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The engineering programs at Texas A&M University have a longstanding reputation for excellence, and the engineering collection developed by the Sterling C. Evans Library plays a key role in supporting and maintaining that quality.

The purpose of this paper is to encourage librarians to become involved in the development of emerging technology standards.

Large amounts of data are accumulating, both in corporations and on the web. New methods of structured information retrieval are under development to help manage and access this information. Librarians, preoccupied with changes internal to the institution of the library, have not been active participants in this process, although they have much needed expertise in this area. Several important standards bodies are profiled.

While the web continues to be a public information space, its guardians will need to concern themselves with some of the same issues with which libraries and librarians always have been concerned. If librarians want to have a say in how the web develops, they will need to learn to speak the same language as those who currently determine the policy and direction of the web.

It will be useful for understanding current trends in structured information. Several pointers to continued research are indicated.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the current use of topic maps in the library field, how they might be integrated into the ILS structure and some of the inherent challenges in trying to transform MARC data.

A review of available literature was conducted as well as e‐mail interviews with researchers and vendors in the field. An introduction to some of the basic concepts quickly leads into a recap of some of the possibilities that have been tried with this technology in the library field. Specific examples of the use of the XML standard XTM are given as well as some theoretical possibilities discussed. Finally some thought is given to where this technology will fit into the ILS.

The paper finds that more work needs to be done by vendors and libraries in structuring data to allow for easier transformation.

This study was a limited overview. The lack of training materials and software make topics maps have an unnecessarily high barrier to entry.

This paper points a way for further research and a need for basic tools and training geared towards the library community.

This paper attempts to address some of the potential and challenges associated with using topic maps in a library environment, especially as part of an ILS.