At the end of 2011, a smart online library will engender a new mode of reading. In addition to massive online books, knowledge discovery, intelligent reasoning, cross-media search will all be made possible with the new online library. On Apr. 1, the startup ceremony for the "CADAL Project, Phase II" was held at Zhejiang University. Vice President of Chinese Academy of Engineering Prof. Pan Yunhe, Vice Minister of Education Chen Xi, Vice Chairman of Zhejiang CPPCC Sheng Changli and some other celebrities attended the meeting. Vice President Luo Weidong presided over the ceremony and Chancellor Zhang Xi made a speech.
CADAL, the China Academic Digital Academic Library, was co-constructed by Chinese and American institutes and researchers in 2004. In 2005, the internet gateway was set at Zhejiang University Library. At present, more countries and universities have participated in this project and it has about 1.5 million digital volumes.
In Zhejiang University Library, 15 million pages of old classics are scanned into the database every month which includes not only written documents but also audio and video resources. Dozens of colleges and universities will participate in the construction of the Project Phase II, which will not only breakthrough the volume of 2.5 million books, but also provide cross-media services. Digital libraries will no longer store only digital books, but turn into a "knowledge base with a navigation function" with the integration of text, audio, video resources. In Phase II, 4 data centers will be built nationwide, providing service for thousands of colleges and universities, and also academic and cultural institutions in western China and overseas.
In the new digital library, it will be made possible to search for resources with sound clips, pictures and video clips as key words. This will become the new means of access to cross-media indexing and retrieval of knowledge. The library is also responsible for the association and integration of knowledge. For example, the digital library will integrate the information of Literature, History and Geography, to provide a data platform for the study of Chinese literary history. The founding of a comprehensive information system for Chinese medicine with information of Herbal, Prescriptions and Diseases will provide technical platform for comparative analysis of different versions of recipe and research in Chinese herbal medicine.
CADAL will become one of the important information infrastructures of the national innovation system to provide multi-disciplinary, multi-language mass of digital resources open to the public. CADAL features the collection of precious ancient books and books published in the Republic of China. English content includes the technical reports, core collections of American university libraries and some other resources open to the public. In Phase II, CADAL will further its international cooperation with Harvard University, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and other universities. Besides, the non-profit organization "Internet Archive,IA" has drafted a memorandum of cooperation to build the world's largest digital center in China, and to digitize 1.4 million books in the next three and a half years.
