The Inevitable Future of Electronic Theses and Dissertations within Malaysia Context

摘要

The intellectual wealth of nations is becoming increasingly visible online. Therefore, providing scholarly materials available electronically has become part of the learning culture. Many universities are now in the process of digitizing their theses and dissertations in an effort to preserve it and to make it more widely available. As more and more electronic documents disseminate from various universities, there is a critical need to formally manage the distribution of resources across institutional boundaries. Hence, this paper examines the proposed framework of ETD initiatives within Malaysia context as well as various issues and concerns including accessibility/availability, scalability, security and searchability of the electronic theses and dissertations. Equally, this paper will also address other issues such as intellectual property rights, archiving and preservation of ETDs.