MILESS — A learning and teaching server for multi-media documents

Abstract

MILESS [7] is a joint project between the Computer Center and the Central Library of Essen University, together with the two pilot departments of linguistics and physics. The main purpose is to provide students and faculty of Essen University with a library server that supports several different functions that are needed within a digital library. Based on the IBM DB2 Digital Library product [4], MILESS can store and retrieve digital documents in any given format; moreover, searching is possible in a very elaborate way, and access control is supported as well.

In this article, we will first discuss why there is a growing need for digital library servers, followed by a description on how MILESS is build on top of the IBM DB2 Digital Library. We will describe the software techniques that are used to build the system, and we give a test case for the use of MILESS when referencing different articles within a mathematical journal.