VD 17: Digitization of 17th century German books recorded as unique copies in the VD 17 / holdings of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin - Preußischer Kulturbesitz

• Applicant: Barbara Schneider-Kempf
• Subject Area: History of Science
• Term: from 2014 to 2019
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 266166449

The project aims to digitize about 10.000 extremely rare books (about 800.000 pages) from the holdings of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin recorded in the „Verzeichnis der im deutschen Sprachbereich erschienenen Drucke des 17. Jahrhunderts (VD 17)“. These books can only be digitized by the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, which makes it a “Type 1-Project” specified by the “Masterplan zur Digitalisierung des VD 17” (digitization of unique copies).In addition, 5.000 Gelegenheitsschriften (about 200.000 pages), which form part of this project, will receive full texts via OCR. These books provide an invaluable source of information for research until now nearly non-accessible. The Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin already proved herself a capable user of OCR-techniques in the DFG-project „Pilotprojekt zum OCR-Einsatz bei der Digitalisierung der Funeralschriften der Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin“ by producing means (e.g. specific word lists) to provide optimal results. This project will further the development of mass-OCR-techniques for early printed books.The digitized books may be accessed via the Digital Collections of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin and via the DFG-viewer. They are catalogued in the VD 17 database, the Zentrales Verzeichnis Digitalisierter Drucke (ZVDD, central register of digitized books), the union catalogue of the Gemeinsamer Bibliotheksverbund (GBV) and the Staatsbibliothek’s OPAC (StaBiKat). The Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin provides open access to the project data e.g. by a specified interface (OAI).

• DFG Programme: Cataloguing and Digitisation (Scientific Library Services and Information Systems)