EMANI Meeting July 25-26, 2002 Cornell University Library Ithaca, New York
EMANI – Electronic Mathematical Archiving Network Initiative: An international collaboration to support and coordinate the long-term preservation and open accessibility of mathematical publications in digital form.
Project Coordinator: Bernd Wegner
1. Project Tasks and Priorities
Immediate Send proposed advisory board names to Wegner All Distribute PDFs of EMANI logo to team Springer Press release Wegner and Hasan Survey of the EMANI partners on metadata requirements Göttingen Collect and distribute “problematic examples” to test All metadata
September Send work package reminders 5 weeks prior to November Wegner meeting DOI report De Kemp
October Definition of work packages due – send to Becker All WPs
November November meeting Göttingen Website operational Springer and Neuroth Minimum list of metadata requirements available by Metadata WP November meeting Functional requirements for users – proposal available by Access, Nav, Design WP November meeting (prototypes by March 2003) Report on the NSDL Becker
No date / ongoing Prepare budget for EMANI Springer Prepare 2-year plans for digitization (toward a registry). All partner organizations Submit descriptions to Becker Assemble a list of organizations for outreach All Conference papers and publications (partner should review All EMANI Meeting July 25-26, 2002 before submission) Funding efforts All Interoperability of distributed system
2. Presentations
Hans Becker (SUB Göttingen), “Retrodigitization” Pierre Bérard (Grenoble), “NUMDAM” Arnoud de Kemp and Syed Hasan (Springer), “Formalizing Project EMANI” Gertraud Griepke (Springer), “Contents and Formats: Existing Digital Sources” Jiang Airong, “The Development of the Chinese Math Digital Library at Tsinghua University” Bernd Wegner (TU Berlin), “Information dissemination” Bernd Wegner, “Ongoing Projects” Project Euclid economic model
3. Meeting Minutes
Below are the minutes from the July 25-26 meeting of the EMANI project, held in Olin Library at Cornell University, Ithaca, New York. The notes are my paraphrase of the transactions and should not be taken as a direct transcript of the discussions. Links to participants’ PowerPoint presentations are provided above, as well as in the text of the minutes. Brief notes on the presentations in the minutes are meant to supplement the slides. – Kizer Walker
N.b. Tasks requiring specific follow-up from participants are marked with “” and bold face.
Thursday, July 25
Sarah Thomas (CUL) opened the meeting by welcoming the EMANI partners to Cornell University Library and wishing the group success in its collaboration.
Bernd Wegner (TU Berlin/Zentralblatt) provided an overview of projects relevant to digital archiving in general and the archiving of math materials in particular. [View presentation]. He noted that several participants in the EMANI meeting would go on to attend the July 29-30 planning meeting of the Digital Mathematics Library project at the US National Science Foundation in Washington, DC. Among other developments, Wegner pointed to a backfiles system being developed by Elsevier for 39 of its journals as a possible competitor for EMANI. He emphasized the importance of establishing visibility for EMANI, noting that content results should be made available as soon as possible – even before the infrastructure is perfected, since the infrastructure is not visible.
Discussion:
Gertraud Griepke (Springer Heidelberg) stressed that the priority assigned to archiving digital materials must influence current production. Today’s digital production must facilitate a future transition to the archives. What is new and significant about EMANI is this way in which the
2 EMANI Meeting July 25-26, 2002 project unites future and past. Bernd Wegner agreed, adding that this influence on the production of digital materials must be a measure of EMANI’s success, not only what the project is able to make available on the web.
Hans Becker (SUB Göttingen) cited the development (e.g. in Germany and the UK) of preservation and archiving projects that are regionally based, rather than subject-based. SUB Göttingen is attempting to play the role of coordinating these two approaches.
Tom Hickerson (CUL) explained that in the US context, subject-based, national (LoC), and institutional archives (i.e., archives that collect scholarship in the institution where it is produced) are typically understood as competing models. He insisted that these models must interoperate. Today (especially in the US context), there can be no single solution, and at the moment, no single model is dominant. EMANI can serve as an exemplar of the subject-based approach and at the same time advocate for interoperability among the different models.
Several of the Work Package subjects assigned at the February Heidelberg meeting were discussed in the context of a grant proposal that EMANI partners from Cornell and Göttingen are preparing for submission to NSF/DFG. The proposal – “Access to Mathematics Over Time: Cooperative Management of Distributed Digital Archives” -- responds to a call for proposals from DFG and NSF’s joint funding program for International Digital Libraries Research (see
David Ruddy (CUL) described the proposed collaboration between SUB Göttingen and CUL as a project that could build, with external funding, core working components of EMANI. If funded, the project will focus on the archiving of electronic journal materials in a distributed system that is open and non-proprietary, taking into account the heterogeneous systems at the different institutions. The partners would develop metadata to support long-term archiving in the framework of the Open Archives Initiative.
Hickerson stressed that the grant activity should not be seen as an attempt to break away from the larger EMANI project. The proposal responds to a specific funding opportunity that has arisen. It is a grant proposal to the two funding agencies, but should be understood at the same time as a proposal to the EMANI group, a suggestion of the direction the larger project can take.
Becker urged that the grant be pursued as a means of fulfilling the tasks laid out in the EMANI Work Packages, but that the Work Package structure be retained, along with the assignments made to the particular organizations in EMANI.
Hickerson emphasized that while the NSF/DFG grant is an International Digital Libraries Research grant specifically requiring US-German collaboration, in the EMANI context, the grant activity would be the business of all the national partners.
Here discussion diverged from the NSF/DFG proposal. Wegner asked whether the style files promised by Springer-Verlag in at the Heidelberg meeting in February were forthcoming. The Springer partners assured the group that the publisher is at work on style files for worldwide production.
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Wegner suggested the group resume the discussion begun at the Göttingen meeting (May ’02): What does EMANI want to preserve? What are the minimum requirements?
Thomas posed the question of the extent to which “context” should be preserved along with “content.” For instance, is it desirable to archive information about a journal’s editorial board? This is not only a metadata question, but also a policy question. Not only a question for mathematicians, but also a question for historians and other user groups.
Arnoud de Kemp (Springer Heidelberg) characterized the “context” question as a structural question: how do the originators of information structure that information?
Pierre Bérard (Grenoble) responded that this is a technical point of view, and not an end-user perspective.
On the particular question of editorial boards, Ruddy noted that Project Euclid had made a decision to capture them in the metadata. But it would difficult to include them retroactively.
Wegner proposed that the group develop a set of potential preservation problems and a set of minimum requirements, with examples.
Hickerson agreed that these kinds of questions need to be addressed immediately as a starting point for future developments.
Hickerson suggested a new Work Package might focus on the question of minimum requirements for content/context archiving.
Jean Poland (CUL) suggested that math librarians consult historians of science on the question of “context” preservation needs.
Griepke: EMANI needs to arrive at a clear definition of what a “journal” is (including, e.g., table of contents, index).
De Kemp: This is a question of structure – the structure of the journal.
Becker noted that SUB Göttingen has already developed a document to address this.
Heike Neuroth (SUB Göttingen) is working on a survey of the EMANI partners on metadata requirements.
Becker reminded the group that we must consider the economics of preservation in formulating metadata requirements. Hickerson cautioned against expending too much of the group’s efforts in the search for a perfect solution – we must make our best guess at what must be preserved and move on. Must be flexible and pragmatic and not get bogged down by the immenseness of the question of what to keep.
Hickerson proposed the November EMANI meeting as a deadline for developing a minimal list of metadata requirements.
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Marcy Rosenkrantz (CUL) asked whether the group is prepared to preserve TeX on the assumption that TeX will continue to be usable in the future.
Ruddy: If we want to preserve presentation formats, preserving TeX will not suffice.
Steve Rockey (CUL) added that publishers must decide whether print or electronic will be the copy of record.
In summary, Thomas noted that two pieces are needed to move forward with the formulation of metadata requirements: the results of the Göttingen metadata survey and examples of problematic materials.
Neuroth will distribute survey and results. Wegner agreed to collect and distribute examples of problematic materials. Griepke agreed to distribute examples from Springer.
The problematic examples will be tested against the proposed metadata – can the metadata describe the examples?
The five participating groups will make recommendations based on the tests.
Access, Navigation, Design
Hickerson: the next step after coming to some conclusions about metadata requirements will be to create models/prototypes of a user system. When should such models be ready for review by the group? In one year?
Neuroth: Six months would be better. If prototypes are available sooner, this experience can still influence the development of the metadata.
Ruddy: The access, navigation, design group (headed by CUL) will propose functional requirements for users in time for the November meeting.
Ruddy asked for clarification of whether the group understands the EMANI project to be creating a “dark” or a “light” archive. Are access controls, etc., a requirement? He noted that he has been working under the assumption that the project will produce a light archive.
Hickerson recalled that Rüdiger Gebauer had spoken at the February meeting in Heidelberg of opening the archive after a “short period.” He asked for the Springer-Verlag partners to make clear if this was not correctly understood.
De Kemp responded that it will not be difficult to discuss opening access to the archive with Springer. He pointed to the open discussion between Springer and Göttingen on Göttingen’s digitization of Springer math books. Springer is willing to discuss an open archive – but probably with restrictions. This might mean a model with 2 or 3 time layers. In any case, Gebauer must be involved in this discussion. There is currently no written policy on this question at Springer.
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Hickerson answered that time constraints on access, a rolling model, do not pose a problem for CUL. What would be problematic is a subscriber-specific system to support subscription processes – this would be too expensive for the library.
De Kemp noted that part of the question of access has to do with the definition of “archive”: is it old materials? Current library collections?
Access, Navigation, Design tasks: basic functional specifications: by November meeting prototypes for presentation to the group: March 1 (to share with the group for discussion in April)
Participants from the CUL group noted that the prototypes should not represent a universal model, but rather prototypes to be adapted to needs of different user communities.
Architecture
Frank Klaproth (SUB Göttingen) opened the discussion on EMANI architecture. He emphasized that the system should be OAI compliant. It will be a distributed system. Rights management must be addressed, as well as the question of which institution holds the digital materials.
Wegner outlined a model of a distributed system in which copies of content would be stored at multiple mirror sites, but individual institutions would retain proprietary rights over specific content. This is the model employed by Zentralblatt MATH and EMIS.
De Kemp said he expected such a model would be of interest to CUL and Göttingen, but wondered whether France or Tsinghua would also be interested.
Bérard responded that the French partners would be interested in principle, but that it is too early for a decision.
Thomas referred to the ongoing discussion in the archives community of the status of mirror sites. Most hold that while mirror sites represent an important safety net for access, they do not constitute an archive.
Nancy McGovern (CUL) drew a distinction between redundancy and replication in the context of digital archiving. Because a mirror site holds copies of documents within an environment that replicates the main site, it is vulnerable to the same problems as the main site. Redundancy in the sense advocated by the LOCKSS project (http://lockss.stanford.edu/) provides more security by storing copies in a different environment.
Wegner added that the EMANI architecture should accommodate updates.
De Kemp envisioned a docking station for the delivery of information directly (i.e., Springer- Verlag to EMANI) in the desired format. Springer wants to see a platform for the delivery of digital information that offers an alternative to Elsevier. This would not be a proprietary Springer system, but an open system with participation from multiple publishers.
Thomas summarized the criteria for evaluating the EMANI architecture: capacity for interoperability with other systems, accommodation of updates.
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Retrodigitization
Becker presented on SUB Göttingen’s Retrodigitization plan for the next two years. [View presentation]. Göttingen will continue work on Springer journals. They wish to create a definitive list of Springer math journals. Teubner journals are also a priority, but like Birkhäuser , Teubner is a sister company of Springer and issues of control must still be worked out. The plan also includes digitization of all the back sets of all the EMIS journals. See presentation for other priorities for journals, monographs.
Wegner and Griepke pointed out Springer has already prepared a list of Springer’s math journals.
De Kemp: Springer is interested in testing monograph digitization. Up to now, this has not been a success. Serviceable on-demand printing is still ten years away – print and binding quality is not up to expectations.
Registry discussion: Need a registry of math materials that will be digitized?
Keith Dennis (Cornell) asked for clarification on the purpose of such a registry. Is its purpose to indicate to libraries what is to be digitized? Or is the point to show users what is available in digital form? If the registry is for math users, Zentralblatt and Math Reviews already function as a repository.
Participants from CUL all understood the registry as a prospective list with the purpose of managing digitization. Thomas: a registry of intent to digitize.
Bérard noted that France is making a list to guide future digitization. A list of priorities.
De Kemp maintained that DOI amounts to an agreed-upon repository. Springer is making DOIs for all digital documents and could register DOIs for EMANI. Whoever has the rights to distribute digital material can register a DOI for that material.
De Kemp will attend an upcoming DOI meeting in Boston and will report back to the EMANI group.
It was agreed that each EMANI partner would prepare a description of what they propose to digitize in the next two years. These will be submitted to Hans Becker who will consolidate and organize the list.
This list is meant to evolve into a mature registry at a later date. For more on the Digital Library Federation’s registry model, see: “The Case for a Digital Registry”
Report on Digitization Projects
Jiang Airong (Tsinghua UL) presented on The Development of the Chinese Math Digital Library at Tsinghua University.
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[View presentation]. The pre-1911 Chinese mathematics literature amounts to approximately 160,000 pages (Jiang did not have a figure for materials since 1911, but estimated more than 1 million pages). Current Chinese digitization efforts intend to cover 60 math journals with over 70,000 articles.
Bérard reported on the NUMDAM project. Topics included technical specifications, metadata structures, quality control procedures, etc., as well as the relationship between the NUMDAM and EMANI and NUMDAM and the Digital Math Library. [View presentation]. Note: On “programme overview” slide (#12), pink represents outsourced processes.
NUMDAM recycles the metadata from CUL and Göttingen for its monograph database.
Bérard noted that NUMDAM’s bibliographies are keyboarded. The next step is to add Zbl/MR numbers to the bibliographies. The beta version of NUMDAM’s citation tool is expected in October.
Bérard discussed the issue of author identification and permissions. In French law, permission must be obtained from the journal and the author. NUMDAM has been advised by lawyer to show a good-faith effort to get permission from the author. When the project is unable to reach an author, the material is posted, but removed if the author requests.
NUMDAM is publicly funded.
Sustainability
Thomas recalled reporting at the February 2002 EMANI meeting on Project Harvest – an exploratory project in subject-based digital archiving in agriculture that was funded by the Mellon Foundation. It had been CUL’s hope that Mellon might fund a mathematics project along these lines, but the foundation has since shifted its priorities. CUL will need to look for other options to support EMANI participation.
McGovern described the competing publisher- and subject-based models of digital archiving that have been under discussion at CUL and elsewhere. The subject-based digital archive (SBDA) model was a key lesson from Project Harvest, but discussion has now moved to a notion of an integrated matrix of repositories, some publisher-based, some subject-based. This integrated model belongs to the broader project at CUL of building a Common Depository of digital materials. This is conceived as an interoperable, distributed system. This reflects a shift in orientation at CUL from individual digital projects to a digital program for the institution. CUL is working with the Open Archival Information System (OAIS) model. While CUL does not have a fully-implemented OAIS archive, it does have pieces.
Griepke raised the question of how to “brand” digital content. With multiple projects making math materials available, how does the user choose, especially when the “real” content – the OCR layer – is invisible? We need a quality stamp.
Wegner: Quality includes comprehensiveness. How do we find a balance between quantity and quality? JSTOR provides an excellent core math collection, but it is a small sample.
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De Kemp: One aspect of EMANI is quality control.
Thomas concluded the sustainability discussion with the question of how to move forward, especially considering the loss of Mellon as a potential funding framework. CUL continues to do preservation research. We may be able to look to the National Science Foundation for support in the context of the Digital Math Library.
EMANI Prototypes
Becker: An important component of EMANI will be to make retrodigitized and born-digital materials available through the same interface. Becker discussed the prospect of gathering and merging data from Zentralblatt and the Jahrbuch. He pointed to the EULER project as an example of integrated access to dispersed math materials through a common user interface (http://www.emis.de/projects/EULER/).
Cornell Math Projects
Poland reported on various CUL digital projects related to mathematics. See the minutes to the May 2002 CUL meeting on digital math projects:
Poland highlighted CUL’s Technical Reports Library (http://techreports.library.cornell.edu), a collection of computer science research reports and papers that descends from the NCSTRL (Networked Computer Science Technical Reference Library) project. CUL views the Tech Reports Library as a prototype collection for an institutional repository model of digital archiving and access provision. CUL hopes to add capacity to handle the ingest of more complex documents than are stored in the Tech Reports Library.
Poland and Hickerson described the economic model developed for Project Euclid. [Euclid economic model].
De Kemp suggested that if CUL finds it cannot sustain financial support for Project Euclid, Springer might be interested.
Hickerson suggested CUL might be interested in discussing a marketing agreement for Euclid with Springer.
De Kemp asked whether CUL supports the Open Archive Initiative (OAI).
Hickerson responded that Cornell has been involved in its development. But he noted his impression that OAI is more popular in Europe than in the US. In the US, interest is primarily in its archiving uses; in Europe there seems to be more interest in OAI’s implications for self- publishing. It would be interesting to fold the OAI discussion into the EMANI project.
Relationship of EMANI to DML
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Several participants in the EMANI meeting went on to attend the first planning meeting of the Digital Mathematics Library project, July 29-30 at the NSF in Washington, DC.
Dennis: EMANI is based on the premise that Springer-Verlag will provide access to archived materials, but will not be charged with paying for the work of archiving. The DML represents a search for funding for third parties to do this work.
De Kemp wished to express Springer’s interest in EMANI in a different way: Springer-Verlag is interested in long-term preservation and access to mathematics.
Thomas: Phillipe Tondeur sees the DML as his legacy at NSF. And NSF seems to have money to fund the project. We hope this wave of interest in math digitization will benefit the EMANI project.
Wegner: A high-profile project, such as the DML promises to be, will have a positive effect on local efforts.
De Kemp asked about the extent to which EMANI needed to be formalized in advance of the DML meeting.
Rosenkrantz: Formalizing EMANI agreements will help to “sell” the DML to funding agencies.
Bérard noted that in the French case, in order for public funds (CNRS) to be put into the project, a clear statement from Springer is needed that the worldwide mathematics community will benefit from the work.
De Kemp asked whether a paper was needed that would define EMANI for the DML project.
The group agreed that this was not needed at this stage, and might even be seen as offering competition to the DML.
Friday, July 26
Griepke presented on Springer’s electronic publishing program, outlining what she called a “pure Springer” approach (rather than wider Bertelsmann policies and processes). [View presentation]. She discussed enhancements to content, functionality, and access for readers and advantages of branding and access for authors. She emphasized Springer’s attention to streamlining the digital production process and workflows, and the impact of Springer’s commitment to archiving on production processes. Griepke presented a list of 22 journal titles in mathematics – Springer titles excluding Birkhäuser, identified as “mathematics” from the point of view of SUB Göttingen (not identical with Springer’s definition, which would include statistics, etc.). The task is to digitize the full back set of these 22 titles. Griepke estimates that this comes to approximately 925,000 pages (the estimate comes from a page count of each of these journals from the past two years, extrapolated back to issue one, and subtracting the pages that are already in digital form). Around 60% of the pages to be digitized are in four journals.
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Griepke and De Kemp cautioned that EMANI must avoid the tendency to produce an overly complex workflow, especially if a distributed system is adopted. More discussion of the evolution of digital workflow within Springer in the past five years.
Participants acknowledged the need to provide controls so that access is not interrupted if a journal changes publishers.
The question of preserving “context” was taken up again. Is a link needed between each article and an editorial board for the issue? Griepke: Preserving advertisements is probably not important. Thomas: In many fields, researchers want to see advertisements.
The group discussed linking to and from errata, which Springer currently provides.
De Kemp: Previously, Springer had not dealt with metadata for letters to the editor, conference announcements, and similar journal contents. ISI demanded that Springer go back and include these.
The Springer team asked how libraries want to handle the metadata for book reviews and similar. Is there a need to index these? Springer needs to know now, to determine how to ship, etc.
Wegner: How is the reader guided to book reviews and similar contents in the electronic environment? Normally with digital material, the reader goes straight to the article.
De Kemp: A well-structured search engine will identify a book review.
Wegner: But in a print environment, the reader typically does not search for this kind of item.
Thomas: The library’s interest in preserving access to supplementary material such as book reviews has to do with the contextual relationship of this material to the main journal content. If in the electronic environment reviews, etc., are moved to a separate database, then there is not so much of a concern. But as long as this material is part of the context of the content, as it has been in the print environment, it needs to be accessible.
Wegner: We need a solution that does not artificially integrate these types of content in imitation of print.
Griepke: A journal is not only its content, but also a community organizer. Are we archiving only journal content, or also this community organizing function?
The group discussed the implications of the ability, in the digital environment, to change an already published work though the addition of links, errata, etc. Springer’s firm rule in this regard is that no article is changed after publication. (In this connection, Wegner referred to the IMU’s Committee on Electronic Information Communication “Best Current Practices” document:
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Dennis proposed this model: The archive contains article content only with a link to additional services. The archived “static content” is free, but the publisher can charge for the added services. This is what the publisher gets in return for giving away the content.
De Kemp: Well defined.
De Kemp posed a question to libraries and mathematicians: Is there a need to identify illustrations, formulae, etc., separate from the text of an article (searchable mathematics)?
Wegner: Project MOWGLI is working on searchable formulae.
Dennis: This is one purpose behind MathML – not all mathematicians are interested in this issue, but some are.
De Kemp: If this is of interest, it is something that Springer wants to explore.
Thomas and Ruddy noted that Project Euclid focus groups did not show much interest in these kinds of features. Perhaps it is too expensive.
Rosenkrantz: Structure searching in chemistry is very important – the need for such features is community defined.
Poland: We do not know whether the math community is interested, since we have not offered these features.
Wegner: When these features become possible, Springer will no doubt offer them. Then they will need to be archived.
Ruddy asked if mathematicians formulate equations in a uniform way. The clear answer from the group was: no. Ruddy: Perhaps MathML will introduce standards.
Springer is involved in the European Commission’s OpenMath project (http://www.nag.co.uk/projects/OpenMath.html) that is working on searchable equations.
De Kemp summed up the discussion, noting that features such as searchable formulae are of interest to the group as a possible future direction, but not a realistic prospect at present.
On monographs, Griepke noted that Springer’s information model for books is similar to that for journals with a uniform workflow. She noted that digitized monographs require guides for readers to render context and promote browsability, since full-text search engines throw readers into the middle of a complex environment.
Formalizing EMANI
Syed Hasan (Springer NY) and the Springer team led a discussion of various aspects of EMANI’s formalization: mission, organization, branding, outreach, etc. Hasan’s PowerPoint on “Formalizing Project EMANI” was updated during the course of the discussion to reflect decisions reached on these points.
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The group agreed upon the following statement of EMANI’s mission: “An international collaboration to support and coordinate the long-term preservation and open accessibility of mathematical publications in digital form.” The term “publications” was chosen after some discussion over alternatives such as mathematical “literature,” “resources,” “material,” etc. The entire group firmly endorsed the goal of open accessibility.
The name of the project was fixed as Electronic Mathematical Archiving Network Initiative. The use of the definite article with the acronym (i.e., “The EMANI”) was rejected.
It was noted that “selecting relevant content,” which appears under the heading “Aims and Scope” in the presentation, does not mean “quality control” (but rather determining the scope of the collection.
With regard to group structure (again, see presentation), the Core Team consists of the representatives of the participating institutions (Cornell University Library, SUB Göttingen, Tsinghua University Library, Orsay Mathematical Library/CMD, Springer-Verlag and its associated publishing houses [Birkhaeuser, Vieweg, Teubner], ELibM in EMIS, and the project Coordinator. Project Coordinator is Bernd Wegner. The precise role of the Advisory Board is still being defined, but it was agreed that it is not “over” the Core Team. It is similar to an editorial board, a scientific board. It is not a management team.
The group was shown several proposals for an EMANI logo that had been prepared by the Springer team. Meeting participants favored C, below, but there was discussion about whether the yellow background might too closely associate the project with Springer. The Springer group will bring that concern back to the graphic artists.
Springer will have PDFs of the logo made up for use by the EMANI team.
A. B. C.
The group wanted to pair the logo with a slogan and tentatively settled on “Serving the mathematics community.”
MathPortal
Rüdiger Gebauer (Springer NY) joined the meeting by speakerphone.
Springer considered a mathematics portal a few years ago. Various ideas were generated at that time. Now, reconsidering portal idea in connection with EMANI.
The portal would aim to be the leading community organizer for mathematicians. Would include an events calendar, conference information, pre-print links, links to various projects, etc.
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Thomas said that CUL had also long harbored the goal of creating a math portal – this was under consideration when Project Euclid was launched. At that time, it was decided that the environment was too competitive – the AMS and others already covered many of the functions envisioned for the portal. But perhaps the environment / alliances have shifted.
The group thought that there had not been a significant shift.
Wegner: First, consider how the existing pieces could be assembled, then consider whether more is needed. Consider forging coalitions. Starting from scratch would be too expensive.
As an alternative to the portal model put forward by Springer, Dennis proposed that what mathematicians want is a Google-like search engine that is math specific.
Ruddy asked whether AMS would allow MathSciNet records to be harvested for this purpose.
Dennis: No. What would they have to sell if they gave the records away?
Ruddy: This would mean giving only the metadata away, not the reviews.
Dennis: But many people go to MR/Zbl just for citations.
Ruddy: We need to encourage the parties to make their records available via OAI.
Griepke discussed the World Health Organization’s Health InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative (HINARI), which provides developing countries access to leading medical journals through a medical and life sciences portal. HINARI offers a useful model for our math portal discussion because its scope is well defined and it serves a limited community.
Wegner urged the group to consider carefully whether there is a real need for the information services (such as conference information) that a portal would provide. Or are mathematicians satisfied with existing sources? Thomas likewise cautioned against creating a redundant service – we need to channel our efforts and not duplicate existing services.
Jerry Curtis (Springer NY) insisted that we would need base our discussion of a portal on a survey of the math community. Impossible to reach a conclusion in this meeting. “One-stop shopping” is talked about a lot, but up to now has not appeared.
Thomas raised the question of a business model for a math portal. De Kemp responded that content issues would need to be discussed first.
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Gebauer noted that the costs involved in building and maintaining a math portal would not be nominal. It would need significant editorial work – one head editor, plus regional contacts. Hickerson agreed: leadership, capital, constant management. What warrants the investment?
De Kemp: Would CUL subscribe? Rockey: Only if the faculty demanded it. Only if the portal offered things that could not be found elsewhere. Thomas: Only if the portal were a real productivity tool for mathematicians, significantly better than free sources. Poland: The library perception is that a sharp librarian can find the information without a portal.
Hickerson: We need to know what we can do before making any announcements. We need a stronger commitment of resources from the meeting participants before pursuing the portal idea.
Hasan: If the portal were a failure, this could damage EMANI.
De Kemp: This preliminary discussion has planted a seed. Gebauer: Perhaps a small working group should develop the idea for the next EMANI meeting in the fall.
Thomas: The National Science Digital Library (NSDL) (http://comm.nsdlib.org/) is an emerging prototype. Instead of a working group, we could look at carefully at the NSDL.
Hans Becker will report at the November meeting on the feasibility of using NSDL harvesting techniques.
Curtis: The group should channel its energies to EMANI, not risk distraction. After EMANI is moving, we can ask the math community what might be added.
Gebauer: Yes. Adding the portal idea to the agenda was not meant to distract from the core EMANI project.
EMANI structure Advisory board
Wegner proposed that there be two boards: An “editorial committee” (or similar) made up of respected mathematicians would represent EMANI to the math community. It would function like an editorial board. A “scientific and technical advisory board” with IT expertise and strong ties to the library community. This would not be a steering committee; rather, would give advise on technical matters
Poland: asked for clarification on the difference between the two boards. Gebauer: One represents end users, the other represents librarians.
Hickerson noted the boards’ outreach function.
Gebauer: The boards should be small and extremely professional. Members would not be figureheads.
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Hickerson: We need to have the advisory groups in place early on, but we also need to have support available for them. We must be able to tell them where the money is coming from to support meetings, etc.
Rosenkrantz: And we need to determine their terms of appointment, the time commitment involved, etc.
De Kemp suggested one meeting of the boards per year.
Wegner: Need to determine procedures for adding and replacing members.
Gebauer: The boards will not be supervisory committees – they will be like a Beirat, an advisory council.
De Kemp: EMANI is an initiative, a collaboration, not a society or a company. We can invite board members on that basis. The term may not be important. Thomas: The term is important, because there must be a mechanism for cycling people out.
Joachim Heinze (Springer Heidelberg) suggested a 3-year renewable term. 2 years deemed too short for a real commitment to the project.
De Kemp: Board members would receive no remuneration, but would be compensated for costs.
De Kemp: We need to formulate a list of names in the coming weeks and finalize the board membership in November.
The group will send suggestions for board members to Bernd Wegner. The listserv should not be used for this purpose.
Springer Update
Gebauer reported on the current status of Springer-Verlag and assured the group that even with a potential new majority owner, Springer is prepared to stand 100% behind EMANI.
Expanding to Other Disciplines
Gebauer discussed the prospects of expanding the EMANI model to other fields. He suggested that a successful project cannot be limited to pure mathematics. The applied areas of math are much larger and are thriving. He proposed that EMANI first be formalized, and that the group then begin talking to content providers in other areas – physics and engineering initially.
Dennis asked what this plan implies with regard to the involvement of other publishers. Gebauer answered that while EMANI is initiated by Springer, it is not a Springer project. Once the project is formalized and stable, it will be open to other publishers. Gebauer proposed that EMANI branch out sometime in 2003 – he suggested AMS and Cambridge UP as possible future partners.
Gebauer envisions EMANI in its final stage as a platform where all publishers in mathematics and related fields find their material archived.
16 EMANI Meeting July 25-26, 2002
Information Dissemination
Wegner outlined EMANI’s specific needs with regard to publicity and gave an overview of his own efforts (articles, conference papers, etc.) to publicize the project. [View presentation].
Bernd Wegner and Syed Hasan will draft new EMANI press release.
Griepke: Link has a list of around 600 addresses of people who have requested information about EMANI.
Springer will set up an EMANI website will be set up on the Springer server in Germany. Heike Neuroth will maintain the website.
Site will contain (among other things…): Links to partner institutions Restricted partners’ page (containing work package material and timeline)
Each partner is to name a contact person for website. first draft of website to be presented at November meeting.
Outreach
Thomas noted that the first EMANI outreach following the Ithaca meeting would take place in Washington at the DML planning meeting. Asked for other suggestions.
Griepke suggested arranging for a student to work on EMANI as a thesis project. Bérard noted that NUMDAM had library students studying that program.
Thomas: Library schools should be alerted about this emerging project. Also: Coalition for Networked Information (CNI) Research libraries ALA SPARC SLA Etc.
Need to assemble a list of organizations for outreach. Give categories and partners fill in appropriate national body.
Thomas questioned whether dissemination and outreach are really separate tasks and suggested collapsing them into one work package. General agreement.
Wegner and Thomas will co-chair combined Dissemination and Outreach work package.
For all work packages: Leaders must formulate definition of work package with responsibilities and timetable. Descriptions are due by October 1 – send to Hans Becker who will organize them.
Descriptions will appear on restricted part of website. Will need periodic updates.
17 EMANI Meeting July 25-26, 2002
Wegner proposed that annual reports be produced. Also, any member of the team planning to present on EMANI at a conference, etc., should ask the list for suggestions.
Hickerson asked whether “access” (which includes large-scale search strategies) should be separated from the “design and navigation” (which have to do with environment) in the work packages. Group decided to leave the single work package for now, but maybe split later when more work has been finished.
Neuroth and Becker raised the issue of dependencies among the work packages – the timeline shows linear relationships (and hence “time dependencies”), but what about other logical and thematic dependencies?
Hickerson responded that when the work packages are explicated, some will come apart. How do the work packages map to the OAIS model?
Arnoud de Kemp and Elmar Mittler added to Work Package 5 (Copyright).
Progress report: NSF/DFG proposal
Ruddy summarized: The proposal addresses archiving of journal material from Springer, Euclid, and EMIS in a jointly managed, distributed, interoperable digital archive. Includes metadata and protocol development. Funding could be available as soon as November 2002. This would be a 3- year grant for approximately $1 million. The participants see the grant project as providing tools and a model for EMANI. The proposal refers to EMANI, but this is not an EMANI project. Whether the project is funded or not, the approach worked out for the proposal can provide an underpinning for EMANI. The participants hope this provides a way to build key pieces of EMANI with public support. The project would also build a working OAIS model.
Summary / Next Steps
The meeting closed with a summary of project tasks (given at top of this document) and optimistic anticipation of further collaboration among the partners.
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