• About the workshop
• Workshop announcement (Word document)
• Participants (Word document)
• Resource Persons
• Workshop programme and material
• Course evaluation
• CD-ROM contents
• Other free/ open source software (a compilation)
• Some photos of the workshop

About the workshop:

Affordable software is a key requirement for successful development and maintenance of digital libraries. Though it is possible today to create simple DLs using prevailing Web and database technologies, it would take lot more effort to develop software that integrates functions such as metadata, object search and retrieval, access management, and support for multiple document types. Further we also expect digital libraries to be robust, scale as collections grow and incorporate international standards. The workshop focused on imparting practical skills to the participants in using two open source softwares - Eprints Archive Software (EAS) and Greenstone Digital Library software (GSDL) for creating and and managing DLs. The workshop also focused on the processes, technology, workflow and economics of creating digital collections.

27 participants from different organizations across India participated in the workshop. Each participant had a dedicated workstation with Linux Red Hat 7.1, and Windows 2000 dual operating systems. While they practiced EAS on Linux, GSDL was tried out on both Linux and Windows platforms, through carefully designed lab sessions. Apart from the course material, both the softwares were also distributed to the participants on CD-ROM.

The workshop was divided into three parts. Part-1 dealt with concepts and technologies (days 1 and 2). Part-2 covered Eprints Archive Software (days 3 and 4), and Part-3 covered GSDL (days 5 and 6). The workshop culminated with a practical demo of ICADL2001 conference publications published using GSDL, providing integrated CD-based multi-media access to all the papers (Word, PDF, PPT, MP3 audio clips), with browse and search features. The ICADL/GSDL collection was designed and produced by the NCSI Trainees of 2001-2002 batch.

We are pleased to bring you the contents of the workshop through this site. We hope you will find this effort useful. Your comments and suggestions are most welcome.

Dr. T.B. Rajashekar
Workshop Coordinator
NCSI, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore
E-Mail: raja@ncsi.iisc.ernet.in

Resource Persons:

Dr. T.B. Rajashekar (NCSI, IISc) (raja@ncsi.iisc.ernet.in)
Prof. R. Shalini Urs, Dept. of Library & Information Science, Mysore (shaliniurs@hotmail.com)
Ms. K.T. Anuradha (NCSI, IISc) (anu@ncsi.iisc.ernet.in)
Mr. Filbert Minj (NCSI, IISc) (filbert@ncsi.iisc.ernet.in)
Mr. Francis Jayakanth (NCSI, IISc) (franc@ncsi.iisc.ernet.in)
Ms. Suvarsha Walters (NCSI, IISc) (suvarsha@ncsi.iisc.ernet.in)
Mr. B.S. Arun (NCSI, IISc) (arun.bs@ncsi.iisc.ernet.in)
Mr. Madhuresh Singhal (NCSI, IISc) (madhuresh@ncsi.iisc.ernet.in)
Mr. T.S. Prasanna (NCSI, IISc) (prasanna@ncsi.iisc.ernet.in)
Mr. Shravan Kumar (NCSI, IISc) (shravan@ncsi.iisc.ernet.in)

Assisted by NCSI Trainees (2001-2002 batch):

Ms. Doncy Augustine
Ms. Neetu Bharti
Mr. Satya Ranjan Sahu
Mr. BS Shivaram
Ms. K. Venkatalakshmi

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Workshop Programme and Material:

Click on the presentation/ lab title link to open the related file. Unless mentioned, most of the material is in PDF format.

Note: EAS - Eprint Archive Software, GSDL - Greenstone Digital Library Software

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Course evaluation:

We had designed course evaluation forms, to assess the effectiveness of presentations and lab exercises, logistics, etc. The evaluation forms were both day specific and also for the overall workshop usefulness.

Participants were asked to evaluate the presentations/ presenters in terms of 5 parameters: Organization, subject knowledge, graphics, grammar, eye contact and elocution. Further, for each parameter, one of the 4 grade points was to be given: 1,2,3,4 (1 - least effective/very poor, 4 - very effective/very good).

For lab sessions parameters used were: Complexity, usefulness, help available, clarity of assignments, and sutable facilities. Each was to be given one of the four grade points mentioned above.

How did we fare in presentations and lab sessions? Overall, presentations reveived grade points averaging between 3.3 to 3.5. Lab sessions received overall grade points averaging slightly below 3.0.

How was the workshop recevied on the whole? On a scale of 1-5 (1-very poor, 2-poor, 3-fair, 4-good, 5-very good), the workshop received the following scores: 4.3 for Content, 4.2 for Logistics, and 4.3 for Overall assessment.

Select the links to open the appropriate evaluation form (Word Documents): Day1, Day2, Day3, Day4, Day5, Day6, Overall workshop feedback form.

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CD-ROM contents:

Each participant was given a CD-ROM containing the two softwares, test data collections for use in the lab sessions for collection building, and other related documentation and material.

The CD-ROM distributed to the participants contained the following folders with the contents mentioned. Portion of the CD-ROM contents are made available on this site for your use. Browse the folders to access the contents.

• "eas": This directory contained the software required to install E-Prints Archive software version 2.0. Other than the software for EAS, the directory also contained additional dependency software that are required for installing EAS. NOT MADE AVAILABLE ON THIS SITE. PL. DOWNLOAD THE EAS SOFTWARE FROM WWW.EPRINTS.ORG.
• "gsdl": This directory contained the software for installing Greenstone Digital Library version 2.37 and related packages and files. NOT MADE AVAILABLE ON THIS SITE. PL. DOWNLOAD THE GSDL SOTWARE FROM WWW.GREENSTONE.ORG.
• "docs": This directory contains general information/articles/documentation related to Digital Libraries.
• "test-collections": This directory contains the test collections that can be used for collection building using the above mentioned Digital Library software. The collections are categorized for each software. The collections are chosen to have appropriate variety of data that will go into the built collections.
  

Note: Standard disclaimers apply for the content in these folders. We are making these as they were prepared for the workshop and will not be updated further. We are not responsible for their correct or incorrect functioning. You are strongly advised to keep in touch with the EAS and GSDL sites for latest versions and related documentation.

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1st May 2002