Showing posts with label resource. Show all posts
Showing posts with label resource. Show all posts

Thursday, 3 September 2015

Qatar National Library offers reading resources online prior to launch

Qatar National Library (QNL), a non-profit organisation under the umbrella of the Qatar Foundation for Education, Science, and Community Development (QF),  is currently offering free online access to a vast collection of online resources, including the latest bestsellers, classical works, concerts, top academic journals and documentaries. 

QF is supporting Qatar in its journey from a carbon-based economy to a knowledge-based economy by providing resources to students, researchers, and the community in Qatar. Announced in November 2012 by Her Highness Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, Chairperson of Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development, the QNL will eventually open in a library building designed by the architect Rem Koolhaas. 

QNL maintains a National Library, a University and Research Library, and a Metropolitan Public Library for the digital age. The National Library function collects and provides access to global knowledge relevant to Qatar and the region. It also collects, preserves, and provides access to heritage content and materials about Qatar and the region. The University and Research Library function supports education and research at all levels by providing printed and digital library materials for students and researchers. The Metropolitan Public Library delivers library services and information for everyone to enjoy reading, meet people, and become information-literate.

Included in QNL’s facilities will be a variety of collaborative and individual learning spaces, a Children's Library, 300 public computer workstations, digital media production facilities, performance spaces, a café, an adaptive technology center, Writing Center and Tutoring Center.

In addition to full-text databases, the QNL expects to have 1.2 million books, 500,000 e-books, periodicals and newspapers, plus special collections.

Interested?

Register. QNL's registered members can currently access the online resources. Anyone who lives in Qatar and has a valid Qatari ID/Residence Permit is eligible for free library registration. 

Prior to its opening, the QNL also maintains a list of Arabic and Islamic reading resources available elsewhere. Its top picks are the Adab website, which has classical and modern Arab poetry (Arabic and English), and Al Waraq (Arabic only), which lists where famous Arabic works in different subject areas may be found.

Wednesday, 29 October 2014

Qatar Digital Library makes archive freely available online

The Qatar Digital Library (QDL) is making a vast archive featuring the cultural and historical heritage of the Gulf and the wider region freely available online, for the first time. 

Source: Qatar Digital Library website.


The aim is to transform the study of Gulf history, improve understanding of the Islamic world, Arabic cultural heritage and the modern history of the Gulf, states the website. 

The QDL includes rich media including digital versions of archives, maps, manuscripts, sound recordings, and photographs complete with contextualised explanatory notes and links in both English and Arabic.

Half a million images are expected to be available on the QDL by end-2014. Current highlights include:
  • India Office Records that span the period 1763–1951, comprising files from the Bushire Political Residency Records and the Bahrain Agency Records 
  • J. G. Lorimer’s Gazetteer of the Persian Gulf, Oman and Central Arabia (1908, 1915), a classic introduction to the history of the Gulf 
  • Five hundred maps, charts and plans of the Persian Gulf and the wider region 
  • The Private Papers of Sir Lewis Pelly, Political Resident in the Persian Gulf between 1862 and 1872 
  • Arabic Scientific Manuscripts from the British Library’s Manuscripts Collections, covering topics such as medicine, mathematics, astronomy and engineering 
  • A selection of photographs, postcards and other printed objects as well as sketches, drawings and watercolours; etchings, engravings and illustrations 
  • A selection of audio collection materials including 200 shellac discs recorded in Bahrain, Kuwait and Iraq between 1920 and 1940 
Explore the QDL by curated topics here.