Annotated maps: charting research through technology

bibliographic database
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Periodical article

Title:	Annotated maps: charting research through technology
Author:	Suwe, Olebogeng
Year:	2014
Periodical:	African Research and Documentation (ISSN 0305-862X)
Issue:	126
Pages:	21-28
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Botswana
Subjects:	libraries information technology GIS
Abstract:	Digitising a library's special collections can be of great benefit to research and education, and can bring prestige to the whole institution. This article describes the digitisation of the University of Botswana's Okavango Research Institute Library map collection. Digitisation and online publication was done through web GIS technology, enabling instant searching for annotations while preserving the originals. The maps were scanned, while spatial coordinates were added which allowed for easy alignment with already existing map data and retrieval in a map interface. Each annotation was stored as a point in a geo-database. The author recommends that, rather than striving to gather all the resources in-house, university libraries planning a digitisation project may seek collaboration with university departments or with external partner organisations that already have experience in this field. Bibliogr., ref. [ASC Leiden abstract]