Retrieving archived electronic publications

If electronic publications are received offline, i.e., on physical media, they will be treated in libraries similar to print media. Items will be cataloged and shelved and will be retrievable through the library catalog. Networked electronic media have to be cataloged, too, and library records must be enhanced so that all available archival information can be included in catalog entries. The Dublin Core Metadata Element set provides a resource description that will improve access to information on networks. If national libraries become digital archives, electronic publications will appear in the respective national bibliographies which will make their retrieval easier than it is today (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, 1995). However, the ability to retrieve networked electronic publications in distributed systems depends not only on their appearance in library catalogs and bibliographies, but also on a reliable global naming and address system. Current network addresses still depend on the Uniform Resource Locator (URL). But URLs are easily mistyped and can lead to error messages when trying to access networked documents. Name resolvers which are already used by some electronic astronomical journals allow a unique name to be assigned to an online publication that will not be changed even if the document is moved to another server. The name resolver will keep track of the actual location of the requested file and translate the name into the current network address.