Wk 4 Readings

Wk 4 Readings | Presentation (Text) and Persistence (DOI)

This week's readings focused on presentation (Chapter 9, Arms), and "persistent" or long-term connection to a publication (Identifiers and Their Role in Networked Information Applications, Lynch and Digital Object Identifier System, Paskin) .

When thinking about Digital Libraries, text is sometimes overlooked; therefore, it was refreshing to read a focussed chapter regarding the presentation of text, then many challenges in presenting text, and the myriad  mark-up methods with pros and cons e.g. html, xml, sgml, TeX, character recognition, PDFs, etc...  Though in 2010 we are much closer to a true shift from print to digital since we are now  living in the era of Kindle-esque applications where note taking, highlighting, and readability are realities.  My colleagues at work were just discussing disappearing paper newspapers...

Of equal importance is the ability to consistently send the user to the correct document over time without error, and now I understand DOI a little better in that they do not change over time and that the DOI is the Handle System that helps to avoid the user ever landing on a broken link.  I did not realize that DOI was trademarked, had a foundation, or was the result of the publishing industry's initiative in the early 90s (Paskin).  The DOI / Handle systems sounded like a blessing (where do I get one and how do I secure my DL with it?)  until I read Lynch's article about concerns about DOI's true intentions, e.g. whether it is geared toward acquiring and payment or for consistency in access to publications.

Questions:

1) How does a DL designer incorporate DOI?
2) Is there still ambiguity over DOI and its true purpose or value?

Muddies Point:

How will our own DLs work?  When we design our own DL, will it be networked somehow or only available on our own PC where we take screenshots of our entries?

Julie