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Chronicle

  • April 2021
    Comprehensive relaunch: The Digital Collections of the MDZ have been completely renewed. With contemporary and innovative technology, responsive design and extensive accessibility.

  • April 2020
    Rapid increase in use of the MDZ's digital services as a result of the Corona lockdown.

  • June 2019
    digiPress now comprises more than 7.8 million digitized newspaper pages.

  • February 2018
    By relaunching the 'Digital Collections East Asia' more than 2 million single images from Chinese, Japanese and Korean manuscripts and prints are conveniently available online via the Mirador Viewer based on the IIIF standard.

  • June 27, 2017
    The Bavarian State Library celebrates the 20th anniversary of its Munich DigitiZation Center.

  • March 2017
    Online launch of the service 'Digital Collections of the Bavarian State Library in IIIF Standard', which is intended to gradually present all copyright-free digital copies in a IIIF-compliant manner.

  • April 2016
    digiPress, the newspaper portal of the Bavarian State Library, goes online.

  • August 2015
    Release of the app 'First editions of German classics' which includes some masterpieces of German literature.

  • May 2015
    Participation of the BSB with the MDZ in the International Image Interoperability (IIIF) consortium and development of a technical IIIF infrastructure.

  • December 2013
    The number of digitized works published online exceeds 1 Million. Most frequently represented are works from the 19th century (357,000), followed by the 18th century (273,000), the 17th century (130,000) and the 16th century (98,000).

  • April 16, 2013
    The portal 'bavarikon - culture and knowledge treasures of Bavaria', which was developed in record time, goes online: 1st regional portal with the presentation of photo-realistic 3D objects. Bavarikon is the Internet portal of the Free State of Bavaria for the presentation of art, culture and knowledge from institutions in Bavaria. Archives, libraries and museums as well as institutions of state administration, monument preservation and science are involved.

  • March 2013
    The amount of preserved files excceeds the number of one billion. The archive contains 1,034,200,065 files (476 TB) so far.

  • February 2013
    Data Seal of Approval for the Library Archiving and Access System BABS.

  • 2012
    Start of the web archiving of the BSB: websites of the Bavarian authorities, with a regional reference to Bavaria (Bavarica), scientific websites in the collection focus of the BSB (music, Eastern Europe, history and antiquities) are archived semi-annually.

  • October 6, 2012
    Under the motto 'SOS for Pergament, Paper & Bytes', the Bavarian State Library is hosting the 8th National Day of Action for the Conservation of Cultural Heritage. The event takes place in cooperation with partners such as the Bavarian Central State Archives, the Munich City Archives, the Associacion of Book Binders and several commercial providers of innovative scanning technology.

  • 2011-2013
    Development of an innovative image-based similarity search in cooperation with the Fraunhofer Institute for Telecommunications (Heinrich Hertz Institute).

  • 2010
    The first app off the BSB, 'Famous Books - Treasures of the Bavarian State Library', becomes available for free. It presents most precious piecesfrom the rich holdings of the BSB. More apps will follow in the next few years.

    Integration of the Rosetta long-term preservation system from ExLibris/Proquest, operated centrally from the Bavarian Library Network for the BSB and the Bavarian university and college libraries, into the BABS library archiving and access infrastructure.

  • January 2009
    Online launch of the 'Verkündungsplattform Bayern', the central mouthpiece for the electronic announcement of the official gazettes of the Bavarian State Government. The MDZ is responsible for operating the publication platform and – together with the LRZ – for the long-term preservation of all publications.

  • October 11, 2008
    The first open day since five years: Many visitors drop to visit the MDZ and the Scan Center.

  • June 18-20, 2008
    Scan-Robot-Days at the Bavarian State Library: The four leading manufacturers of fully automatic scanning systems show their latest devices to a large international audience at the invitation of the MDZ and the Institute for Book Restoration.

  • June 2008
    BSB is 'Library of the Year 2008'. The jury of the German Library Association (Deutscher Bibliotheksverband e. V.) cites as reasons for the award esp. the consistent expansion of the MDZ into a service and technology provider and the development of sustainable long-term preservation models. Festive award ceremony on 24 October of the year.

  • January 2008
    In just one year, the total data stock doubled to 25.1 million files (49.9 TeraByte).

  • July 2007
    Start of the DFG-funded project VD16 digital: Digitization of the total stock of 16th century prints published in the German language area (approx. 7,230,000 book pages). World premiere: Use of scan robotics for the digitization of 16th century prints (huge media response).

  • March 7, 2007
    Start of the public-private partnership with Google. All works digitized by Google are also made available and archived in the Digital Collections of the MDZ.

  • 2007
    On the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the MDZ: Relaunch of the MDZ homepage. Completion of the reorganization of the 'Fotostelle' (photo department) into the fully digital scanning center of the MDZ.

  • February 2007
    Rapid increase of production. The archive exceeds the limit of 15 million files (28 terabytes).

  • December 2006
    Complete hardware migration of the data stock in the long-term archive, caused by the move of the LRZ to its new location in Munich-Garching.

  • Summer 2006
    The MDZ is the largest national retro-digital content provider.

  • July 2006
    The long-term archive exceeds the limit of 10 million files (15 terabytes).

  • 2005
    Start of the project 'Long-term Preservation of e-Publications' to establish the organizational and technical infrastructure for the long-term preservation of the BSB, the 'Library Archiving and Access System' BABS.

    Evaluation of the MDZ by the German Research Foundation with positive result.

  • 2004/2005
    Comprehensive expansion of the MDZ with funding from the Bavarian Ministry of Research. Entry into mass digitization. Establishment of a modern digitization line with high-performance scanners and renewed server infrastructure. Establishment of new workflows and quality standards.

  • 2004
    Relaunch of the Bayerische Landesbibliothek Online as a comprehensive portal for Bavarian regional history.

  • January-March 2004
    Conversion of long-term preservation from CD-ROMs/DVDs to tape storage in cooperation with the Leibniz Supercomputing Centre. Fully automated handling of all archiving processes via ZEND.

  • July 2003
    The Bavarian State Library is founder member of the nestor-initiative, the German Network of expertise in digital long-term preservation.

  • 2003
    Implementation of a central technical infrastructure for digitization (ZEND).

  • 1999
    First long-term preservation project (focus on data media), together with the Institute for Software Technology at the University of the German Federal Armed Forces (Universität der Bundeswehr).

  • 1997-2003
    Realization of numerous small and several large digital projects (including German Reichstag Session Reports 1867-1943), which were partly implemented with own scanning equipment, partly with the help of digitization service providers. Presentation via the first server of the MDZ (Enterprise 450 and Unix).

  • 1997
    First homepage for the Digital Collections.

  • July 1997
    Foundation of the MDZ with the support of the German Research Foundation (DFG) as part of the funding program 'Retrospective Digitization of Library Holdings' as one of two national competence centers for retro-digitization.