The Virtual Library museums pages (VLmp) formed an early leading directory of online museums around the world.

History

The VLmp online directory resource was founded by

Jonathan Bowen Jonathan P. Bowen FBCS FRSA (born 1956) is a British computer scientist and an Emeritus Professor at London South Bank University, where he headed the Centre for Applied Formal Methods. Prof. Bowen is also the Chairman of Museophile Limited ...

in 1994, originally at the

Oxford University Computing Laboratory The Department of Computer Science is the computer science department of the University of Oxford, England, which is part of the university's Mathematical, Physical and Life Sciences Division. It was founded in 1957 as the Computing Laboratory. ...

in the United Kingdom. It has been supported by the

International Council of Museums The International Council of Museums (ICOM) is a non-governmental organisation dedicated to museums, maintaining formal relations with UNESCO and having a consultative status with the United Nations Economic and Social Council. Founded in 1946, I ...

(ICOM) and

Museophile Limited Jonathan P. Bowen FBCS FRSA (born 1956) is a British computer scientist and an Emeritus Professor at London South Bank University, where he headed the Centre for Applied Formal Methods. Prof. Bowen is also the Chairman of Museophile Limite ...

. as part of the World Wide Web Virtual Library, initiated by

Tim Berners-Lee Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee (born 8 June 1955), also known as TimBL, is an English computer scientist best known as the inventor of the World Wide Web. He is a Professorial Fellow of Computer Science at the University of Oxford and a profe ...

and later managed by Arthur Secret. The main VLmp site moved to

London South Bank University London South Bank University (LSBU) is a public university in Elephant and Castle, London. It is based in the London Borough of Southwark, near the South Bank of the River Thames, from which it takes its name. Founded in 1892 as the Borough P ...

in the early 2000s and is now hosted on the MuseumsWiki

wiki A wiki ( ) is an online hypertext publication collaboratively edited and managed by its own audience, using a web browser. A typical wiki contains multiple pages for the subjects or scope of the project, and could be either open to the pu ...

, established in 2006 and hosted by

Fandom A fandom is a subculture composed of fans characterized by a feeling of empathy and camaraderie with others who share a common interest. Fans typically are interested in even minor details of the objects of their fandom and spend a significan ...

(previously

Wikia Fandom (formerly known as Wikicities before 2007 and later Wikia before 2019) is a wiki hosting service that hosts wikis mainly on entertainment topics (i.e. video games, TV series, movies, entertainers, etc.). Its domain is operated by Fandom ...

). The directory was developed and organised in a distributed manner by country, with around twenty people in different countries maintaining various sections. Canada, through the

Canadian Heritage Information Network , nativename_a = , nativename_r = , logo = Logo of Canadian Heritage Information Network.png , logo_caption = , seal = , seal_width = , seal_caption = , picture = , picture_width = , picture_caption = , formed = , preceding1 = ...

(CHIN), was the first country to become involved. The MDA maintained the United Kingdom section of museums, later the Collections Trust. The

Historisches Centrum Hagen The Historisches Centrum Hagen (HCH, in English: ''Historical Centre of Hagen'') in Hagen, Germany, has hosted the city museum, the municipal archives, the Westphalian Music and Literature Archive, the offices of Hagen historical societies, and ...

has maintained and hosted pages for Germany. Other countries actively participating included

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central, Eastern, and Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Moldova to the east, a ...

. In total, around 20 countries were involved. The directory was influential in the museum field during the 1990s and 2000s. It was used as a standard starting point to find museums online. It was useful for monitoring the growth of museums internationally online. It was also used for online museum surveys. It was recommended as an educational resource and included a search facility.

Virtual Museum of Computing

The Virtual Museum of Computing (VMoC), part of the Virtual Library museums pages, was created as a

virtual museum A virtual museum is a digital entity that draws on the characteristics of a museum, in order to complement, enhance, or augment the museum experience through personalization, interactivity, and richness of content. Virtual museums can perform as t ...

providing information on the

history of computers History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbrella term comprising past events as well ...

and

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to practical disciplines (includin ...

. It included virtual "galleries" (e.g., on

Alan Turing Alan Mathison Turing (; 23 June 1912 – 7 June 1954) was an English mathematician, computer scientist, logician, cryptanalyst, philosopher, and theoretical biologist. Turing was highly influential in the development of theoretical c ...

, curated by Andrew Hodges) and links to other computer museums. VMoC was founded in 1995, initially at the

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the world's second-oldest university in contin ...

. As part of VLmp, it was hosted by the

(ICOM). VMoC was also hosted by the

University of Reading The University of Reading is a public university in Reading, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1892 as University College, Reading, a University of Oxford extension college. The institution received the power to grant its own degrees in 192 ...

and

, with mirror sites internationally within VLmp. Later it was also provided by Museophile Limited. It then became available in archival form as a

). VMoC has been referenced in books and papers. It has provided computing history event reports.

References

External links

Virtual Library museums pages
archival site o
MuseumsWiki

Aggregation-based digital libraries 1994 establishments in England International Council of Museums Internet properties established in 1994 London South Bank University Museum informatics Oxford University Computing Laboratory Virtual museums Web directories Web portals {{website-stub

History

Virtual Museum of Computing

See also

References

External links