Copyright was not expected to be a problem as it is the established policy of the European Commission to encourage re-use of its copyright material. Reproduction of most publications, except for commercial purposes, is freely allowed, provided that the source is acknowledged. The one restriction, that texts taken from the Official Journal and the COM Documents series must not be in facsimile, means that we cannot use PDF format for the documents. Economic and monetary union, regional policy, agriculture and fisheries are the next policies we will cover. A frames-based interface, with one frame for navigation buttons and the other for the texts, facilitates movement between the various sections of Eurotext which include texts of documents, search options, links to other Internet resources and project information.
Students generally like the interface.
While the number of texts available is growing at a steady rate, the interface is in the process of development and project staff have benefited considerably from the input of users. Focus groups of students are the principal ways in which the appearance, content and user-friendliness of the database are being assessed. Further work is needed on both the keyword and bibliographic searches as some students have either found them confusing or are not confident about the results of their searches. A structured Help section is now being developed. Further evaluation activities will involve librarians in assessing the potential value of Eurotext in the context of other electronic resources available for European studies, and academics in assessing whether there is evidence, in students' work, of educational benefit.