IT Department

Information Technology Department

The Department of Information Technology began its work in 1997 while the Centre for the Great Islamic Encyclopaedia’s new building was inaugurated. The centre’s computer network has more than 45,000 meters of network cable throughout the building. Through it, all departments have access to the internal and global networks (Internet) with a coverage level of nearly 100%. With the quantitative and qualitative development of the information technology undertakings, in May 2009, a department with the same name was formed in the centre’s organisational structure to centralise the management of various sections in this field. Automating the scientific and administrative departments of the centre, connecting the centre to databases and digital libraries inside and outside of Iran, establishing the digital library of the centre, and digitalising the content produced in the CGIE are among the most important goals of this department.

The IT department of the centre includes the following organizational sections:

Informatics section: The main task of this section is the technical support of the centre’s network, including all the software and hardware. Also, the Data Centre is located in this section, where all operating and storage servers are located. The Informatics section has also automated the scientific and administrative workflow by preparing numerous software, which has played a significant role in the ease of administrative affairs and the implementation of scientific projects.

Simorgh Cataloguing and Indexing section: Parallel to the establishment of the library of the CGIE, the library department started cataloguing and indexing books, journals and magazines based on the Library of Congress Classification system. In the beginning (1984), this operation was done manually on special sheets. However, in 2000, through a contract with Iran Software and Hardware Company (Nosa), the centre’s library was equipped with “Simorgh” indexing software. Since then, the cataloguing and indexing of sources have become digital, which includes two main parts: 1. Cataloguing books in Eastern and Western languages ​​in manuscript, printed, lithographic and digital formats. 2. Indexing of periodicals, including monthly magazines, newspapers and annuals in several languages.

Digital Library section: In 2005, the first version of the centre’s digital library was implemented by our engineers, and the scanned sources of the library were uploaded there, which were available to the researchers of the centre through the internal network. However, the need to have a more efficient system that can meet the needs of researchers prompted the centre to replace the previous system with the Simorgh Digital Library software in November 2011 through a contract with Nosa. In the new system, broader possibilities have been provided, including full-text and integrated search in all sources. This system is currently only available on the internal network of the centre.

The workflow in the centre’s Digital Library section briefly includes the following:

• Provision of sources: The Digital Library, in cooperation with the library section of the centre, prepares the required digital sources through purchase or donation and, in some cases, exchange and delivers them to the information processing section for preparation and uploading into the system. Also, the required sources are searched through the internet and downloaded if available.

• Scanning the library sources: In this section, the sources available in the centre’s library, such as books, magazines, manuscripts, documents, and photos, are scanned according to the priorities of the library section and the demands of the centre’s researchers.

• Processing: At this stage, all digital sources are processed for uploading into the digital library system. The processing operations include solving the issues and defects in the appearance of the scanned material, OCR, compression and file naming.

• Control and uploading: in the last stage of the workflow, all processed files are controlled by the project manager and the digital library manager. After the final control, the files are uploaded into the system.

The centre’s website: The first version of the centre’s website was launched in 1999, and the second in 2004. The second version provided free access to the articles of the Great Islamic Encyclopaedia in HTML format. In February 2013, the third version of the website was launched. With a new approach, the PDF format of all the centre publications is accessible through subscription.