Minutes for Midwinter 1992 (fwd) Margaret Mering 09 Mar 1992 16:43 UTC
Here are the minutes from the LITA/ALCTS Serials Automation Interest Group's Midwinter meeting. Margaret Mering University of Nebraska - Lincoln mvm@unllib.unl.edu -------------------------------------------------------------------------- LITA/ALCTS Serials Automation Interest Group The LITA/ALCTS Serials Automation Interest Group met at Midwinter 1992 for a discussion on the "Processing of Electronic Journals." Peggy Johnson (University of Minnesota-St. Paul) began with a brief history of printing as an overview from which to look at the issues regarding the electronic journal. This new technology has presented some global issues that need to be resolved: the need for standards for publishing materials with tables, scientific notation, etc.; bibliographic access to titles that may not be housed in your library; the need for cooperation for storage and retention to preserve scholarly communications; standardization of citations and indexing for retrieval. Local issues, which often are the same issues as for print publications, include: budgeting for hardware, software, journal costs, electronic mail; selection; implications for service, such as access and distribution; user education for access to this format. Marilyn Geller (MIT) spoke about the findings of MIT's Electronic Journals Task Force regarding electronic journals: the range of access and delivery options available; differing archival patterns; the need to develop expertise in using these materials; limitations imposed by licensing agreements; the need to contribute to the development of this medium through involvement in the scholarly community. The task force also discussed non-network electronic journals, the impact on the serials crisis, and the role of commercial publishers. Current projects underway at MIT include education of staff and Project Mercury. Gail McMillan (Virginia Tech) concluded with a report on providing access to this format. At Virginia Tech, electronic journals are stored on the university's mainframe computer for access via LAN, with transferring, downloading and printing of files treated as routine operations. Easy-to-use screens provide access to the titles available, tables of contents, and individual articles. Gail described the steps required to subscribe to an electronic journal, receive issues, retrieve articles as a separate package, scan for proper text storage, check- in issues, update MARC holdings, claim issues, update library holdings, electronically forward titles for new or maintenance cataloging in the opac, and describe the mode of access via the network or on the university's mainframe. --Kristin Lindlan, University of Washington