Administering the Navy Virtual Library, Version 1.0

The Navy Virtual Library (NVL) is an Internet-based system that provides customized library services to researchers through their desktop computers. Using a World Wide Web interface and secure safety layer (SSL) encryption, users may search licensed databases, buy documents, read journal articles, and observe from a remote location as a reference librarian searches on line resources for them. User profiles and organization profiles are maintained by librarians so that those resources acquired by an organization, and relevant to the user's interests, are presented on his/her dynamically generated NVL web pages. Librarians administer resources through HTML forms, which allow restriction by dollar amount, or by number of transactions, at the user level and the distribution of an organization's resources among that organization's users and suborganizations. The NVL gives a user access to professional library support from a remote site, a hotel room, or shipboard, as long as an Internet connection, a secure browser, and a supporting library exist.