Dubai, July 2016: In line with its vision to promote the cultural, literary and artistic scene in the Emirate, Dubai Culture & Arts Authority (Dubai Culture), the dedicated entity for arts, culture and heritage, has announced a new initiative to support the Dubai Public Library Database - a modern and innovative Dubai Library smart application aimed at improving the city’s library services and helping all segments of society to access library books and e-books.

This high-tech application will enable users to easily sign up, renew or cancel memberships of Dubai Public Library, and reserve books, publications, classrooms and multi-purpose halls. The application will also allow subscribers to benefit from an extensive collection of e-books within the library’s ‘Al Manhal’ and ‘Gale’ databases.

The pioneering database Al Manhal empowers users to effectively search for information, and enables researchers and professionals to access a wide range of reference books to gain some of the highest quality library content in the world. In addition, ’Al Manhal’ will provide the ability to search in Arabic for a wide range of periodicals and electronic reports.

The famous reference content database ‘Gale’ will allow the application users access to a large collection of full-text academic articles from leading journals and magazines around the globe. Featuring an inclusive and diverse collection, it comprises a wide range of educational resources available across physical and social sciences, technology, medicine, engineering, arts, literature and many other subjects.

Dubai Culture & Arts Authority’s Director of Dubai Public Library, Fahad Al Mamari said: “Through the launch of this application, we aim to upgrade the performance of Dubai’s public libraries, in line with the Authority’s mandate to support the UAE National Strategy for Reading 2026 and further facilitate the accessibility of knowledge to the public. The new advancement will also support Dubai Public Libraries’ rich portfolio of cultural and educational books through the adoption of the latest technologies and advanced services, which meet the needs of our visitors to reach a vast range of information quickly and effectively.” 

Al Mamari continued: “Dubai Culture has carefully selected and acquired the foremost databases available, in order to provide a public library with a specialized collection of information and knowledge across a variety of topics in both Arabic & English. All of the content for the Al Manhal & Gale databases is subject to a rigorous evaluation process to ensure we deliver thoroughly reliable content based on trusted sources. This process is in line with Dubai public library’s vision to develop services which reach the very highest standards, to provide world-class library resources at local, GCC, and international levels.”   

Dubai public library is keen to enter into partnerships with institutions and other government entities, including through the signing of memorandums of understanding, in order to achieve the vision and goals of Dubai Culture.
 
For more information on Dubai Culture, visit www.dubaiculture.gov.ae or any library branches in Dubai.

For more information on Al Manhal Databases, email us at info@almanhal.com