Books from the past:an e‐books project at Culturenet Cymru

Purpose To describe the open‐source solution developed by Culturenet Cymru, for the Welsh Books Council, for presenting digitised books and other printed material online. Design/methodology/approach The challenges faced in the implementation of a pilot e‐book collection of nine out‐of‐print books is described. Findings The adoption of a number of international standards for the presentation, coding, conversion, metadata and searching of texts have resulted in a working pilot project. Practical implications It is hoped that many publicly funded bodies such as libraries and archives will make use of the system. A small collection of e‐books may be of some use, but it is the ability to search for, and access, e‐books across distributed collections which will provide real educational benefit. Originality/value Culturenet Cymru hopes to play a role in co‐ordinating the adoption of common standards for text digitisation in Wales.