The service called CDL (CILEA Digital Library) was started in 1998. It has several purposes. Firstly, it makes resources in digital format (journals, monographs, databases) available to its users. Then, it offers organisation and commercial support to organisations willing to make cooperative initiatives and help for the access.

 

 

The CDL attends to the cooperative acquisition and the management of electronic resources, like electronic journals, archives of full-text papers, bibliographical and other databases. It deals also with systems for the management of electronic resources (link resolver ERM). All these activities are of interest for the national scientific community.

 

 

Case by case, the CDL can use a remote server, managed directly by the provider of the electronic resource. Or a local server can be used, installed at CILEA. In the latter case, CILEA attends to the periodical updates of the archives and, where the agreements allows it, guarantees access to the resources after the agreement with the provider has ended.

 

 

The access control is IP based. The workstation of the user must therefore be specified in the subscription contract. The user might also have to know its user-name and password.

 

 

CILEA provides assistance for the use of the network services necessary to access the databases, and for the use and management of the enabled codes. For this purpose, each subscribed service has a few pages of description. Moreover, users have a help desk available, both by email and by telephone. Subscribers receive monthly usage statistics of the services.

 

 

In 2005 the CdU, the CDL users' committee was created. It represents the interests of the institutions that have subscribed to the service.

 

 

CILEA, within the CDL activities, takes part in INFER (Italian National Forum on Electronic Resources), ICOLC (International Coalition of Library Consortia),  SELL (Southern European Libraries Link) and cooperates with other Italian consortia with similar aims (CIBER and CIPE).