For all the advantages of digital formats over their analog counterparts they still suffer from one terrible weakness: obsolescence.

File formats and protocols change constantly. Digital data can be perfectly copied and easily archived -- losing it is rarely the problem. Maintaining access is the issue. And even when access is maintained it is often done so at the expense of interoperability. There is a lot of information available today from closed software packages and databases -- the information can still be viewed, but it is difficult, even for the copyright owner, to extract, convert, or re-purpose it.

The Libronix Digital Library System was designed with the future in mind. Whenever possible data is stored in flexible, well-known formats like XML. When data needs to be protected for copyright management reasons it is still created, maintained, and stored in standard formats on the publisher's behalf; only the consumer deliverable is placed in the special, secured file format.

Libronix believes in using standards not only for data files but even for communication between system components. The programmatic interfaces between code modules are the minimum required for speed and functionality. Many of the lowest-level code modules exchange XML within the system and communication between client software and Internet servers is through standard SOAP (XML) calls or ANSI Z39.50.

The commitment to standards extends to the smallest pieces of data. When the system records a user's country of residence it does so according to the ISO 3166 standard; price lists for resources are stored with ISO 4217 currency codes; anytime a date or time is recorded it is stored in Universal Time Coordinated in the ISO 8601 format.

All text in the Libronix DLS is stored in, or converted to, Unicode and tagged with a standard language code.

We believe that our support for standard data formats will help protect the publisher's investment in data preparation and the user's investment in digital resources. Support for standards within the product and even between the individual software components that make up the system helps ensure that the Libronix Digital Library System remains a robust, expandable, and scalable platform for electronic reference.