Challenges of Digital Library

When any Librarian wants to set up a Digital Library, he is not aware of the Challenges of

Digital Library. When you are working on ground level then only you can identify the

Challenges of Digital Library. Digital Library is an important part of any Library. The Library

are moving toward digitizing the documents.

You have to understand what a digital library is. This means that you should have digital

collections. It means in electronic format. Users will be able to access it by visiting a digital library

or through remote access.

Building digital collection

1) The first way to build a digital collection is that you have to convert the documents into digitized

format and store them. It can be stored and read in electronic format. After digitizing through

the software then can be uploaded to an Institutional repository like DSpace and complete its

metadata description!

2) The second way to build a digital collection is to subscribe the e-books and E-Journals by paying

the price. You will get a login ID and you can do login and access it.

The third way to build a collection is to have access to external digital collections. This will

not be part of the internal collection. It can be accessed by local users from your digital

library. It may be part of open-access resources.

Challenges of Digital Library

Acquire the Latest Technology Equipment

When you are planning to create a digital library, you have to acquire or purchase the

latest technology for developing a Digital Library. You have to find it at the local level or at

the international level. Most librarians will not find these types of technologies at the local

level Then you have to search at the international level. There you have to see whether it

fulfills your requirements.

Shortage of Digital Tools

There is a shortage of these tools in an Open source environment. You have to purchase as

these software as they are all commercial You have to contact distributors and vendors

to purchase it.

Less Budget

Libraries have very less budget. They are not aware of the cost of new technologies which

will be quite productive in the library. The institutional management lacks proper budget

and that budget is not enough to procure latest technology. Librarian is helpless though he

wants his ibrary to be digitised.

This is also one of the Challenges of Digital Library is to do proper maintenance of digital

library which is very expensive. The cost of backup digital materials and preservation of

digital information is high.

Damage the materials

This is one of the challenges of Digital libraries which nobody thinks about before the digitisation

process. The documents are very old and brittle. So when you want to build

comprehensive resources, you have to digitize all documents. But old documents

sometimes get more damaged in the digitization process.

These original documents are very precious and need extra care. However, the shortage of tools

and demand for best quality reproduction makes the process more repetitive and thus

damages the documents. The old manuscripts are not in good state but these are the most

demanded document for digitisation.

Design Retrieval tools

After digitization, you have to do a metadata description. At this point, some people give

abbreviated keywords of important fields like author, title, Publisher, Keywords, etc. These

things will not let the documents be retrieved by users. Incomplete cataloging will not

fetch those documents in that retrieval tool. So you have to design a sort of retrieval

tool that can automatically read abbreviated information.

Establish Standard Protocols

The Libraries of the whole world should create virtual unity. The Libraries responsible for

digitizing documents should follow the standard protocols. This will help in accessing and

sharing all those documents with other libraries. However, this is lacking among the libraries that are

in the digitization process so implementing is difficult.

Intellectual property

As you know it is a very important issue that prevails before and after digitization. You

have to properly check about its compliance. When you are digitizing, it is easy to find

out about its license information. You will get to know through the license that it is copied and

can be shared for adaptations or not.

Intellectual Property is the greatest challenge of Digital Libraries. The librarian has to

formulate a framework of rights and permission. The levels of access should be governed by

privacy rights. The Digital library should have defined copyrights and legal concerns

related to the website or portal of the digital library.

Effective Access

If you are developing a digital library, that does not mean that your physical collections will

be abandoned or neglected. The user should know about the original physical document's

whereabouts in the library. In some places after digitization, the physical book seems to be

unimportant and left somewhere not to be traced.

Access all heterogeneous resources

A digital library should give access to all the heterogeneous resources of that library. In

your library, there are comprehensive resources like books, journals, sound recordings,

videos, manuscripts, photographs, Reports, etc. So it is also a challenge for the digital

library to present all documents in the retrieval process.

Digital library for all

Users are exploring the Digital libraries but they get to access limited subjects which they

called gateways. But that gateways are on a particular one or related subject. So This is also

a challenge to set up a digital library which should be for all communities and

professionals. It should not be restricted for a particular purpose.

Develop more flexible Tools for Digital library

Today in the era of digital libraries,there should be an option for accessing multi-script

resources. Libraries should provide flexible tools for transforming digital content to suit

the needs of all users.

Conclusion

There are many challenges in Digital Libraries, but we have to face the challenges and get

solutions for those problems. You can't keep sitting thinking about these problems. Every new

work has hurdles. Digital Library is a boon for this civilization. Every piece of information is at your

fingertips. Who had thought that it would be so easy to access information.

But every new technology demands cost and every maintenance demands cost. Nothing is

free in this world. You have to give charges for that service The Libraries should increase

their budget now as it is high time to move and adapt to new technologies. If Libraries are

not coming forward and not taking initiative then the librarian profession will come at

stake.

Information communication technology is now an integral part of the Library. The digitization

process can't be done without ICT. So librarians should improve their skills and

budget. Welcome the challenges of digital libraries and sort them by their positive decisions.

Note: Photo by Polina Zimmerman