Abstract
D. Litt. et Phil.
Today, more and more organisations are adopting the use of the Internet and webbased
technologies in the management of and provision of access to information
and knowledge resources and services in digital formats. However, it appears that
innovative use of the web is more pronounced in corporate organisations. For
example, corporate organisations are using portals or sophisticated websites to
conduct electronic commerce via the web and provide access to both internal and
external information resources and services, accessed via the Internet, intranets,
and extranets. The view of the researcher is that innovative use of the Internet and
web-based technologies, such as portals, should not be the domain of the corporate
world alone.
The focus of this thesis is, therefore, to establish the potential application
possibilities of portals in other types of organisations, especially agricultural
research organisations in the Southern African Development Community (SADC)
region. The main research problem addressed in this thesis was What is the nature
and application possibility of agricultural information portals in the provision of webbased,
value-added information services for researchers?
To address the above research problem, literature relating to the historical
development of the Internet and the World Wide Web, intranet and extranet
applications in organisations, as well as portals and their applications, was
reviewed. In addition, a study was made of international trends regarding the
provision of access to digital agricultural information resources and services via the
web, and a questionnaire survey was conducted to establish whether it was
necessary to use portals to provide access to digital-based agricultural information
resources and services in agricultural research organisations in the SADC region.
ii
Resulting from the literature reviews, the study of websites of international
agricultural organisations, and the survey on the need for portals in agricultural
research organisations in the SADC region, the study established that:
· There are several potential applications of portals in agricultural research
organisations. This led to the definition of the nature and major components
of the type of portal that could serve the needs of researchers in agricultural
research organisations.
· There is a need for portals in agricultural research organisations in the SADC
region. The current use of the web in these organisations in the region is
largely limited to the development of brochureware types of websites,
providing access to information contained in the organisations’ brochures.
Therefore, there is need to upgrade from basic Web sites to advanced sites
or portals, and the study concluded that in this regard there is a need for
clear guidelines to assist agricultural research organisations to plan the
deployment of their information portals. Currently, most organisations are
using ad hoc approaches when developing their Web sites.
The dissertation, furthermore, develops the definition of an agricultural information
portal as a web-based application that is accessed via the intranet or extranet and
provides a personalised and adaptive interface that enables agricultural researchers
to discover, track, and interact with colleagues and other people, software
applications, information resources, services and tools relevant to their research
interests and work.
Taking into account the major components and definition of an agricultural
information portal, the study proposes guidelines for use in planning the deployment
of portals in agricultural research organisations. The proposed guidelines are
independent of specific portal design or development methodology, application
domains, and techniques.