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The Library's Center for Electronic Text & Image

By Michael T. Ryan

Six months ago, the Library launched a series of pilot projects designed to create electronic facsimiles of original source materials and make them available on a web site. It was a strictly bootstrap operation.

Today, those beginning efforts have matured into a substantial program that has a mission and an ambitious agenda. A visit to the web site of the Center for Electronic Image & Text (CETI) will yield a rich harvest of nearly 5,000 pages of scanned documents and images. Here the visitor will find early editions of Shakespeare, manuscript diaries kept by American women in the 19th century, temple art of India, and the first published catalogue (1829) of the collection of the Penn Library, among others. Comparatively small in staff and budget, CETI is nonetheless well on its way towards developing a major collection of facsimile books and manuscripts for the Penn community and for scholars around the world.

A selection of the thumbnail icons from CETI's home page.

Unlike many other university text centers, CETI is not primarily concerned with encoding texts for searchability and manipulation. While SGML encoding initiatives may be on the horizon, for the present CETI is focused on producing archival quality images of rare and unique materials. Rather than requiring the scholar to visit the Library to consult these materials (they do not circulate), CETI brings the artifact to the scholar's desktop. The mountain moves slowly to Mohammed.

CETI's sources are the rich and varied holdings of Penn's several special collections: those in the Fisher Fine Arts Library, the Museum Library, the Center for Judaic Studies, the South Asia Collection, and the New Bolton Library of the Veterenary School. In choosing to emphasize archival quality facsimiles, CETI has found itself a niche among text sites on the Internet. Scholars who have used CETI's collection have encouraged us to continue producing electronic facsimiles, since they are a valuable complement to the encoding work of other e-text centers.

The inspiration for CETI came from Paul Mosher, Director of the Library, who as a Medievalist himself wanted to make it easier and more inviting for scholars to use some of Penn's singular library resources. CETI has become, therefore, an integral part of the Library's larger commitment to bring more resources and information to the scholar's work station. However, CETI's scans do more than that; they add value. Thus, medievalists used to working with mediocre-quality, black and white microfilms will be pleasantly surprised to consult electronic facsimiles, whose clarity and legibility are as good as -- and in some cases better than -- the original. Scanning technologies used in combination with Adobe Photoshop and Acrobat provide the scholar with the ability to manipulate sections of the page according to his/her needs. In some of CETI's test files, for example, it is even possible to discern the hair side of a 14th-century vellum fragment from the Cairo Genizah. Pen strokes are clearly discernable from shadows, folds, and imperfections. The text has been distinguished from its material context.

At present, CETI has particular commitments to three projects. One is to expand our Shakespeare file, drawing on the holdings of the Horace Howard Furness Collection and its superb resources for the study of Shakespeare and English Renaissance literature. We also want to provide facsimiles of a dozen or more diaries for students to use in classes requiring research into primary sources. Finally, we plan to put onto the web site a significant segment of the images from the collection of the American Institute of India Studies.

So, the mountain does indeed move to Mohammed, but it moves very slowly. In part this is because it is a large and dense mountain; Penn is fortunate to have in its Library a remarkably diverse and substantial set of special and unique collections. Within the mountain are many exciting and important future projects. But the mountain moves slowly also because bandwidth limitations make it difficult for scholars using modems to the view the images quickly and efficiently. Even those with 28.8 connections may be frustrated by the snail's pace at which the images unfold on the screen. As an alternative to modem access, CETI plans to issue selections from its collection in CD-ROM format until such time as the bandwidth situation improves. Not only do CDs free the user from a modem in this case, they should also provide a more flexible environment in which to work. CETI also wants to test-market the desirability of producing primary source "bulk packs" in CD format, so that students will have easy, convenient access to source materials wherever they have access to a computer.

The short history of CETI is a case study in how a lot can be done by a few with a little. The Center's goal is not to evolve into a large, free-standing operation that might seem like the tail that wagged the dog. Rather, CETI's future is tied directly to the ways in which it can facilitate research and learning at Penn. This will mean collaborating with other units on campus who have similar missions, such as Electronic Technology Services in the School of Arts and Sciences.

CETI can be found at www.library.upenn.edu/etext/. In the material world, CETI resides in the Department of Special Collections on the sixth floor of Van Pelt Library. The Penn community is encouraged to visit the site -- virtually or in person -- and to pass along suggestions for improvements and future projects.