Information Technology Reference
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Another important consideration relates to how libraries organize themselves
relative to their automation environments and the opportunities for large-scale
implementations to transform the way they provide access to their collections to
patrons. The traditional model of library automation targets providing service to a
finite number of facilities organized within a system. A system may be comprised of
multiple branches within a municipal library service or a central library and
departmental or faculty libraries within a university. Multiple library systems may
collaborate to share a library automation system.
The current phase of library automation, with the support of cloud computing
technologies, support ever expansive implementations of platforms that enable
libraries to automate collaboratively in ever larger numbers. While libraries have
shared consortia systems from the earliest phases of automation, their size has been
constrained due to the limitations of computing resources. In today's era of cloud
computing, the limits of scale seem almost boundless. One of the important trends in
recent years includes the consolidation of libraries into shared automation
infrastructure, often at the regional, state, or national level [5]. These consolidated
implementations allow libraries to automate at a lower cost relative to operating their
own local systems and provide their users the benefit of access to massive collections.
Some examples of these large shared infrastructure implementations include the State
of South Australia where all the public libraries share a single SirsiDynix Symphony
system, the country of Chile that provides shared automation based on Ex Libris
Aleph coupled with VuFind interface, and the Illinois Heartland Library System
based on a Polaris ILS shared by over 450 libraries in the largest consortium in the
United States. The country of Denmark has recently launched a project to automate
all of the public libraries in the country in a shared system.
Cloud computing stands to support important advancements in library automation,
enabling libraries to have a greater impact on the communities they serve. In these
times when libraries have fewer resources at their disposal, yet must meet ever
increasing expectations to meet the information needs of their clientele, technologies
based on cloud computing have considerable potential. A new generation of library
services platforms has emerged in recent years that aims to manage resources more
comprehensively, to leverage shared knowledge bases and bibliographic services, and
to provide open platforms for extensibility and interoperability. Web-scale index-
based discovery services provide library users instant access to library collections,
spanning all types of resources. This new phase of library automation, built on the
foundation of cloud technologies, offers libraries willing to break free from traditional
models of automation based on local resources the means to collaborate on a global
scale to meet the needs of their communities.
References
1.
Breeding, M.: Automation Marketplace: The Rush To Innovate. Lib. J. 137(6) (2013),
http://www.thedigitalshift.com/2013/04/ils/automation-
marketplace-2013-the-rush-to-innovate/
2.
Breeding, M.: Cloud Computing for Libraries. ALA TechSource (2012)
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