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= Subject Gateways =

Introduction
Information technology has made many advances over the years, with the most rapid ones coming recently. From Gothenburg’s printing press to e-publishing. One might think that technology is making it easier for us to organize and store information, has made access and retrieval easier; however, it is not a straightforward case. Advancing technology has created a whole new problem – information boom.

Technological advances have made it easier and faster to analyze, collect, abstract, index, search, and use data and information. But the information may be scattered, not only in several different databases, but also on completely different systems, some, of which users may not be able to access. If information professionals find it difficult, then for users it is nearly impossible. So to arrest this titanic problem, the concept of “ Subject Gateways” has emerged in the early 1990s.

2. Why Gateways?
People are increasingly going to the Internet before they go to the library Librarians are increasingly taking librarianship out of libraries and onto the Internet.The phenomenal growth of the Internet has posed an unmanaged and increasingly unmanageable environment.

3. The current situation of Internet may be characterized as follows

 * Internet as a whole is not well organized
 * Huge amount of public information are handled by various search engines in a fairly basic manner.
 * Search engines have no inbuilt mechanism for matching retrieval to the age, level or experience of the users or to the purpose of the study.
 * Web publishing is often very careless in authenticating sources.
 * Accessibility is sometimes illusory, and different file formats and protocols require additional software to read files and to achieve cross platform performance.
 * Ease of technical facilities to copy and paste makes a copyright abuse inevitable.
 * Inspite of attempts to create metadata structures, there is an almost complete absence of effective information control mechanisms.
 * Although Internet is a unique example of the successful linking of people and resources,but still it is somewhat lacking in the cost-effective manner.
 * Users do not find what they are searching for, and still waste hours looking, are
 * frequently arguments against the Internet.

4. What are Gateways?
Moffat describes the establishment of the gateways as “a process of identification, Filtering, description, classification and indexing before they are added to databases Which is freely available via a WWW.”

So we can say that gateways are the Internet search tools to help people find resources on the Internet, e.g.: electronic journals; software; data sets; e-books; mailing lists / discussion groups (and their archives); articles / papers / reports; bibliographies; bibliographical databases; organizational home pages; educational materials; news; resource guides.

Gateways offer linked collections of Internet resources via a database of resource description. This can be: Thus it can be said that the gateways are “ a gathering place of discipline specific resources.”
 * Browsed – according to broad classification
 * Searched –through index
 * Quality controlled – due to selection

What are subject gateways?
Subject gateways are also known as

(1) subject-based information gateways (SBIGs);

(2) Subject based gateways;

(3) subject index gateways,

(4) virtual libraries;

(5) clearinghouse;

(6) subject trees;

(7) pathfinders;

(8) quality –controlled subject gateways, etc.

Subject gateways is nothing but the facility that allows easier access to networked-based Resources in a definite subject area. The simplest type of subject gateways isa sets of web pages containing lists of links to resources. “Subject gateways” as a term was popularized in the UK Electronic Libraries Programme(e- lib).

Historical development of subject gateways
The subject gateways engaged in response to the challenges of “resource discovery” in a fast developing Internet environment in the early and mid-1990s. Due to the emergence of the network information retrieval systems (Gopher, WWW, Archie, net first, etc) and access protocols ( ftp, gopher, telnet, http, etc) innovative information technologies and services emerge.

The Electronic Libraries Programme (eLib) of JISC of the UK Higher Education Funding Council set up in 1995 which includes besides other things, access to network resources (ANR) and subject gateways were funded as the part of ANR area and latter on it lead to the funding and establishment of eLib subject gateways- SOSIG, EEVL, OMNI, History, ADAM, and Biz/Ed.

(a) Follett Report
The most significant step that led to the establishment of subject gateways was the review of libraries and related provision in higher education in UK commissioned in 1992, and the recommendations given in the resulting comprehensive report, popularly known as the Follett Report4. The Review Group was chaired by Prof Sir Brian Follett. Its membership included nominees of the four funding bodies, and other representatives from the higher education and related sectors. The Review group met at regular intervals and its report, consisting of eight comprehensive chapters, was brought out in December 1993. It led to several initiatives for increasing the effectiveness of libraries, especially through the application of IT for network access, navigation tools, electronic document storage and delivery, etc.

(b) DESIRE (Development of a European Service for Information on Research and Education)
This is one of the largest projects funded by the Telematics for Research Sector of the Fourth Framework Programme funded by the European Union. In particular,

DESIRE intend to provide: (http://www.desire.org)
 * Tools for indexing and cataloging information servers.
 * Tools for management and maintenance of information servers.
 * Demonstration and evaluation of tools and techniques for information catching and secure access to information servers.
 * background information for developers of networked information systems training materials
 * IN Oct’99 DESIRE published the “Information Gateway Handbook”- a guide forlibraries interested in setting up large-scale subject gateways of their own.

(c) Electronic Libraries Programme (eLib)
This was an initiative of the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) of UK. The gateways established under eLib were SOSIG (Social Science Information Gateway, which slightly predated eLib, and acted as a model for other gateways), ADAM (Art, Design, Architecture and Media), EEVL (Edinburgh Engineering Virtual Library), OMNI (Organizing Medical Networked Information) and BizEd (Business Education).

(d) R Discovery Network (RDN)
This new service was started in 1999 under funding from JISC to maintain these gateways on a long-term basis and to co-ordinate their activities. RDN comprised eight gateways set up between 1999 and 2003 out of which five were new: Altis (Hospitality, Leisure, Sport and Tourism), Artifact (Arts and Creative Industries), GEsource (Geography and Environment), Humbul (Humanities) and PSIgate (Physical Sciences). Three converted from existing eLib gateways – ADAM, BizEd and BIOME, which was formed out of OMNI, EEVL, and SOSIG.

(e) ROADS ( ResourceOrganization and Discovery in Subject-based Services)
It is being funded by the JISC (Joint Information system Committee) through e-Lib programme (UK). It is an open source set of software toolkit, which enables the set up and maintenance of web-based subject gateways. A ROAD based informationGateway is based on a database that contains information about Internet resources. Therecords in the database contain information such as the title of the resource, whichmaintains it how to access it, a classification number, and a description and keywords.The user is given access to this information while either browsing or searching thedatabase. This is particularly important for geographically distant resources that mightrequire some time and effort to access. The software includes the database technology, required to set up a gateways.

For downloading the free online software visit its site

URL: http://www.ilrt.bris.ac.uk/roadsMeaning

(f) ISSAC
It is a research project of Internet Scout in the USA. Its aim is to create an architecture that enables repositories of metadata records to be cross-searched.

( http://www.scout.cs.uisc.edu/research/index-html/)

(g) IMesh
It was formed as a result of a meeting at the second European Conference on Research and Advanced Technology for Digital Libraries, held at Crete, in Sept’98. One of the main aims of Imesh, “The International Gateway Community” is to explore the potential for collaborative development of gateway internationally. Many of the technologies required for cross-searching different gateways and from remote cataloguing into gateways already exist, but the strategic organization between gateways are lacking and IMesh aims to address it. In June’99 the first IMesh workshop was held in Warwick in the UK. It includes a mailing list (Imesh Mailbase), some informational web pages ((Imesh Website) and some collaborative activity.

(h) IMESH Toolkit Project
This project was started in 1999 and funded by the National Science Foundation (USA) and JISC (UK) to develop the architecture toolkit for distributed subject-gateways. (Building on ROADS and ASAAC) The Toolkit project is intended to produce a consistent framework for the development of subject gateway software. The focus is on the sharing of both software and metadata. Where possible, the toolkit will build on existing and ongoing work (ROADS DESIRE, Isaac Network and RDN). One of the main aims of the project is to reduce the entry costs for new subject gateways, including reducing the effort required to support specialized or local functionality.

(i) Reynard project
It was decided in the Fifth Framework programme under the European Project, and its duration is from Jan-2000 to June-2001. Its aim is to provide a one-point access to, and at a consistent presentation of national subject services in Europe. It will exploit the existing services by way of creating a shared test environment within which national initiatives will experiment with co-operative efforts, devise models for sharing metadata, develop business models and foster standardization activities.

Meaning of Subject Gateways
A subject gateway is a website that provides searchable and browsable access to online resources focused around a specific subject. Subject gateway resource descriptions are usually created manually rather than being generated via an automated process. As the resource entries are generated by hand, they are usually superior to those available from a conventional web search engine.

Definitions of Subject Gateways
According to Lorcan Dempsey,“Subject gateways are internet services which support systematic resource discovery. They provide links to resources (documents, objects, sites or services) predominantly accessible via the internet. The service is based on resource description. Browsing access to the resource via a subject structure is an important feature”.

According to Dempsey, L; Gardner, T and D. Michale, UKOLN, University of Bath, UK)“Subejct gateways are Internet services which supports systematic resource discovery. They provide links to resources( documents, objects, sites or services) predominantly accessible via the Internet. The service is based on resource description. Browsing access to the resource via a subject structure is an importantfeature”

According to (Emma Place, ILRT, University of Bristol, UK) “Subject gateways are Internet- based services designed to help users locate high quality information that is available on the Internet. They are typically, data bases of detailed metadata (or catalogue) records which describes Internet resources and offer a hyperlink to the resources.”

Search engines and subject gateways
Subject Gateways offer user an alternative to the generalized approach of the commercial global automatic “vacuum cleaner” type of search engines, as infoseek; AltaVista, etc.

Subject gateways are characterized by two key factors:
 * 1) They are selective, pointing only to Internet resources that meet withquality selection criteria
 * 2) They are built by subject and information specialists- often librarians.Besides these there are few more, as-
 * Generally limited to specific subjects
 * Scope-policy declaring what subjects they are indexing
 * Defined target group- e.g. academics, researchers, etc.
 * Manually created records- rich resource description containing relevantinformation
 * Distributed cataloguing – a scattered group of subject specialistscontribute to the databases
 * Quality criteria- there is an official set of quality criteria
 * Classification systems- used as underlying system for browsingpossibilities
 * Use of open standards – to support co-operation with other services e.g.cross-searching.

Features of subject gateways

 * Each resource selected is evaluated against explicitly defined quality selection criteria.
 * Resources are classified using a range of schemes, e.g.-DDC, MESH
 * Metadata ( standard resource description) are provided based on a particular standard e.g.- Dublin Core
 * Writen resource descriptions are provided for each resource, often by library subject specialists.
 * Currency of resources is checked by link checking software (e.g. ROADS), databases such as OMNI.
 * Institutional commitments are the vital component for continued development of a subject gateway.

Why libraries should go for subject gateways?
Libraries are the most suitable institution to undertake this work due to the following reasons:
 * The natural metaphor


 * Browsing, reference desk
 * Expertise in relevant areas
 * Classification, acquisition, keywords
 * Information, seeking behavior
 * Guiding & helping users

Benefits of gateways for library

 * Leading the way into the information age
 * Communicating with “non-nerds”
 * Access to huge-high quality collection


 * Integrate into existing structures on the Internet.

Benefits of gateways for the users

 * Diverse resources brought together


 * Spectrum of resources on Internet
 * Complete coverage
 * Business driven selection
 * Shallow description
 * Targeted coverage
 * Explicit selection
 * Policy value added description


 * Research, learning, leisure, enrichment-all brought together

1 Business issue
Subject gateways, and mostly dependent on project or research funding- “soft money”, which is temporary and unpredictable in nature thus creating issues for long term planning, collaboration and service development. Some gateways had commercial partners, some were part of a wide service, and some stood alone, which offers various heterogeneous services directed at consumers, learners, and professional users, thus gateways differs widely in aims, and scope, which is the hindrance in its popularity.

2 Sustainability issue
In this age where survival of the fittest is the mantra, subject gateways still lacking a  good rapport with the professional or scholarly publishing, or with public service broadcasting, and without their active participation the very purpose of subject gateway will die.

3 Collaboration issue
There is a various levels where collaboration may take place but which one is most suitable for our purpose is not clear as it is still not clear that whether collaboration will be fruitful between national initiatives or not where the extension of a particular services are same.? Whether it may be within a particular country, and then within subject? How much is the subject areas are susceptible to international treatment? Another aspect here is that of “branding”. Gateways aspire to high quality “brands”. And the successful collaborative arrangements will be done only if they don’t compromise on the brand value of individual initiatives, which is unlikely to happen.

4 Interoperability issue
It is the heart of all the issues and the areas where interoperability and standard solution are required are: protocols, query languages and record syntaxes, metadata schemata, subject classification and cataloguing rules. Without solving these problems we cannot dream of a seamless flow of information in a subject gateways.

5 Integration and cross searching issue
The approach of searching remote databases often in addition to a local database isreferred to as cross searching. If a system allowed several gateways in the same subject area to be cross-searched, then inevitably there would be some duplication of results, as some source would be catalogued by more than one gateway. There is another aspect, as different subject gateways are having different collection development policies, so the combined results of a cross-search will contain links to resources of a differing minimum “quality” resource description. So again it is somewhat similar situation to what today’s search engines are encountered with.

6 Quality issue
The sense of the word quality changes with the circumstances and in the context of architecture, standards and software solutions of subject gateways, the use of uniform resource names (URN) is also having two major issues. First, the infrastructure needed to support the full requirements for URNs is currently not available. Second, the support for URNs by the major web browser developers has been low (if not non-existent). This means that end users are unlikely to start to create and distribute URNs if the majority of typical web browser users will be unable to resolve them. So there is no fun at all to build such an ambitious subject gateways if it will not be browsable by the users end effectively and smoothly.

7 Multilingual issue
As the Internet has been flourishing outside the English speaking countries, so we have to take care of metadata properly in a multilingual platform. Here, the character-set issue is most important. If all the cataloguers and users make use of multiple languages and character sets, it may run the danger of increasing “false positives”, where the same word means different things in different languages.The host institutions of each gateway have a mandate to be information providers, but they are not required to be information creators.

Conclusion
Each gateway has a distinctive logo and a reflective name, thereby positioning them for a significant Web presence. Distinctive branding also bears fruit as a common recognition technique. Each gateway has selected and utilized a standard metadata schema for describing the resources incorporated into the gateways. The metadata is applied by librarians or educators with experienced knowledge of the disciplines. The resources in each gateway have all been selected according to predetermined criteria, published at each gateway site as part of a content coverage policy. A gatekeeper function, often a mix of computer and human intervention, ensures n adherence to the selection criteria. The coverage policies have made electronic resources, both 'born digital' and digitized, the highest priority for inclusion in the gateways; The resources are supported by similar architectures, based on distributed creation and maintenance of their metadata, with a centralized facility for access.

For the logo of the existing subject gateways please click on the following link: Logo of Subject Gateway