RedLightGreen was a
database
In computing, a database is an organized collection of data stored and accessed electronically. Small databases can be stored on a file system, while large databases are hosted on computer clusters or cloud storage. The design of databases s ...
of
bibliographic
Bibliography (from and ), as a discipline, is traditionally the academic study of books as physical, cultural objects; in this sense, it is also known as bibliology (from ). English author and bibliographer John Carter describes ''bibliography ...
descriptions on the
Web created by
Research Libraries Group (RLG). It used a set of four million records extracted from
OCLC's
WorldCat
WorldCat is a union catalog that itemizes the collections of tens of thousands of institutions (mostly libraries), in many countries, that are current or past members of the OCLC global cooperative. It is operated by OCLC, Inc. Many of the O ...
database, and was designed to help novice users make selections from the vast bibliographic resources they would encounter in such a large set. RedLightGreen also allowed users to create
citations for works found.
Work on RedLightGreen began in 2001 with funding from the
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation of New York City in the United States, simply known as Mellon Foundation, is a private foundation with five core areas of interest, and endowed with wealth accumulated by Andrew Mellon of the Mellon family of Pitts ...
. It was one of the earliest experiments with the
Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records
Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR ) is a conceptual entity–relationship model developed by the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) that relates user tasks of retrieval and access in onlin ...
which provides a structured view of bibliographic data. On July 1, 2006, RLG was merged with
OCLC, and it was announced that the RedLightGreen service would be replaced by
WorldCat
WorldCat is a union catalog that itemizes the collections of tens of thousands of institutions (mostly libraries), in many countries, that are current or past members of the OCLC global cooperative. It is operated by OCLC, Inc. Many of the O ...
, via Open WorldCat, available at WorldCat.org.
"RLG to combine with OCLC"
(Press Release, Dublin, Ohio, USA, 3 May 2006)
References
External links
Open WorldCat site
Library 2.0
Bibliographic databases and indexes
{{Library-stub