BHL Accomplishments 2006

• Website: The BHL website (bhl.si.edu) was launched in late December 2005.
• Presentation: Martin R. Kalfatovic (Smithsonian) attended the ALA Midwinter conference and served on a panel, “Too many decisions, too many possibilities: what gets to be reformatted and why, and what happens to the original media.” His area for discussion was mass digitizing efforts including the BHL. San Antonio, Texas. January 20, 2006.

• Website: The BHL working Wiki site (bhl.wikispaces.com/) was launched for BHL members. February 3, 2006.

• Literature Online: Smithsonian Libraries makes Smithsonian Contributions to the Earth Sciences available online. March 1, 2006.
• Presentation: Martin R. Kalfatovic (Smithsonian) spoke at the Association of Information & Dissemination Centers (ASIDIC) on the topic of content selection for digital library projects, specifically the Biodiversity Heritage Library project. Ft. Meyers, Florida. March 13, 2006.

• Presentation: Open Access to Legacy Taxonomic Literature: The Biodiversity Heritage Library by Martin R. Kalfatovic, Smithsonian Institution Libraries. Refactoring Natural History Literature. April 17-18, 2006. University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
• Presentation: Open Access to Legacy Taxonomic Literature: The Biodiversity Heritage Library by Martin R. Kalfatovic and Tom Garnett, Smithsonian Institution Libraries. NVC National Science Digital Library/NSF. April 25, 2006

• Metadata: Three libraries sent data to OCLC for analysis (NHM London, MOBOT and Smithsonian). This set the ground work for what type of materials, what topics, and what specific data fields should be included in the total comparison. May 2006.
• Literature Online: Botanicus.org – a prototype interface model to the BHL literature launched. May 10, 2006.
• Literature online: Smithsonian Libraries opens portal to approximately 100,000 pages of online taxonomic literature from Smithsonian collections (www.sil.si.edu/digitalcollections/BHLCollections). May 23, 2006.
• Taxonomic Intelligence: MOBOT begins to use the uBio FIND IT tool in scanning project. May 31, 2006.
• Funding: Smithsonian Libraries’ receives $50,000 on behalf of BHL from the Richard Lounsbery Foundation for a BHL Metadata Repository and collections analysis. May 2006.

• Metadata: OCLC began analysis of all Smithsonian, MOBOT, NHM, Kew, NYBG, AMNH, and Harvard. June 7, 2006.
• Organization/Technical Meeting: BHL members met in Washington for organizational and technical meetings. Attending: Catherine Norton (MBL/WHOI), David Remsen, (MBL/WHOI), Chris Freeland (MOBOT), Doug Holland (MOBOT), Brewster Kahle (Internet Archive), Sebastian Hammer (IndexData), Graham Higley (NHM), Bernard Scaife (NHM), Neil Thomson (NHM), Chris Mills (Kew), Eric Muzy (AMNH), Indra Neil Sarkar (AMNH), Christie Stephenson (AMNH), Joe deVeer (Harvard/MCZ), Michael Godow (Field Museum), Tom Moritz (Getty), Klaus Jung (LuraTech), Mark McKinney (Luratech), Daniel Lanz ( CCS), Bill Carney (OCLC), Han Sues (NMNH), Marcia Adams (Smithsonian), Tom Garnett (Smithsonian), Martin Kalfatovic (Smithsonian), Bess Missell (Smithsonian), Suzanne Pilsk (Smithsonian), Courtney Shaw (Smithsonian), Keri Thompson (Smithsonian). June 12, 2006.
• Technical Meeting: BHL members held a technical meeting during the American Library Association Annual Meeting. Attending: Martin Kalfatovic (Smithsonian), Suzanne Pilsk (Smithsonian), Lowell Ashley (Smithsonian), Keri Thompson (Smithsonian), Kathy Hill (Smithsonian), Mark McKinney (Luratech), Sebastian Hammer (IndexData), Ronald Broadfoot (Harvard/MCZ).
• Presentation: Open Access to Legacy Taxonomic Literature the Biodiversity Heritage Library & Index Animalium by Martin R. Kalfatovic and Suzanne C. Pilsk (Smithsonian). Science and Technology Section Research Forum at the American Library Association Annual Meeting. New Orleans, Louisiana. June 22, 2006.

• Taxonomic Intelligence: Missouri Botanical Garden's Tropicos database is indexed in NameBank. August 1, 2006.
• Taxonomic Intelligence: uBio creates new XML Web Services. August 15, 2006.
• Metadata: OCLC analysis report on BHL member library received. August 17, 2006
• Organizational Meeting: BHL directors (and others) met at the New York Botanical Garden for organizational and other administrative topics. Attending: Christie Stephenson (AMNH); Michael Godow (Field Museum); Doug Holland (MOBOT); Graham Higley (NHM); Susan Fraser (NYBG); John Mignault (NYBG); Judy Warnement (Harvard/Botany); Chris Mills (Kew); Tom Garnett (Smithsonian); Marcia Adams (Smithsonian); Kim Tripp (Director, NY Botanical Gardens). August 31, 2006

• Funding: BHL (via the Open Content Alliance) and Microsoft begin discussion for support of BHL and Boston Library Consortium (BLC) scanning project. Ongoing discussions led by Cathy Norton (MBLWHOI). September 2006
• Literature Online: Harvard Botany libraries announce Orchidaceae Type Specimen Project with 3 complete texts. September 1, 2006
• Literature Online: Botanicus.org reaches 400,000 pages of botanical literature online. September 30, 2006

• Presentation: Open Access to Legacy Taxonomic Literature: Index Animalium & The Biodiversity Heritage Library by Courtney Ann Shaw, Suzanne C. Pilsk, and Martin R. Kalfatovic, Smithsonian Institution Libraries. IAMSLIC: Every Continent, Every Ocean. Portland, Oregon. October 11, 2006.
• Presentation: Botanicus.org: Prototyping a Web 2.0 interface to digitized taxonomic literature by Chris Freeland, Missouri Botanical Garden. Taxonomic Databases Working Group Annual Meeting 2006. St. Louis, Missouri. October 18, 2006
• Presentation: Digitizing the legacy literature of biodiversity: An introduction to the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) by Neil Thomson, Natural History Museum. Taxonomic Databases Working Group Annual Meeting 2006. St. Louis, Missouri. October 18, 2006
• Technical Meeting: BHL members met in London to discuss technical details related to metadata. Attending: Marcia Adams (Smithsonian), Chris Mills (Kew), Neil Thomson (NHM), Ed Chamberlain (NHM)
• Technical Meeting: BHL members met during the Taxonomic Databases Working Group Annual Meeting 2006 in St. Louis, Missouri. Project updates, technical requirements for scanning and the BHL Metadata Repository were discussed. Attending: Rusty Russell (Smithsonian, Botany), Patrick Leary (MBLWHOI), Connie Rinaldo (Harvard/MCZ), Chris Freeland (MOBOT), Doug Holland (MOBOT), Melissa Tulig (NYBG), Martin Kalfatovic (Smithsonian), David Remsen (GBIF), Neil Thomson (NHM), Suzanne Pilsk (Smithsonian), Nestor Pérez-Molière, and Bryan Heidorn (UIUC). October 17-18, 2006
• Technical Meeting: BHL members met with OCLC staff to discuss collections analysis and metadata harvesting. OCLC and BHL will work to define the functions of the BHL Metadata Repository so that it will notify OCLC WorldCat of scanned items. Additionally, BHL and OCLC will work to include URL information in WorldCat that will link those records to the content on the BHL portal. Attending: Tom Garnett (Smithsonian), Martin Kalfatovic (Smithsonian), Suzanne Pilsk (Smithsonian), Chris Freeland (MOBOT), Bill Carney (OCLC), and Katherine Savage (OCLC). San Francisco. October 19, 2006.
• Technical Meeting: BHL members met with Internet Archive staff in San Francisco to discuss technical details related to serving taxonomic serial publications. Attending: Chris Freeland (MOBOT), Doug Holland (MOBOT), Martin Kalfatovic (Smithsonian), and Suzanne Pilsk (Smithsonian). October 19, 2006
• Conference: BHL members attended the Open Content Alliance meeting in San Francisco. Attending: Chris Freeland (MOBOT), Doug Holland (MOBOT), Christie Stephenson (AMNH), Martin Kalfatovic (Smithsonian), Suzanne Pilsk (Smithsonian), Tom Garnett (Smithsonian), and Cathy Norton (MBLWHOI). October 20, 2006
• Metadata: The Field Museum Library signed a contract with OCLC (Online Computer Library Center) in October to convert 92,000 bibliographic card catalog records into digital format for inclusion in the Library's online public access catalog named Harlow. OCLC will begin processing records in October 2006 and will process approximately 10,000 records monthly through July 2007, with Library patrons having access to these new records as they are loaded each month. The Library currently has over 46,000 titles in Harlow and at completion of the retrospective conversion the library should have upwards of 140,000 titles in its online catalog. While the conversion itself should be complete by the summer 2007, Library staff will continue to edit records through 2008. October 15, 2006

• Taxonomic Intelligence: Name Bank surpasses 9.4 million names. November 1, 2006
• Literature Online: BHL member libraries reach approximately 1 million pages of online taxonomic literature from their collections. November 1, 2006
• Presentation: Biodiversity Heritage Library: A Conversation About A Collaborative Digitization Project by Martin Kalfatovic and Suzanne Pilsk (Smithsonian). Library of Congress Digital Conversion Group Meeting. Library of Congress, Washington, DC. November 8, 2006
• Literature Online: Contributions to the Marine Sciences and Smithsonian Contributions to Paleobiology online (17,000 pages). November 15, 2006
• Metadata: BHL Metadata Repository planning advanced as tentative plans for hosting a prototype version of the BHL Metadata Repository at MOBOT are under discussion pending funding and clarification of data architecture. November 2006
• Metadata: Staff at NHM (Bernard Scaife) and MOBOT (Chris Freeland) perform ongoing data analysis of BHL member metadata data. November 2006