The TRAIL Collections Working Group chooses and prioritizes what series will be added to TRAIL. Any library or other organization may contribute needed content for any active series.
The Technical Report Archive & Image Library (TRAIL) identifies, acquires, catalogs, digitizes and provides unrestricted access to U.S. government agency technical reports. TRAIL currently consists of over four dozen member institutions [1] whose annual membership fees and volunteered staff time further the efforts of the project.
ACCESS AND PRESERVATION
TRAIL was formed to meet the challenges of access to technical report literature. These reports are rapidly disappearing from library shelves and documents collections. TRAIL selects, digitizes, and deposits technical reports into trusted repositories: the HathiTrust and the University of North Texas (UNT) Digital Library. Content in the HathiTrust and UNT repositories is full-text searchable, and is openly accessible to all users. Both HathiTrust and UNT follow strict preservation standards (see http://www.hathitrust.org/preservation [2] and http://www.library.unt.edu/digital-projects-unit/software-and-processes [3] for more information). TRAIL provides a search interface as well, www.technicalreports.org [4], that searches only on metadata, but not the full text.
FUNDING and OUTLAYS
TRAIL depends on the continuing financial support of member institutions - new members are actively being sought to help TRAIL continue to do its work. While roughly 80% of TRAIL content is digitized through Google at no cost to TRAIL, the remaining 20% of material that cannot be sent through Google due to multiple-sized pages within a report, i.e., fold-outs, maps, etc., is digitized and stored at UNT at a cost to TRAIL. Other major workflow costs include cataloging & metadata creation at the University of Arizona for all items digitized by TRAIL and the costs associated both with shipping technical reports to Arizona and then on to either Google or UNT for digitization. Funding is driven by membership. The more members, the more funding available to digitize that "special handling" content.
PARTNERSHIPS/RELATIONSHIPS
TRAIL’s collaborative effort leverages the contributions of institutions and other organizations committed to increasing access to science and technology literature across many disciplines. TRAIL has developed partnerships with institutions including the University of Arizona, University of Michigan, University of North Texas, and University of Washington, based on their individual priorities and strengths. These and other TRAIL partners have developed processes for documents to be scanned and digitally archived to ensure the longevity of these resources.
TRAIL is a member of the CRL Global Resources Network. CRL provides administrative assistance, a collaborative workspace for members, and a public website. Membership in CRL is not required to be a member of TRAIL or to access TRAIL content.
The University of Arizona, in collaboration with CRL, submitted a proposal in 2006 as a response to a call for projects from the Greater Western Library Alliance (GWLA) to address new strategic directions. The proposal was to develop a collaborative project with CRL to identify, digitize, and provide open access to federal technical reports. GWLA accepted the proposal and the developed project became the Technical Report Archive & Image Library (TRAIL).
The University of Arizona is the central processing site that receives and creates inventories of shipments, assembles collections, creates catalog records, and ships processed technical reports to either the University of Michigan or the University of North Texas for digitization.
In 2007 the University of Michigan Digitization Project [5] offered to become involved. Michigan funnels the majority of the technical reports the Task Force wants to include in the project into the stream of materials that Michigan supplies to Google as one of its partners. Michigan receives a copy of all scanned documents it sends to Google. Thus TRAIL documents were funneled through U of M to Google for digitization. Content that requires special handling is digitized at the University of North Texas (UNT).
TRAIL content digitized by Google is deposited in and made available through the HathiTrust [6], a shared digital repository for storing partner libraries’ digital content.
UNT is a TRAIL member and serves a major role in digitizing and hosting content that requires special handling and cannot go through the Google digitization stream. UNT has developed a workflow for the digitization of microfiche (TRAIL has digitized almost exclusively from paper to this point).
One of TRAIL's founding members, the University of Washington, developed and maintains the TRAIL search interface at www.technicalreports.org [4].
TRAIL ANNUAL MEETING
The focus of the annual meeting, usually held in the spring, is on acquainting new attendees with TRAIL, general direction and policy setting, and short and long-term strategic planning. The members of the Steering Committee constitute the core attendees at the annual meeting, although all TRAIL Member Representatives and others who participate in TRAIL in some way are also welcome to attend.
TRAIL would like to acknowledge the contributions of the following individuals, organizations, and institutions. If we have missed a contribution of which you are aware, please let us know. Email us at trail@crl.edu [7].
FINANCIAL CONTRIBUTORS
University of Hong Kong
CONTENT CONTRIBUTORS
University of Arkansas
University of Arizona
Auburn University
Bowdoin College Library
University of California at Davis
California Institute of Technology
University of Cincinnati
Cleveland Public Library
Colorado School of Mines
Colorado State University
University of Connecticut
Dallas Public Library
Denver Public Library
Drake University
Evergreen
Georgia Institute of Technology
University of Illinois
Iowa State University
Johns Hopkins University
Kansas State University
Lehigh University
Linda Hall Library
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Michigan State University
National Transportation Library
New Orleans Public Library
University of New Mexico
Nielsen Engineering & Research, Inc.
University of Notre Dame
Ohio Northern University
Oklahoma Dept. of Libraries
Oklahoma State University
Pennsylvania State University
Princeton University
Rawlins Public Library
Rice University
Rutgers University
San Diego Public Library
San Francisco Public Library
Seattle Public Library
Southwestern Research Institute
Stanford University
State University of New York at Stony Brook
Texas A & M University
Texas State Library
University of Tulsa
USGS Fort Collins Science Center
University of Utah
University of Washington
Washington State University
Western Wyoming Community College
University of Wisconsin, Madison
University of Wyoming
ADDITIONAL SIGNIFICANT CONTRIBUTORS
University of Arizona - Project idea originator
Linda Hall Library - Project idea support. Provided technical report scans used in the pilot digitization project.
Greater Western Library Alliance (GWLA) - Pilot project sponsorship
Center for Research Libraries (CRL) - Continued development and support of TRAIL as part of the Global Resources Network
University of Hawaii at Manoa - Hosting of pilot search interface
University of Washington - Hosting of TRAIL search interface
University of North Texas - Acts as one of the Streams receiving documents to be digitized and hosts part of the TRAIL digitized collection
WHY JOIN TRAIL?
Your institution becomes associated with a national open access digitization project that is highly visible and successful - one of the best digitization projects around.
Member institutions have a voice in current and future plans for TRAIL.
Joining TRAIL provides an opportunity to collaborate and support persistent, sustainable open access to digital technical material.
REPRESENT YOUR INSTITUTION'S PERSPECTIVE AND PRIORITIES
Institutions may have space needs, user needs, or materials in poor condition that need immediate attention. These needs can be met through digitization efforts. Members on the Steering Committee [8] and Working Groups [9] decide and prioritize what will be digitized.
Gain valuable library space and collection management resources by recommending or donating collections/items to the project for scanning.
Members can access project working documentation, reports, and collection analysis to aid in collection management decisions for their home libraries.
CONTENT DISCOVERY FOR YOUR USERS
The search interface www.technicalreports.org [4] provides immediate access to digitized content - add this resource to your electronic resource/database list.
ACCESS OR OFFER SUBJECT EXPERTISE
Members can supply subject expertise, technical assistance, or other in-kind contributions to the program, extending the accrued benefits to all participants. For institutions without such local expertise, members may rely on the expertise of fellow participants to understand the history and background of difficult-to-use print technical report series in their collections.
PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
There are professional development opportunities for librarians through the participation in and support of an open access project.
Opportunities for TRAIL members to get involved:
WHAT CAN NEW MEMBERS OFFER?
New members allow us to do more. The economies of scale or cost advantages due to increased membership allows us to advance the work of the project. TRAIL is a membership-supported project.
Discussion began at the University of Arizona (UA), followed by meetings at the American Library Association (ALA) [10] and the 2004 American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) [11] on a possible project to digitize U.S. federal technical reports to make them more visible and searchable. Maliaca Oxnam of UA led these discussions.
A letter of interest was sent to Judy Russell at the Government Printing Office.
The discussion group wanted to create a pilot to explore potential problems and successes of a national, collaborative technical report digitization, access, and preservation project. The demonstration project would be small (less than 500 reports or 50,000 pages), but large enough to identify and work out some technical and user problems.
Maliaca Oxnam started a TECHREPORTS e-list at UA to communicate with other interested parties.
GPO showed interest in the project but had no funding. UA received word that Bernie Reilly at the Center for Research Libraries (CRL) [12]was interested in the project. A group from UA met with Bernie, who agreed to gauge the interest of CRL libraries in the project.
The Greater Western Library Alliance (GWLA) [13] opened discussions on possible new strategic directions. In response, UA submitted a proposal to develop a collaborative project with CRL to identify, digitize, and provide open access to federal technical reports.
A straw poll over the TECHREPORTS list asked subscribers which agencies' reports would attract the most interest.
Maliaca Oxnam and Bernie Reilly talked again at the ALA Midwinter Meeting and Reilly reiterated CRL’s interest in the digitization project. Results of the straw poll were reported.
GWLA announced that the UA proposal had been accepted as one of four strategic initiatives for the Alliance. A small group of GWLA Deans and Directors met to expand each initiative into a program outline and suggest next steps.
GWLA approved the outline for the technical report digitization project and the GWLA/CRL Federal Technical Reports Task Force was created to move the project forward. At this point the Task Force was primarily composed of engineering librarians. Maliaca Oxnam became Chair of the Task Force.
The institutions represented on the Task Force were:
University of Arizona
University of Arkansas
Center for Research Libraries
University of Colorado, Boulder
University of Hawaii, Manoa
Kansas State University
Linda Hall Library
University of Washington
The Linda Hall Library [14] in Kansas City expressed particular interest in the project and agreed to assign an individual to work on the Task Force as well as to do a 200–500 report digitization test to identify costs.
The University of Arizona agreed to provide seed money for the project; funds were transferred to CRL to avoid fiscal year spending deadlines at UA.
The Task Force met for the first time; over two days, members reviewed the entire project and outlined questions and next steps for each stage. The Task Force also:
These efforts were followed by:
The Task Force:
Task Force members met in January at the Linda Hall Library to continue intensive planning for the pilot and for a longer-phased project. They also developed digitization quality control checks.
AEC collections were scanned and added to the pilot site.
Pilot project was named TRAIL (Technical Report Archive and Image Library).
GWLA Deans and Directors agreed to support the project with $4,000 per GWLA institution (about $120,000 total). GWLA added a Digital Collections Program Officer to its staff, who joined the Task Force as the GWLA representative/liaison.
The University of Arkansas received a gift of the U.S. Bureau of Mines technical report series, which became the next major set of materials to be digitized. The University of Arkansas became the first “node”.
The University of Michigan Digitization Project (Michigan) [5] offered to become involved. Michigan would funnel the technical reports the Task Force to be included in the project into the stream of materials that Michigan supplies to Google as one of its partners. Michigan would receive a copy of all scanned documents it sends to Google. Development of a separate interface that would allow searching of just the technical-report content was proposed, leading to much discussion between the Task Force and Michigan.
The Task Force met again at the Linda Hall Library to develop a process and workflow for a much larger volume of material, since Michigan had offered to do the scanning. The Task Force was recharged to address a production system (as opposed to a pilot) and added two new members, who were both government documents librarians. The Task Force created and assigned new task lists after this meeting.
Stanford expressed an interest in joining the project to design a user interface to the scanned documents.
The group agreed on a permanent project name—TRAIL—and the name of the group became the TRAIL Task Force.
Discussion began about having OCLC create collection sets of records for each series (or group of series from a particular agency) digitized by the Task Force.
Linda Hall Library bowed out of participation in the project since its commitment was only for the pilot. The Task Force welcomed four new members, three of whom were government documents librarians. The updated version of the Task Force met in Chicago to bring the new members up to speed, decide on future directions, and identify tasks.
The Task Force identified point people and groups to complete these tasks:
The “Collection Group” subgroup would define the collections to be included in the project.
The “External Communication” subgroup would develop a project Web site to inform the public and project partners about the work of the Task Force and how to become involved.
A skeletal website was launched using free Google space for hosting and creation, and much background work to populate the site with content.
UA developed a project internal tracking system.
The group made a final decision on the TRAIL logo.
Work began at the second “node” to process of all remaining report series of the National Bureau of Standards.
The University of North Texas (UNT) became a partner for hosting TRAIL content. UNT had a strong track record with content hosting and digital projects with the Government Printing Office and was very familiar with the unique needs of the technical report literature. The University of Washington initiated to develop the web interface and federated search between UNT and the Hathi Repository.
TRAIL won the ALA/GODORT/LexisNexis Documents to the People Award [15]. The Award “is a tribute to an individual, library, institution, or other non-commercial group that has most effectively encouraged the use of government documents in support of library service.”
In the spring of 2010, TRAIL became part of the Global Resource Network (GRN) within CRL. A new administrative structure was formed, bylaws were created and a funding structure established. TRAIL began soliciting institutional members who would provide support via a membership fee and also be willing to assist with the work of TRAIL.
The latter half of 2010 saw the creation and initiation of an orientation program for new members, increased participation in TRAIL from new member institution representatives, and the release and rollout of the new TRAIL search interface.
In spring of 2011, the first election of officers within TRAIL's new organizational structure occurred. The new officers began planning how to build an expanded member base as a Global Resource Network within CRL. A membership working group was formed to actively solicit new TRAIL members
The membership working group met with modest success as TRAIL's institutional member total finally eclipsed in 2011 what it had been when it was a GWLA initiative. The TRAIL Steering Committee determined that a major bylaws revision was needed and a small task group was formed to draft a reworking of TRAIL's bylaws. 2011 also saw a significant push to increase content available in TRAIL. A pilot to digitize microfiche and microcards was begun at the University of North Texas.
TRAIL’s new bylaws were approved. The retirement of the primary TRAIL cataloger caused a disruption in content processing. The first significant adjustment to the composition of the TRAIL Steering Committee occurred after the bylaws went into effect. The pilot project to digitize microcards and fiche was successful and 174 reports were added to the TRAIL collection consisting of 14,207 pages of content as a result of that pilot at the University of North Texas.
TRAIL search widget created by staff at Iowa State. In an effort to boost membership, a new Membership Working Group was created and new members were solicited.
The next significant bylaws revision, which allows for personal memberships within TRAIL (in addition to the standard institutional/organizational variety) was passed by the TRAIL membership. Although the pre-1976 focus for TRAIL content had not been a priority for years, at this point TRAIL dropped that focus completely.
TRAIL began to look more strategically and closely at harvesting content from other sites, including costs for metadata creation and/or clean-up when necessary. TRAIL content at UNT crested 1,000,000 pages. Overall number of TRAIL reports surpassed 50,000. TRAIL was in the top 25 of content suppliers to the Hathi Trust. The first non-educational institution became a member when the Government Publications Office joins TRAIL.
Number of TRAIL institutional members surpassed 40 for the first time.
2016 marked the 10th anniversary of TRAIL, recognized as the “10 Years of TRAIL” promotion.
By February 2016, TRAIL deposited over 39,000 volumes in HathiTrust. This placed TRAIL in the Top 25 of HathiTrust content contributors. Most top-rated contributors are universities, with notable exceptions being the Library of Congress, Getty Research Institute, and TRAIL.
TRAIL completed the digitization of Research and Development Progress Reports issued by the Office of Saline Waters (1955-1972). These technical reports are valuable for the study of thermodynamics, engineering, economics, and water resource policy.
TRAIL has made over 61,500 federal technical reports discoverable and searchable.
First pilot of microcard digitization began with 1,700 cards.
Instructions for how to download TRAIL MARC records created: https://trailguides.crl.edu/series/marc [16].
TRAIL reached 50 institutional members.
At the TRAIL Annual Meeting at the University of North Texas, the second pilot microcard digitization pilot is approved to proceed as a project. Two vendors digitized 1,000 cards.
The inaugural Metrics page debuts in March. Usage data is updated every six months: https://www.crl.edu/trail-metrics [17].
In March, TRAIL distributed its first quarterly newsletter issue to members.
Because of the COVID-19 pandemic-related travel and meeting restrictions, the annual meeting in May was held virtually. Most of the sessions had about 40 attendees.
The pandemic affected other areas of the operations of TRAIL:
A creative video was made to virtually celebrate TRAIL's 15 years of existence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7l5ZYaWdkyg [18].
UNT DL staff began processing microcard image files received from the vendor in February. Microcard digitization was completed by the vendor in August.
The TRAIL Annual Meeting was held virtually again.
Late in the year the Google Scanning Center reopened and processing of TRAIL materials resumed.
With the Google Scanning Center now re-opened, TRAIL content is again flowing into the HathiTrust DL. However, because of the huge backlog of material for the Google Scanning Center to process (including 120 boxes of material from TRAIL) it will be well into 2023 before all of the TRAIL material will be added to the HathiTrust Digital Library.
Current partner institutions of TRAIL are listed here http://www.crl.edu/grn/trail/member-list [1]
The Global Resources Network [19], based at the Center for Research Libraries [12] in Chicago, welcomes the active participation of institutions interested in facilitating access to U.S. federal technical reports through the TRAIL project.
Institutions wishing to participate in TRAIL should fill out the TRAIL Participant Agreement [20]. As of FY22, TRAIL members pay an annual membership fee of $3,000.
Individuals who work at institutions that are not institutional members may join TRAIL by filling out the Individual Participant Agreement [21]. There is no membership fee for Individual Members of TRAIL.
TRAIL is looking for additional partners to participate in the project. Institutions, whether large or small, can participate in many ways, including (but not limited to):
Additional questions about participation in TRAIL may be answered in the Frequently Asked Questions [22] document.
The name of the body is the Technical Report Archive & Image Library (TRAIL). TRAIL is an unincorporated association, with the Center for Research Libraries (CRL) acting in the capacity of fiscal and legal agent.
The purpose of TRAIL is to lead a collaborative effort to identify, digitize, archive, preserve, and provide persistent and unrestricted access to US federal technical reports. Emphasis is placed on legacy collections authored and distributed prior to approximately 1976.
Membership in TRAIL is open to organizations and individuals with an interest in facilitating access to US federal technical reports in a manner consistent with the purpose of TRAIL.
Organizations need not be members of CRL to participate in TRAIL.
There are two categories of membership: Institutional and Personal.
Revised March 2015
The TRAIL Collections Working Group chooses and prioritizes what series will be added to TRAIL. Any library or other organization may contribute needed content for any active series.
See the Series List [23] to learn which series have been digitized or the status of a series under review for digitization.
HathiTrust storage architecture has two synchronized instances of storage with wide geographic separation and an encrypted tape backup with 6 months of previous-version retention. For more information, see https://www.hathitrust.org/technology [24].
The University of North Texas maintains redundancy for all the content in the UNT Digital Library system. For every file there are at least two copies (both preservation files as well as all of the access files that are getting viewed online).
There are several reasons. First, if our series processing inventories indicate that we still need the report, we actively seek the report. We do not have the staff to check our needed items against what was digitized and made available in HathiTrust by another content provider. Second, ONLY reports digitized by TRAIL are indexed and searchable by our search interface [4]. Finally, technical reports that have maps, foldouts, etc. are rarely included in the reports available at HathiTrust. TRAIL sends these reports to the University of North Texas (UNT), our other TRAIL repository, where the maps, foldouts, etc., are digitized along with the reports.
It’s quite likely that we do. You may have reports that will fill in the gaps for series we’re working on. Please compare what you have against the TRAIL Series Inventories [25].
If you cannot find the series that pertain to your reports, please contact the TRAIL Collections Working Group Coordinator (the Coordinator’s name and email can be found here [26]). This person leads the group that determines which series TRAIL will consider for digitization.
No, not at present. The TRAIL Search Interface [27] does not have a "browse" function because a large share of TRAIL content consists of documents for which agency names and series titles have changed frequently over the years. Creating and maintaining an authority record structure, which would pull together all the variant combinations for each agency/series pairing, would require a significant investment of our resources at this time.
See the list of contributing Institutions [28] on the website of TRAIL Collections Processing Database.
Some digitized reports may not be available due to copyright restrictions. TRAIL content in the HathiTrust is subject to copyright decisions made by HathiTrust. For more information about copyright see the HathiTrust copyright [29] page.
Anyone can download TRAIL documents, page by page. HathiTrust partner institutions can download documents page by page or can download a PDF of the complete document. The complete document is available for viewing online. For more information see the Access Chart [30] on the HathiTrust Help page.
See the most recent update on numbers at the TRAIL Metrics page [17].
See TRAIL Tools [31] to find widgets. And by all means, please "LIKE" TRAIL on Facebook [32] and Twitter [33]!
Individual print documents that are easily scanned (destructive process) are preferred. TRAIL is currently digitizing a set of microcards. TRAIL is also developing guidelines, processes, etc. for digitizing maps. Special formats including maps and other non-standard sized items are deposited at the University of North Texas Digital Library [34]
See our TRAIL Guide on the Series G [35]ap Fill Process [35]. Find it here: https://trailguides.crl.edu/series/gapfill [35]
It is a freely searchable database that provides the details about the series that have been received, inventoried, and processed at the University of Arizona, the central processing site for TRAIL.
Use the TRAIL Series Processing Inventories [25] to see what series have been processed for digitization.
TRAIL content is open for indexing by any/all Internet search engines.
Any interested library may purchase sets of provider-neutral catalog records for available collections via OCLC [36]. These OCLC Record Sets enhance access to existing print collections or electronic versions.
Digitized technical reports are located in HathiTrust [6] and in the University of North Texas Digital Library [37].
See About TRAIL [38] on the website of the Center for Research Libraries in the Global Resources section.
Use the TRAIL Search Interface [39], which is maintained by the University of Washington Libraries.
TRAIL began as a Greater Western Library Alliance (GWLA) project with the Center for Research Libraries to increase access to and preserve government technical reports. TRAIL is now a CRL Global Resources Network Initiative which provides unrestricted access to this unique body of literature via the TRAIL Search Interface.
Government documents that have not been digitized or that are not born-digital are vulnerable for a number of reasons:
To ensure preservation, discoverability, and persistent open access to government technical publications regardless of form or format.
No. Any of the following will benefit TRAIL: membership dollars, service on TRAIL working groups, educating others about TRAIL, donation of materials.
Through regularly scheduled phone conferences and through a workspace site (wiki) provided by CRL. Members use the CRL wiki to create, post, and edit the documentation of the TRAIL Steering Committee [8] and Working Groups [9].
See the TRAIL Member List [1].
Dozens of academic, government, and commercial organizations have contributed content, services, funding, and staff time to TRAIL and members invest in these efforts to keep it going and growing.
This glossary was created to explain terms and concepts used by TRAIL. It is intended as an explanatory guide for current and potential members.
Agency A specific entity of the United States Government as defined by the United States Government Manual (http://www.usgovernmentmanual.gov [43]).
Central Processing Unit The institution receiving collections for digitization from the Nodes. This Unit assembles collections and inventories the collections in the TRAIL Collection Processing Database. Catalog records for each technical report are created and the cataloging is supplied to OCLC. The appropriate Stream is determined and collections are shipped to be digitized.
Content Contributors The institution(s) providing technical reports to a Node. A Content Contributor’s responsibilities include creating an inventory of the reports, taking the necessary steps to have the reports removed from their collections, and shipping the reports to the appropriate Node.
Member Organization Any organization interested in supporting the work of TRAIL that has submitted a signed member agreement and has paid the annual membership fee.
Member Representative The person designated by the Member Organization to have voting authority in elections, bylaw revisions and other governance issues. This person is responsible for being the primary contact between TRAIL and the Member Organization. The Member Representative may also elect to participate in TRAIL activities such as standing for elected offices and serving on the Steering Committee, working groups and/or task forces. This person must be employed by the Member Organization and not be a student.
Member Participants The employees of a Member Organization participating in TRAIL project activities. Member Participants, other than the Member Representative, do not have voting authority, but can participate in all other TRAIL activities.
Node An institution responsible for soliciting and collecting from Content Contributors a copy of reports in a series to form a collection to be digitized. The Node adds information about the reports to the Central Processing Unit inventory, and ships them to the Central Processing Unit.
Personal Members Personal Members are individuals who are interested in supporting TRAIL, but work at non-member institutions. Personal Members do not pay a yearly membership fee and are encouraged to participate in TRAIL’s Working Groups and activities. The TRAIL Bylaws were amended to include Personal Members in 2015.
Series A defined publication with a unique SuDoc call number that is numbered or unnumbered. Note: Title changes without SuDoc changes do not constitute a new series.
Streams The destination of the technical reports to be digitized after processing at the Central Processing Unit. Presently there are two main streams; the Google Stream and the University of North Texas (UNT) Stream. The Google Stream is in collaboration with University of Michigan Digitization Project. Reports entering this stream must be in print and all components (maps, foldouts, etc.) of the report must be of a uniform size. Reports entering the UNT Stream may be print or microform. Print reports entering this path will be those where all components are not of uniform size. If a Content Contributor is loaning reports and therefore wants them returned, those reports will also enter the UNT Stream.
TRAIL Annual Meeting The in-person meeting of the Steering Committee, that is usually held in spring and open to all Member Representatives and Member Participants of TRAIL. The meeting is a venue for acquainting everyone with TRAIL and also to discuss the direction of the project including strategic planning.
TRAIL Guides (trailguides.crl.edu/series [25])- online listing of series inventories. These inventories are useful in determining what TRAIL has processed and what reports are needed.
TRAIL provides promotional materials and information to help member institutions promote TRAIL resources and services locally.
These infographics highlight fiscal year accomplishments.
These brochures highlight the importance of technical reports and highlight TRAIL tools to access reports. The brochures contain the same content, but one has more color and the other has less color, and is therefore cheaper to print. Designed to help TRAIL libraries spread the word among library staff, research and teaching faculty, students, and others as an introduction to TRAIL, as well as to opportunities to participate in TRAIL
Don't forget to link to our social media outlets for updates from TRAIL
Use our graphics to promote TRAIL on your social media.
TRAIL Facebook 1 [67] | TRAIL Tweet 1 [68] | TRAIL Instagram 1 [69] |
TRAIL Facebook 2 [70] | TRAIL Tweet 2 [71] | TRAIL Instagram 2 [72] |
TRAIL Facebook 3 [73] | TRAIL Tweet 3 [74] | TRAIL Instagram 3 [75] |
Sample text for social media:
Currently we have pens and stickers promoting TRAIL. Contact Laura Sare at Texas A&M University Libraries to acquire materials. Quantities are limited.
Use TRAIL logos to promote TRAIL in your local institution's social media announcements, newsletters, and more.
In 2021, TRAIL celebrated fifteen years of preserving technical reports and making them accessible. Here is the video and logo from that year.
Media Contact: Laura Sare lsare AT tamu.edu
TRAIL statistics are updated every six months, generally in January and July. Some statistics reported below are for the most recent six months, while others are cumulative.
The statistics below are current as of March 17, 2024.
Number of TRAIL reports available in the HathiTrust Digital Library |
66,195 |
Number of TRAIL items available in the University of North Texas Digital Library |
32,509 |
Total Reports/Items in Repositories |
124,865 |
Total Reports/Items Available |
98,704 |
1,469 | |
Usage of TRAIL content held at the University of North Texas [84] |
192,753 |
2,096 |
|
1,576 |
59 |
|
14 |
Number of reports processed
The number of reports that have been processed and counted in one of TRAIL's repositories. Processed reports may not be publicly available.
Total Reports/Items Available
The combined number of reports (from each TRAIL repository) that are available for public view.
Usage of UNT-located TRAIL content
The number of uses of the TRAIL items stored in the University of North Texas (UNT) Digital Library. It is not yet technically possible to provide similar usage statistics for the TRAIL content stored in the HathiTrust Digital Library, TRAIL’s other digitization/preservation partner.
Number of TRAIL search interface sessions
The number of times individual IP/browser combinations accessed the TRAIL search interface for up to 30 minutes.
Number of TRAIL search interface users
The number of individual IP/browser combinations that access the TRAIL search interface.
Current members of the TRAIL Steering Committee:
Laura Sare, Chair 2023-2025
Data Librarian
Texas A&M University
Zac Painter, Vice-Chair / Chair-Elect 2023-2025
Head, Terman Engineering Library
Stanford University
Marie Waltz, ex officio
Head of Access Initiatives and Collections Care
Center for Research Libraries
Jason Burton, Treasurer 2022-2024, Collections Working Group Coordinator, 2023-2025
Science Collections Librarian
University of California, Los Angeles
Monica Carrol, Membership Working Group Coordinator 2023-2025
Engineering & Physical Sciences Librarian
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Mel DeSart, Appointed At-Large Member 2023-2024
Head, Engineering Librarian and Head, Mathematics Research Library
University of Washington
Jesse Garrison, Secretary 2022-2024
Science and Technology Librarian
Iowa State University
Teresa Hazen, Processing Working Group Coordinator 2022-2024
Head, Collection Services Department
University of Arizona
Jen Kirk, Metrics Working Group Coordinator 2022-2024
Government Information Librarian
Utah State University
Kari Kozak, Communications Working Group Co-Coordinator 2022-2024
Director, Lichtenberger Engineering Library
University of Iowa
Lisa Nickum, Past-Chair 2023-2025
Systems Discovery Librarian
Colorado School of Mines
Amy Van Epps, Communications Working Group Co-Coordinator 2022-2024
Director of Sciences and Engineering Services
Harvard University
Sinai Wood, Appointed At-Large Member 2023-2024
Government Documents Librarian
Baylor University
The TRAIL widget is a search box that can be added to your LibGuides or webpages allowing users to search the TRAIL archive easily. It brings the search interface to your users!
Librarians using Springshare’s LibGuides software are familiar with the availability of many search widgets and the customization features available.
Example of the TRAIL Widget used in a Technical Report LibGuide at Iowa State University [87].
The TRAIL Widget Code can be found on the right side of the TRAIL LibGuide [88].
If you need technical assistance regarding this widget, contact Norma Dowell at njdowell@iastate.edu [89].
The TRAIL Search Interface is the free search engine for finding TRAIL digitized content: http://www.technicalreports.org/trail/search/ [39]. Please feel free to add this link to any guides, webpages, or instructional material where it would be useful.
Series information can be found on our Series Processing Inventories Guide [25]. This guide also lists information on the reports we need in order to complete our work on various series.
Links
[1] https://www.crl.edu/grn/trail/member-list
[2] http://www.hathitrust.org/preservation
[3] http://www.library.unt.edu/digital-projects-unit/software-and-processes
[4] http://www.technicalreports.org
[5] http://www.lib.umich.edu/michigan-digitization-project
[6] http://www.hathitrust.org/
[7] mailto:trail@crl.edu
[8] https://www.crl.edu/grn/trail/about-trail/steering-committee
[9] https://www.crl.edu/grn/trail/working-groups
[10] http://www.ala.org
[11] http://www.asee.org
[12] https://www.crl.edu/
[13] http://www.gwla.org
[14] http://www.lindahall.org
[15] https://www.ala.org/rt/godort/2010-award-winners
[16] https://trailguides.crl.edu/series/marc
[17] https://www.crl.edu/trail-metrics
[18] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7l5ZYaWdkyg
[19] https://www.crl.edu/grn/
[20] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20participant%20agreement%20May%202022.pdf
[21] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL_individual_participant_agreement_0.pdf
[22] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/FAQs.pdf
[23] https://www.crl.edu/grn/trail/current-activities/series-list
[24] https://www.hathitrust.org/technology
[25] http://trailguides.crl.edu/series
[26] https://www.crl.edu/grn/trail/working-groups/collections-working-group
[27] http://www.technicalreports.org/
[28] https://www.crl.edu/grn/trail/about-trail/acknowledgements
[29] http://www.hathitrust.org/copyright
[30] http://www.hathitrust.org/help_digital_library#Download
[31] https://www.crl.edu/grn/trail/about-trail/trail-tools
[32] https://www.facebook.com/pages/Technical-Report-Archive-Image-Library-TRAIL/74862316717
[33] http://twitter.com/TRAILTechReport
[34] http://digital.library.unt.edu/search/?q=TRAIL&fq=untl_collection%3ATRAIL&t=fulltext
[35] https://trailguides.crl.edu/series/gapfill
[36] http://www.oclc.org/
[37] http://digital.library.unt.edu/explore/collections/TRAIL/browse/
[38] https://www.crl.edu/grn/trail/about-trail
[39] http://www.technicalreports.org/trail/search/
[40] https://www.crl.edu/grn/trail/contact-trail
[41] https://www.crl.edu/grn/trail/about-trail/benefits-of-participation
[42] https://www.crl.edu/grn/trail/about-trail/how-join-trail
[43] http://www.usgovernmentmanual.gov
[44] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Infographic2019.pdf
[45] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20FY2020%20Infographic_0.pdf
[46] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/2021_TRAIL_Infographic.pdf
[47] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20FY2022%20Infographic.pdf
[48] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Winter%202024%20Newsletter.pdf
[49] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Autumn%202023%20Newsletter.pdf
[50] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Summer%202023%20Newsletter.pdf
[51] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Spring%202023%20Newsletter.pdf
[52] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Winter%202023%20Newsletter.pdf
[53] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Autumn%202022%20Newsletter.pdf
[54] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Summer%202022%20Newsletter.pdf
[55] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Spring%202022%20Newsletter.pdf
[56] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Autumn%202021%20Newsletter.pdf
[57] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Summer%202021%20Newsletter.pdf
[58] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Spring%202021%20Newsletter.pdf
[59] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Winter%202021%20Newsletter.pdf
[60] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Summer%202020%20Newsletter.pdf
[61] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Autumn%202020%20Newsletter.pdf
[62] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAILbrochure2018color.pdf
[63] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAILBrochure2018white.pdf
[64] https://twitter.com/TRAILTechReport
[65] http://www.facebook.com/pages/Technical-Report-Archive-Image-Library-TRAIL/74862316717
[66] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technical_Report_Archive_%26_Image_Library
[67] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL_Facebook_1.png
[68] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL_Tweet_1_0.png
[69] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL_Instagram_1.png
[70] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL_Facebook_2.png
[71] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL_Tweet_2_0.png
[72] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL_Instagram_2.png
[73] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL_Facebook_3.png
[74] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL_Tweet_3_0.png
[75] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL_Instagram_3_0.png
[76] https://www.crl.edu/programs/trail
[77] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%20Logo.jpg
[78] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/FINAL%20Logo.tif
[79] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/Trail%20Logo%20Stacked%20-%20white.png
[80] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/Trail%20Logo%20Stacked.png
[81] https://www.crl.edu/sites/default/files/attachments/pages/TRAIL%4015FINALB.jpg
[82] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7l5ZYaWdkyg&feature=youtu.be
[83] https://www.crl.edu/trail-metrics#num-of-report
[84] https://www.crl.edu/trail-metrics#usage-of-unt-content
[85] https://www.crl.edu/trail-metrics#num-of-search-session
[86] https://www.crl.edu/trail-metrics#num-of-search-user
[87] http://instr.iastate.libguides.com/c.php?g=49318&p=318014
[88] https://trailguides.crl.edu/series/home
[89] mailto:njdowell@iastate.edu
[90] http://trailguides.crl.edu/