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Discusses what can be done to protect digital library services and collections from disasters. Techniques for disaster prevention, including storage of data on hard disks using Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks (RAID) technology; Importance of backing up data; Methods of emergency response and recovery if a Web site crashes.

Explains how librarians can use Extensible Markup Language (XML) to create and manage digital library services and collections. The benefits of XML over Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) and Hypertext Markup Language (HTML); How XML works; XML and software; XML and structured information; XML and digital publishing; XML toolbox; Comparison of XML and the MARC electronic bibliographical format.

Profiles the Digital Library Federation whose purpose is to serve its membership by helping to solve pressing digital library problems. Four key objectives of the Federation; History of the group; The Making of America II project which aims to develop a method and syntax for encoding complex digital objects in a standard way; Future outlook for the Federation.

Presents an overview of user interface design used by libraries to create electronic resources for patrons. Importance of the design being consistent and efficient; Keeping in contact with users to collect feedback about the system.

Discusses ways of making a digital collection accessible in libraries. Goals of access; Questions to ask; Using a variety of methods and interfaces; Functional interaction issues; Questions about cataloging; Downsides to access; Avoiding technology overkill; Making improvements; Customizing access.

Comments on Google's strengths and weaknesses. Role of librarians in making effective decisions about when and how to use Google's services and advise users appropriately; Strengths as a search engine; Overview of Google's Scholar search service, which offers content from academic and scholarly publishers; Advantages and trade-offs.

Comments on library collection development. Benefits of technological innovations to collection development; Importance of locating and including information published in nontraditional formats; Methods of locating important information in the Internet; Influence of the Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAIPMH) on the process of finding Internet resources; Recommendation that librarians use a targeted web crawl in collection development; Importance of creating a selective, organized, and relevant collection for library patrons.

Keeping up has never been easy, although we can probably be forgiven if we think it is harder today. From print magazines to journals, from electronic discussion lists to Web logs, there seem to be more sources of information than ever. The idea of a current awareness service is nothing new. What is new is that Web-based technologies have made it easier to discover and subscribe to these services and to create and manage them. These technologies are increasingly used for other functions, such as automatically updating Web sites. The linchpin technology is RSS, variously described as "RDF Site Summary" (referring to the Resource Description Framework), "Rich Site Summary," and "Really Simple Syndication." But RSS, as used on most sites, has nothing to do with RDF. It is a very simple XML syntax for describing a "channel" or "feed" of information that consists of "items" (e.g., news items) with titles and URLs. Feeds are typically read through an "aggregator," which allows the information to be presented in a variety of ways. Feeds can be either Web-based or special client software. Client software is available for all platforms, and Peter Scott's Web page "RSS Readers" lists the options. Where it gets really interesting is using RSS to update web sites automatically. Jonathan Eisenzopf, in "Making Headlines with RSS," offers a Perl module for both maintaining and using (as in a web site) RSS feeds (XML::RSS, dependent upon XML::Parser).

Discusses the efforts of OCLC and RLG to reengineer their bibliographic databases. Publication by the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) of a report on the Functional Requirements of Bibliographic Records (FRBR); Application of the revolutionary aspects of FRBR by OCLC and RLG to their catalogs; Re-creation by OCLC of the WorldCat database, which is no longer based on MARC but on an internal XML metadata schema; Explanation of how RLG is doing data mining.

Presents the opinion of the author that most integrated library systems, as they are configured and used in 2003, should be removed from public view. Important role of the integrated library system as a key piece of infrastructure of a library; Comment that the central problem of library catalog systems is that they include only information about the books and journals held by a particular library; Failure of catalogs to allow patrons to discover all the books that are available to them; Recommendations for an information system that helps users find all different kinds of resources.

Discusses the difficulty in finding librarians who are conversant with technology and are willing to work for a librarian's salary. Way libraries may hire nonlibrarians into positions which may have been originally for librarians; Need for taking seriously professional responsibilities of librarians concerning information technology.