Decision making in text digitisation
TÓSZEGI Zsuzsanna
Könyvtári Figyelő (Library Review) vol. 16. (52.) 2006. no. 2.
Librarians involved in digitisation projects need to make many important decisions during the digitisation process. This study aims to support the decision making with presenting the most important aspects that need to be considered in the digitisation of printed texts. Digital texts can be digitally born or digitised, and the digitisation of texts can be carried out at three different levels: reproductive, representative or interpretative. At the reproductive level, the digitised version of the text does not offer extended features compared to the original text. At the representative level, the digitised version offers additional functions, e.g. can be searched. At the interpretative level, a higher quality hypertext is produced, generally enhanced with cross-references. When planning a digitisation project, a number of questions need to be clarified. For what purpose (preservation, archiving or accessibility)? For which user group (private use, institutional access, or for the wide public)? In the context of intellectual property rights, digitisation means reproduction, thus digitisation needs to be authorised by the author or the copyright holder. The project can only start after the clarification of these issues. The study presents the most frequently applied scanning solutions. If the original document is available in multiple copies, scanning of separated pages can be chosen. Contact scanning represents a rapid, cost-effective solution for achieving reasonable quality. When the original document needs a high degree of protection, special and more costly scanners must be used. The typographical, structural and semantic features of the work need to be examined thoroughly in order to decide upon the format to be used (HTML, SGML or XML). As digitisation technologies develop rapidly, it needs to be thought through if the digitised material will be used in the short or long term. The advantages, disadvantages and costs of the above technical options are summarised in table format.The collection scope of national bibliographies: can completeness be achieved?
DIPPOLD Péter
Könyvtári Figyelő (Library Review) vol. 16. (52.) 2006. no. 2.
The idea of a universal bibliography has been haunting librarianship since the work by Conrad Gesner called “Bibligraphia Universalis”. The IFLA UBC program of 1973 stated that the universal bibliography needs to be established through the national bibliographies. In order to achieve this goal, national bibliographies must strive for completeness, while applying international standards and methods. However, it has since become obvious that this program cannot be accomplished. National bibliographies are based on legal deposit systems. In order to bring electronic publications under bibliographic control, a number of countries have had to modify their legal deposit rules. The recommendations of the International Conference on National Bibliographical Services held in Copenhagen in 1998 also talk about the registration of the complete national publishing output, but the IFLA survey of 2000 based on 50 national bibliographies show that this objective has not been achieved in any of the countries. It is therefore necessary to rethink the collection scope of national bibliographies based on geographic, linguistic, subject and formal approaches. Currently the collection interest of national bibliographies is generally limited to books, meaning that other types of documents only have a sporadic representation. Retrospective cataloguing, as well as the cataloguing of web-based documents and making them accessible to users represent other important challenges. As for the cataloguing of web-based documents, a successful model is provided by the Pandora project of the National Library of Australia that has been collecting online publications since 1996.
Computer use by blind people at libraries
KATSÁNYI Sándor – PIROSNÉ PETŐ Tímea – PILLER Antalné – VÁRHEGYI Ágnes – NAGY Gábor
Könyvtári Figyelő (Library Review) vol. 16. (52.) 2006. no. 2.
The study offers an overview of the assistive technologies (screen reading software, refreshable Braille displays, screen magnification software and others) available at libraries that help blind users with computer accessibility. The application of these devices is illustrated through related services of three Hungarian libraries. Assisting people with disabilities has become one of the strategic objectives of the Metropolitan Ervin Szabo Library in Budapest. The Library of the Eötvös Loránd University has created a studio for visually impaired users. The Hungarian Electronic Library has introduced a web accessibility service for the blind, which enables users to access more than 1,000 items of the virtual library. The observations of a blind user concerning computer accessibility complete the article.
Máté Kovács, the state secretary
BÉNYEI Miklós
Könyvtári Figyelő (Library Review) vol. 16. (52.) 2006. no. 2.
On the occasion of the 100th anniversary of the birth of Máté Kovács, professor of library sciences and a leading figure of Hungarian library policy, a commemoration was held at the Department of Library and Information Sciences of the Eötvös Loránd University. The current paper, focusing on the professional activities of Máté Kovács between 1943 and 1949 was presented at this event. Máté Kovács was the head of the National Council of Public Education, then after the termination of the council, he started to work for the Ministry of Education and Religion in 1945. He elaborated the draft programme of the modernisation of the Hungarian public educational system. The organisation of primary schools at a national scale was implemented under his direction. As a political state secretary, he was confronted with all the issues that emerged within the scope of the ministry, but his approach to developments was far more than administrative. In the field of higher education, he supported the idea of training young people to become highly educated intellectuals rather than one-sided professionals. His endeavours in library policy were directed at the re-organisation of public libraries and the setting up of district libraries. He raised the possibility of libraries with twofold function, serving as the school library and the local public library for the same population. He later became the Director of the Library of the University of Debrecen.
A Hungarian “newspaper library”, created by József Szinnyei
SONNEVEND Péter
Könyvtári Figyelő (Library Review) vol. 16. (52.) 2006. no. 2.
This paper is an introduction to the republishing of “Let’s create newspaper libraries”, an article by József Szinnyei first published in the Hungarian journal “Homeland” (A Hon) in 1880. The concept of public libraries started to spread widely in Hungary in the 1880s. This was the time when the first library journals were launched and the need for journal and newspaper reading rooms emerged. In 1884, a special collection devoted to journals was created within the National Museum and this is where József Szinnyei started journal and newspaper cataloguing.
“Let’s create newspaper libraries!”
SZINNYEI József
Republishing of the original article published in “Homeland”, 16 October 1880.
József Fitz, a reformer of the Hungarian library field
M. MÁTRAI Györgyi
Könyvtári Figyelő (Library Review) vol. 16. (52.) 2006. no. 2.
The first large-scale modernisation process of the services of the National Széchényi Library was initiated by József Fitz, director general of the library in the 1930s and 1940s. Under his direction, changes were made to both the collection / acquisition activities and the cataloguing / reference services. The special collections were enhanced further. Mimeograph machines were installed for the duplication of catalogue records and the old-fashioned catalogue was replaced by a decimal classification system. Readers’ services were given special attention, rooms for readers and researchers were made more comfortable and standard lending rules were introduced. The program of Fitz was supported by the ministry of culture of the time. His knowledge, professionalism and human qualities were recognised by the staff of the National Library too.
Zoltán VIDA (1906-2006)
(KÁPOLNAI Iván)
Language options of Internet search tools
TÓTH Erzsébet
Following international examples (survey of Judit Bar Ilan and Tatyana Gutman, 2002), the author tested the language options of English and Hungarian search engines in 2005 in order to see the capability of these tools (e.g. Altavista, Google, AlltheWeb) to achieve a more accurate linguistic interpretation of searches. The results show that the Hungarian tools only deal with the peculiarities of the Hungarian language to some extent, while the English language search engines show serious deficiencies when dealing with Hungarian search terms. English language search engines work better with English terms, including the options of truncation and searching for synonyms, but they are less efficient in dealing with accents which is an important feature of Hungarian language texts.
Application of radio frequency identification systems at libraries
(Rev. by: Mohor, Jenő)
Radio frequency identification systems might substitute barcode systems at libraries in the near future, which might lead to a major change in library services. The article summarises the advantages and challenges brought by the new technology.
HAYES, Emma–MORRIS, Anne: Leisure role of public libraries: a historical perspective.
(Rev. by Mohor, Jenő)
GÓRNY, Miroslaw–NIKISCH, Jan: Polish libraries in the past and today.
(Rev. by Mohor, Jenő)
JACSÓ Péter: Content evaluation of textual CD-ROM and Web databases
(Rev. by Dudás, Anikó)
HERNON, Peter – WHITMAN, John: Delivering satisfaction and service quality. A customer-based approach for libraries
(Rev. by Bognárné Lovász, Katalin.)
KÉGLI Ferenc: The role of biographical sources in local information reference services
(Rev. by Gyuris, György)
Equal opportunities and library services. European policies and practices.
(Rev. by Éger, Veronika)
Guide to historic libraries in Slovakia
(Rev. by Dancs, Szabolcs)