Virtual Slavica

Book excerpt: Get an inside view of producing digital information projects Digital technology has provided great opportunities as well as colossal challenges for information professionals at Slavic libraries, collections, and archives. Virtual Slavica: Digital Libraries, Digital Archives presents leading information experts exploring the monumental task of converting Slavic manuscripts and books for presentation in the digital realm. Readers get a clear inside view of how to conquer the various challenges that arise within digital library and archive projects through detailed descriptions of specific projects discussed in easy-to-understand language. Slavic studies present innate problems when attempts are made to allow access to the material over the Internet. The Cyrillic alphabet is just one of the huge stumbling blocks standing in the way of universal access to this important material. Virtual Slavica: Digital Libraries, Digital Archives provides practical strategies for anyone looking for answers to problems within their own virtual information project. Copyright issues, digital reference, text encoding, online translation, presentation issues, and use of grant funding are some the topics comprehensively discussed to give information professionals clear solutions to the issues they may be facing. The book is carefully referenced. Virtual Slavica: Digital Libraries, Digital Archives examines: the persistence of multiple standards for digitally handling the Cyrillic alphabet presenting the Comintern archives online FEB-web—its structure, the creation of digital editions, its plans for the future copyright issues in the twenty-first century Meeting of Frontiers—the reorganization of the text content of the international collaborative digital library project at the Library of Congress standardized encoding practical and theoretical programming issues the unforeseen difficulties—and solutions—to complete a grant-funded digital Slavic project and more Virtual Slavica: Digital Libraries, Digital Archives is of keen interest to librarians, archivists, Slavic studies academics, and library and information science educators and students.