User Requirements for Digitised Resources in Islamic Studies- report published

The JISC Digitisation programme recently commissioned work from the University of Exeter to look at the digital needs of the Islamic Studies community within HEIs. This was in response to the subject of Islamic Studies being made a strategic subject by the government.
A range of recommendations were made, many of which overlap with issues JISC-funded projects are engaged in:

* The creation of a authoritative gateway to Islamic Resources
* Develop digitised catalogues of Islamic manuscripts and related
research material such as recent theses;
* The commissioning of a feasibility study into the creation of a corpus
of interactive online education materials, which could also be hosted by
the national gateway
* Continuation, and increase, of the subsidies for major online
reference works in Islamic Studies.
* The archiving of the websites of UK Islamic organisations
* Subsidising the acquisition of an online collection of research
monographs in Islamic Studies, should such a collection be developed by
a commercial organisation.

The full report can be downloaded via
http://digitisation.jiscinvolve.org/2008/07/09/
JISC is in discussion with HEFCE about how these recommendations can be
taken forward