Digital Library Center Blog | UF

Laurie N. Taylor November 19th, 2007

The UF Libraries’ Preservation Department has started a retrospective dissertation scanning project to help solve problems of access to research, but UF needs permission for Internet Distribution from each author. Authors can grant permissions by completing this form and sending it to the address on the form.

UF requires all new dissertations to be submitted electronically, but that leaves decades upon decades of paper and microfilm-only versions. Finding all of the UF alumni to assign permissions is a monumental task. The retrospective dissertation scanning project has been featured in various news venues (newsletters and the newspaper, emails have been sent to alumni with email addresses on file, letters have been sent to addresses on file) and more communications are planned. Other efforts to get the word out include working through departmental and college contacts and larger and smaller news venues, but this is a slow process so anything automated or anything that easily grows on its own would be a major help. With all of this work the response is slowly building, but I’m hoping that this blog post helps get the word out, too.

Having the dissertations and theses online will be great for researchers and society because it will build the overall pool of shared and available knowledge. Like the picture above, having these materials online will also show a bit of history - UF’s history; the history of a particular idea, research topic, field, researcher; and more. Making high quality research, even older research, openly available to everyone changes the information landscape and opening new doors and allowing for many new possibilities.

If anyone has ideas for more keywords or ways to share the information through faster channels, please add comments to help the project. Authors can give permissions through this online form and mailing it to the address at the bottom of the form, and those who know authors can share the form with the authors. For more information, see the Preservation Department’s page on the Retrospective Dissertation Scanning Project or see this example of a digitized dissertation.

To best help this message get to past authors, here are keywords to further it along through the magic inner workings of the Internet and search engines: UF dissertation, dissertations, thesis, PhD, EdD, doctorate, doctoral, graduates, alumni, former graduates, graduate students, research, retrospective, online, microfilm, print, past, online, digitize, share, archives, scanning, prior, past, old, database, University of Florida, UF, gators, Florida alumni, alumnus, open access, online, openly accessible, make available, share, digitization, digital

• open access , uf , Academia , Collection Items , Library , Digital Library
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Laurie N. Taylor November 1st, 2007

While the map linked from this slideshow isn’t actually accurate because nearly all of the images are from the University of Florida’s original Library, Smathers East, and I spread them out for easier viewing, the map does accurately show why there’s reason to be excited because Picasa has improved once again. Not only can the images in Picasa be mapped, the images now show as small icons of the images instead of the generic picture icon, and the individual images can be clicked on and enlarged and they can be played in a slide-show format across the map.

The slideshow with the map is a great way to embed complicated information (this picture taken here, before this picture which was here, and after these pictures which were taken in this sequence in these places) and makes it allow easily visible. Plus, this is all available online without requiring any additional software so it’s even easier for users. This sort of elegant design is exactly what more programs need and it’s exactly what the Digital Library Center needs for many of our projects. We need ways that our users can easily access our materials in ways that contextualize the materials. While we still need more functionality because we need the same material-mapping onto a real map and we need it added to a chronological mapping system so we can locate materials in space and time, and over time (years, time periods, timeline-event markers). Other downloadable applications like Google Earth offer us more functionality and almost as much ease for our users, and each step toward more data integration and ease takes us closer to our current goal of modeling systems for a historical virtual world that users can see through time and space.

• design , uf , gis , exhibit , Library , Digital Library
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Laurie N. Taylor October 30th, 2007

UF’s public awareness campaign is “The University of Florida is the foundation for The Gator Nation” and then sub-campaign taglines like “The Gator Nation is everywhere.” While it does sound a little sci-fi overlord-esque, it’s actually true in that UF does have land everywhere and does have projects conducted all over the state and all over the world. UF is also one of the largest public schools and has alumni everywhere. If Gator fans are counted, then this becomes even more validated because Gator fans are everywhere. I’m not a sports person, so I only know about any of the sports when people tell me or when my students are on the teams (the students work so hard that it’s almost an ethical imperative to keep up as a teacher). However, I’m so often on phone calls or emails with someone and they hear/read “UF” or “Gainesville” and I hear/read “Go Gators!” in return. It happens so often that it almost no longer seems strange, even when they’re in California or Texas or Canada or wherever. What had seemed strange was not that the recognition of UF and the general friendliness of the response, but that the people were actually Gator fans.

Looking at the image from Puerto Rico, with the grounds keeper in a Gator shirt seems so fitting for UF’s presence across the globe and for Halloween (Dia de Los Muertos).

• holiday , uf , Collection Items
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