Editorial

Citation

Tedd, L.A. (2011), "Editorial", Program: electronic library and information systems, Vol. 45 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/prog.2011.28045baa.001

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: Program: electronic library and information systems, Volume 45, Issue 2

I stated in the overview paper written to celebrate 40 years of publication of Program: electronic library and information systems that “although Program began as being a newsletter for British libraries it soon became an important journal for international librarians and a place of publication for international authors” (Tedd, 2006). That paper includes a table of contributions from different countries over the first 40 years of Program’s existence and India was the “top” of the league with 19 papers from Indian authors published. One of the first was written by Kulkarni and Bharucha (1986) and covered the development of a system known as READFAST – Retrieval of Acquired Documents using a Friendly and Structured System at the Physical Research Laboratory in Ahmedabad. Contributions from India have continued over the past five years with at least three papers being published each year. Use made of articles published in Program: electronic library and information systems by Emerald customers in India has also increased over recent years. The latest statistics indicated that Indian users were second only to those from the UK for the number of articles downloaded. Particular recent papers by Indian authors that have proved to be popular have included Anuradha and Usha (2006), Bansode and Desale (2009) and Ghosh and Ghosh (2009). With a number of submissions “in the pipeline” from Indian authors it seemed appropriate, therefore to bring these together for this special issue, which covers applications in a variety of topic areas as well as from different geographic areas of India.

I have been fortunate in having visited India on several occasions in recent years and have been greatly impressed with the speed of development in digital library applications in the country. In February 2011 there were two conferences being held in Delhi that were related to themes covered by Program: electronic library and information systems. The International Conference on Digital Libraries and Knowledge Organisation (ICDK) was held from 14-16 February with a wide range of national and international speakers, including one of our Editorial Board members, Dr Maja Zumer, from the University of Ljubljana in Slovenia (www.mdi.ac.in/icdk/home.html). The International Conference on the Convergence of Libraries, Archives and Museums was held in conjunction with the Art Libraries section of the International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) and institutions from 15-17 February, and has taken as its theme “User empowerment through digital technologies” (www.nift.ac.in/ICLAM_2011/index.htm). Again, there is a range of national and international speakers, including myself.

Over my many years as Editor of Program: electronic library and information systems I have enjoyed working with colleagues in India (and indeed from other countries) in developing papers that are suitable for readers of this journal. It is sometimes time-consuming – but hopefully worthwhile. I hope you find this issue interesting – and any other papers that may result from the conferences mentioned.

Lucy A. Tedd