Key projects

The design, acquisitions and testing of the customer interface of the National Digital Library (NDL) proceeded according to plans. In August, the Ex Libris Group was selected to implement the interface and Primo was chosen as the software. During the initial phase, eight pilot organisations will be testing the system.

The customer interface of the National Digital Library

The customer interface, the development of which is the responsibility of the National Library, is part of the NDL project of the Finnish Ministry of Education and Culture, which aims to improve the availability and long-term preservation of digital material in libraries, archives and museums. The customer interface system will also be connected to Europeana, the European digital library.

Drafts for the principles of operation and the organisation model of the customer interface consortium were, by and large, completed. An advance evaluation and report, which were included in the usability plan, were completed, together with a risk analysis, the results of which were considered in the planning of actions and measures to be taken.

The Final Report of the Long-term Preservation Project, which is closely connected to the National Digital Library, was finalised in the spring. The project continues under the leadership of the CSC IT Center for Science Ltd.

National Library’s digital library

Alongside its efforts for the promotion of the National Digital Library, the National Library focused on the establishment of its own digital library. Preparations included the normalisation of metadata, in other words, solutions were sought for extracting reference data for the customer interface search index.   

The Board of Directors of the National Library of Finland approved the Library’s digitisation policy in May. The policy draws attention to the scope and reliability of digital collections as well as to the unrestricted use of the material and online distribution.

The national infrastructure of libraries

The national infrastructure of libraries was enhanced by providing free access to the national union catalogues Linda (the union catalogue of Finnish university libraries) and Arto (the reference database of Finnish articles) starting in early 2010. 

The National Library had representatives in the groups for the data architectures and joint IT services of the Valtiotason arkkitehtuurit (interoperability of public data architectures) project led by the Ministry of Finance.  The National Library also participated in the drafting of common standards and a common metadata register for public administration.

The project on the reform of bibliographic description made preparations for the testing of the international FRAD model and the RDA standard in Finland.  Moreover, the Library participated in the development of the semantic web through the FRBR Review Group operating under the auspices of the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA).

On the occasion of the anniversary of the Centre for Preservation and Digitisation, the National Library opened a virtual bookshelf on its website to offer a brief overview of the history of printed literature in Finland, starting from the ABC-kiria (ABC book) by Mikael Agricola.

Screenshot / Website of the National Library of Finland