Chairman: Mogens Sandfær

The programme group for information supply deals with the content of the digital library – and consequently with the basis for the modern digital research libraries’ mission:

• to procure and disseminate the information which researchers, instructors, students etc. need in order to do their job (i.e. make global information available locally)
• to administer and disseminate the information which researchers, instructors, students etc. produce in connection with their tasks (i.e. to collect, register, organise, preserve, publish and disseminate local information globally

Thus the programme group has a broad level of cooperation with DEFF, Meeting the User and Architecture and Middleware as well as New Institutions. The programme group also participates in a wide international collaboration, primarily via Knowledge Exchange, which has more or less the same action lines as the programme area. Nordforsk and Nordbib have likewise been a cooperation platform, both in terms of electronic publishing and future eScience perspectives.

The area’s action plan from May 2009 contains four action lines, each with a number of activities and objectives:

• Global information supply to researchers, instructors, students etc.
• Research publishing and Open Access
• Research data and Open Access
• Teaching resources and Open Access

However, when the project budget for the period turned out to be considerably less than previously - and than expected - the initiatives were scaled down to a single project for each of the first three action lines, coupled with a number of studies and a very active participation in national and international activities and fora.

The first project to be set in motion had to do with global information supply. It is a question of developing statistical tools to support the libraries’ license purchases. The project, which enjoys a very broad participation, is expected to introduce a new web-based tool at the end of the year, which i.a. takes into consideration the researchers’ publishing and citation pattern when assessing the value of the licenses for the universities etc. This helps to ensure that the libraries’ limited resources are optimised fully.

The next project was launched within the area of research data – an area which is extremely active in the rest of Europe. This is a pilot and mediation project about the libraries’ role in connection with research data, i.a. primary data, the experimental and statistical data which are the basis for the research results and the publications. Two problem clarifying pilot projects are being carried out in two universities, while a third university concentrates on evaluation and dissemination of the project’s activities and experiences to the other stakeholders in the DEFF landscape.

In connection with this the programme group is involved in Nordforsk’s planning within the eScience area in expectation of a possible, and useful, synergy effect between DEFF’s initiatives within the data field and some major potential Nordic initiatives.

Open Access has been a very large inter-disciplinary action line without any actual projects. The year before the programme group launched Danish Open Access Network, which includes experts and interested parties from libraries at all universities as well as ’new’ institutions. This network has been broadened and consolidated quite significantly over the past year.

The programme group has participated actively in the work concerning the follow-up on the EU Council of Ministers’ conclusions about scientific information in the digital age by participating in the appointed national Open Access Committee. Primo 2010 a report was prepared with recommendations for implementation of Open Access in Denmark. The recommendations are then submitted for hearing and a decision is made as to whether the committee will continue over the following years with the task of monitoring and stimulating the implementation.

The programme group has been heavily involved in consultancy investigations and scenario events with a view to a clarification of DEFF’s future. As regards this programme group it goes without saying that the following subjects will continue to be a central part of DEFF’s field of work:

• global information supply to researchers, instructors students etc.
• research publication and Open Access
• research data and Open Access
• educational resources and Open Access.

Read more on the programme group’s wiki: http://informationsforsyning.deff.wikispaces.net/