tutorials
o Have Spanish translation of Dlib Magazine
o Highly visible digitized heritage resources made usable for K-12
students
Other Ideas from Juan Eduardo Vargas
o Seek interdisciplinary collaborations with researchers in potentially
related areas, such as:
o Data mining
o Language translation focused on from- and to- Spanish
o Speech recognition focused on the Spanish language
o Articulate strategies for sustained development and growth of DL
research
o Seek support at the highest levels of government and private sector: Use
the analogy of cellular phones, which bypassed the cost of phone lines
infrastructure in developing countries, to exemplify how DLs can also
bypass investment while providing public access to information.
It was also decided to create future opportunities in México for
Librarians and Computer Scientists to meet to develop the plan further
under the auspices of ISTEC and CONACyT (see below).
The OAS observers from South and Central America also prepared a plan for
similar workshops in the region and the OAS committed funding and
resources for the first such event, possibly in Costa Rica.
Outcomes subsequent to the Workshop:
Since the above workshop and due to contacts made there, the following
developments took place:
1. A Mexican branch of the ISTEC Library Linkages initiative was
established on 10/22/99 at the "Seminario del grupo de trabajo ISTEC-Red
de bibliotecas digitales mexicanas" at the TEC de Monterrey, Campus
Morelos (Cuernavaca, México). This group is called REBIDIMEX and has had 6
subsequent meetings, including a digital libraries follow-up workshop in
Puebla at UDLAP in February, 2000.
2. A similar DL workshop was funded by the OAS, ISTEC and Costa Rican
agencies involving some of the same keynote speakers. For a full
description of " PRIMER SEMINARIO-TALLER SUBREGIONAL SOBRE BIBLIOTECAS
DIGITALES. Ciudad Universitaria Rodrigo Facio, San José, Costa Rica, 8-10
de diciembre de 1999" see <
http://www.istec.org/jerome/costarica/seminario.html>
3. Two similar workshops will be organized in 2000 funded by the OAS and
ISTEC. The first will be for all South America and the second for the
Caribbean. In addition a third workshop will be organized for all
Ibero-America to address the role of DL's in distance education.
4. The model that has proofed to be successful in México is being adapted
to Columbia, where 12 Universities have begun collaborating after an
initial DL meeting in May, 2000.
5. Another outcome of the DL workshop is an invitation from UNESCO to join
their DL Committee to promote DLs and to create standards for electronic
theses and dissertations.
6. The Phronesis software which was demonstrated at the NSF/CONACyT DL
workshop is being used as a vehicle to create DLs in Latin America.
7. We are currently deploying 13 servers donated by Sun MicroSystems in
Ibero-America as the ISTEC infrastructure to support DL efforts.