May 25, 2013

Reference: Data.gov Launches New Catalog and APIs

From the Data.gov Blog: Data.gov is launching two innovations today to mark both the anniversary of the Digital Government Strategy and the fourth anniversary of Data.gov. First is a comprehensive listing of the application programming interfaces (APIs) that were released from across the federal government as part of the Digital Government Strategy. [Clip] Data.gov is also launching a new data [...]

“EPUB for Archival Preservation: An Update”

The update appears in a new post by Johan van der Knijff (National Library of the Netherlands) on the Open Planets Foundation blog. From the Introduction: Last year (2012) the KB released a report on the suitability of the EPUB format for archival preservation. A substantial number of EPUB-related developments have happened since then, and as a result some of the [...]

UK Organization Publishes Research Into Public Library of the Future

The research comes from the Arts Council of England and is found in a report titled, The Library of the Future. From an Arts Council Summary: This research has found that public libraries are trusted spaces, open to all, in which people continue to explore and share the joys of reading, information, knowledge and culture. [...]

Reference: Fast Facts: NCES Releases The Condition of Education 2013

From the National Center for Education Statistics: The 42 indicators presented in The Condition of Education 2013 provide a progress report on education in America and include findings on the demographics of American schools, U.S. resources for schooling, and outcomes associated with education. Report findings include: As of 2012, about 90 percent of young adults [...]

Texas A&M And University Of Texas Systems To Open Joint Library Storage Facility Tomorrow

From Texas A&M University: The Texas A&M University System and The University of Texas System will celebrate the opening Friday (May 24) of their Joint Library Facility at Texas A&M University’s Riverside Campus. The 18,000-square-foot library facility represents an unprecedented collaboration between the state’s two largest university systems to provide joint storage of more than [...]

Open Access Legislation Passes Illinois Senate and House, Awaits Governors Signature

The “Open Access to Research Articles Act” (SB 1900) recently passed both houses of the Illinois General Assembly. From an Illinois Senate Democrats News Release: Legislation State Senator Daniel Biss (D-Evanston) [where Northwestern U. is located] sponsored to work toward making state universities’ taxpayer-funded research available to the public passed the House today [May 16, [...]

U.S. Department of State Historian Releases API for Online Ebook Catalog

Since March, 2012, the Office of the Historian at the U.S. Dept. of State has been releasing digitized volumes of the Foreign Relations of the United States series and making them available online. 103 volumes are currently online (free) and available in Mobi and EPUB formats. More volumes will be made available in the future. Today, the [...]

FTRF (Freedom to Read Foundation) Announces Seven Recipients of 2013 Banned Books Week Event Grants

From the Freedom To Read Foundation: The Freedom to Read Foundation (FTRF), via its Judith F.Krug Memorial Fund, has announced seven $1,000 grants to libraries, schools and community organizations in support of Banned Books Week events. Banned Books Week, which will take place Sept. 22–30, 2013, celebrates the freedom to access information, while drawing attention [...]

Scholarly Publishing: Computers & Graphics Journal Includes First Executable Papers Published Online on Science Direct

From Elsevier: Computers & Graphics for the first time has published executable papers in its special issue on 3D Object Retrieval within the online article framework on ScienceDirect. An executable paper combines the narrative of a traditional scholarly paper with embedded data sets and computer code that underlie the reported results. Readers can inspect code, change [...]

Reference: UK’s Culture Grid Search Now Also Provides Access to Europeana Material

Culture Grid (1)

From Collections Link: As part of Collection Trust’s mission to give everyone greater access to culture, arts and heritage from across the globe, whilst promoting UK collections internationally, over 30 million items from 1000’s of UK and European museums, galleries, libraries and archives can now be easily found using Collection Trust’s Culture Grid search www.culturegrid.org.uk. [...]