Sonderband 2. International Council on Archives. Dritte Europäische Archivkonferenz, Wien 11. bis 15. Mai 1993. Tagungsprotokolle (1996)

4. Session / Séance. Strategies for Links with Historical Research / Stratégies de Communication envers la Recherche historique - Gonzalez, Pedro: Data Bases and Long Distance Communication. A Spanish Éxperience / Bases de données et information a distance. Une expérience des archives espagnoles (english 319 - français 343)

4. Session/Séance: Gonzalez, Data Bases and long distance Communcation

beginning to use the new media. Today many historians use the most common word processing tools (spreadsheets, word processing, data bases, hypertext, etc.), which consult data bases of all types, or which have access to national or international information networks. It is now normal in archive reading rooms to see some researchers recording information they gather directly on to their portable computer.

The Archives have not been pioneers in this area either. Other colleagues in the field of information have been far ahead: without doubt, the possibilities which computing offered for saving work in cataloguing books, work repeated many times in a multitude of libraries, are at very basis of advantage.

It is a fact that in the Archives, as opposed to other areas of information such as libraries, very little has been done so far as regards the transmission of remote information. However, there is little doubt that this need has not been felt so deeply due to a number of features which distinguish the archive document from the library document or that of the documentation centre:- the uniqueness of the document, as opposed to the multiplicity of books or periodicals, means that the benefit from the exchange of information is not as apparent, in order to avoid repetition of the same task of cataloguing in a large number of centres.- each archive has its own documentation which is different from that of other archives. Therefore it is generally not essential for each centre to be able to use the information contained in other centres rapidly. Although one centre’s documentation may be completed with documentation existing in other centres, the task of offering the researcher additional information is not considered a priority one.- apparently access to archival information is not so urgent for researchers’ as access to scientific information published day by day.- the always meagre archive budgets have not permitted large scale computerization projects to be undertaken, except in very particular cases.

In European archives, specifically, only a few national projects, as well as some particular experiences of data interchange at an international level, have been undertaken up till now. However, these opportunities will also be used in the future in the Archives. It is even possible to think not only about a Reading Room without any paper2, but also of the future „remote“ reading room, with researchers gaining access to information from archives through terminals installed in their workplace or in their own homes.

1. The scientific Information exchange Networks

Using this basic infrastructure supplied by the telecommunications operators, as well as special lines, either private or leased out to the operators, different institutions interested in sharing their computing resources have created Scientific Infor2 Gonzalez, Pedro: ^ Salas de lectura sin papel? in: Proceedings of the 11th International Congress on Archives, Paris, August 22-26, 1988 (Archivum, vol. XXXV, 1989) p. 229-233.

321