New role for community networks
Donald D. Cowan, Colin I. Mayfield, Frank Wm. Tompa, W. Gasparini · Communications of the ACM · 1998
Community information covers a wide range of sources. Communities are repositories of large amounts of heterogeneous information that need to be searched, read, explored, acted upon, updated and that offer opportunities for collaboration and others forms of two-way communication. In the absence of digital library technology, most of this information is not easily accessible to members of the community or to those making inquiries from outside. Thus, the ability to browse, search, and acquire data is essential for the establishment of community networks. Canada's Technology Triangle (CTT) are creating a community-based digital library called the CTT Community Network. Although a broadly based community network does not yet exist in the CTT, many experiments are being conducted to determine the feasibility of providing the level of service required. The prototypes for some services in the CTT Community Network involving maps and wireless communication, are complete and are now being deployed in the rural areas. The network will be expanded into the urban areas in the next year.