DL Project Suggestion: ETD Digital Library and OAi

• Number of people: 2-3
• Goal: To develop an ontology and initial support for ETDs through OAi
• Contact information: Dr. John Eaton (Graduate School), Gail McMillan (Library), Professor Eberhard Hilf (Physics, University of Oldenburg, Germany) and his staff, Marcos Andre Goncalves (mgoncalv@vt.edu), and the instructor, all at Virginia Tech
• Required background: interest in ETDs and familiarity with library, digital library and/or information retrieval system operation
• Description: NSF will fund 2 students for 3 years starting Jan. 2001 on a project to apply ideas related to the Open Archives initiative to two application domains, in US and Germany. One is to help make available electronic theses and dissertations in US and Germany. The work involves developing an ontology or characterization of the relevant information and to map how that is represented around the world so that open archives can be developed, harvested, and support highly effective information access.

  This project aims to get that project started. It will include analysis, design, and prototyping. See www.ndltd.org and www.theses.org for background.

• Students involved: The following students are working on this project: