Belarus’ National Library provided remote access to digital copies of 130,000+ documents

The National Library’s automated system provides remote access to digital copies of documents from its collections, the institution’s press service reports

Users are now able to read books, abstracts of dissertations in various languages of the world, posters, prints, postcards, and other materials. In total, more than 130 thousand documents are available.

In line with Belarus’ law On Copyright and Related Rights, all materials are conditionally divided into two groups, according to the level of access: open access documents (marked with an icon, can be viewed in any convenient place and downloaded in pdf format) and documents with limited access (marked with an icon, can be viewed in reading rooms of libraries or their fragments can be received through the e-document delivery service).

“The automated system makes it possible to conduct two types of search: basic (by author, title, subject, ISBN/ISSN number, all fields); advanced (by author, title, subject, publisher, series, publication date, ISBN/ISSN number, all fields). A certain type of document (book, dissertation abstract, dissertation, edition, etc.), the language of the publication, and recognised documents (‘Documents with full text’ bookmark) can be selected on the advanced search page,” the source said.

In addition, users can search through full-text collections represented by nineteen different topics. The latter reflect rare and old printed publications, manuscripts, personal libraries of prominent figures, unique factual material about Belarus as a whole and its regions.

“Registered users can use the personal account service, which makes it possible to save search queries, create lists of necessary publications with the ability to sort them into groups or collections, order the original document to work in the reading rooms of the National Library of Belarus. The number of documents presented in the Electronic Library of the National Library of Belarus automated system is constantly expanding,” the source added.