Archive - Historical Material

The communications protocol developed for interlibrary loan within the Open System Interconnection framework was developed for the business model for interlending in the 1980s. After the Interlibrary Loan Application Standards received official ISO approval in 1992, a limited number of protocol-conformant ILL message management systems were developed in Canada and Europe.

In the mid-1990s, work began on a second generation of protocol implementations, spearheaded by the North American Interlibrary Loan and Document Delivery (NAILDD) project's ILL Protocol Implementors' Group (IPIG). IPIG participants found that changes in communications technology and the explosion of interlending on global scale required an expansion of the business model on which the protocol had been based. IPIG acts as the de facto Advisory Group for the ISO Interlibrary Loan Application Standards Maintenance Agency (ILL ASTHMA). As work progresses on implementations of new ILL message management systems, implementors identify aspects of the protocol where changes are required in response to new telecommunications technology and the globalisation of the interlending services.

This paper will examine several areas where these changes are impacting on the implementation of the Protocol and address how the Maintenance Agency plans to ensure that the ILL Protocol specifications evolve to meet the messaging systems requirements in this new era of interlending and document supply.