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The purpose of this article is to provide a comprehensive literature review on the utilisation of intelligent agent technology in the library environment.

Research papers since 1990 on the use of various intelligent agent technologies in libraries are divided into two main application areas: digital library (DL), including agent‐based DL projects, multi‐agent architecture for DLs, intelligent agents for distributed heterogeneous information retrieval and agent support to information search process in DLs; and services in traditional libraries, including user interface for library information systems, automatic reference services and multi‐agent architecture for library services. For each paper on the topic, its new ideas or models, referred work, analyses, experiments, findings and conclusions are addressed.

The majority of the literature covers DLs and there have been fewer studies about services in traditional libraries. A variety of architecture, framework and models integrating agent technology in library systems or services are proposed, but only a few have been implemented in the practical environment. The application of agent technology is still at the research and experimentation stage. Agent technology has great potential in many areas in the library context; however it presents challenges to libraries that want to be involved in its adoption.

The survey has practical implications for libraries, librarians and computer professionals in developing projects that employ intelligent agent technology to meet end‐users' expectations as well as to improve information services within limited resources in library settings.

The paper provides a comprehensive survey on the development and research of intelligent agents in libraries in literature.

The purpose of this paper is to envision the benefits of applying the Instant Messaging (IM) paradigm in pervasive computing environments. With IM in such an environment, all smart entities, human or not, can interact using IM as the unified interface. To realize this vision, the design of a Smart Instant Messaging (SIM) system is proposed, which features context‐aware presence management, user‐centric resource configuration, and adaptive grouping.

Three prototype versions of a client have been implemented and their performance in terms of memory usage and response time evaluated.

The SIM system was found to transcend current IM products by having new features including context‐aware presence management, user‐centric resource configuration, and adaptive grouping support.

The system described here extends the Jabber‐based IM framework and relies on an ontology‐based supporting middleware to handle the chore of retrieving and interpreting contextual information.

This paper aims to explore how digital technologies can transform the museum into an “interaction platform” able to play a key role in the value co-creation processes of the tourism destination.

The paper applies the “co-creation through interactions” perspective by Ramaswamy and Ozcan. Empirically, the paper is based on the methodology of single case study identified in MArTA, the well-known National Archeological Museum of Taranto (South Italy). Data collection has been implemented through interviews with key informants and secondary data related to online interviews, press release and reports.

Findings provide empirical evidence about the contribution that a digitalization strategy can create a “museum as a platform” in which the interactions between the museum, its stakeholders and other co-creation elements (interfaces, artifacts and processes) bring benefits in terms of tourism experiences and sustainable development of the destination.

This research highlights the cultural changes and the actions that museum management has to implement to properly benefit from digitalization and to transform the museum into a reference point for reflection and innovation.

Elements of originality can be found in (1) the exploration of the wide spectrum of benefits and innovations that digital technologies can offer to the museum-mediated interactions and (2) the contribution to the understanding of the museum as a digitalized “interaction platform” capable of supporting the processes of co-creation of value in the complex network of actors and objects of a tourism destination.

This paper aims to review current developments that have been initiated to meet the challenges of the information society.

The approach takes the form of a general review and survey of selected research and development (R&D) topics.

The paper illustrates the multi‐ and trans‐disciplinary nature of cybernetics, systems and management sciences.

The choice of reviews provides an awareness of the current trends in these areas of endeavour.

The reviews are selected from a global database and give a studied assessment of present‐day R&D initiatives.

Cultural heritage archives rely on environmental monitoring devices, such as dataloggers or more complex networked systems, to ensure collection preservation through collecting temperature, humidity, light and/or air quality measures. Existing systems are often costly, inflexible and do not use a modern, internet of things (IoT) approach. This paper aims to determine the suitability of currently popular general-purpose IoT devices, standards and technologies to the environmental monitoring needs of archivists, as well as identify any challenges.

This paper describes an exploratory study detailing the design, construction and usability testing of a do-it-yourself datalogger and data dashboard system, which seeks to manage previously identified trade-offs in cost, required technical skill and maintainability.

The environmental monitoring system presented met archivists’ needs well and was generally noted to be easy-to-use, efficient and an improvement on existing systems. This suggests that an IoT approach can support archivists’ needs in this area.

Potential limitations of this study include lack of archival staff with sufficient technical training to maintain such a system and the rapid pace of IoT evolution yielding unstable and constantly changing technologies.

The system design presented in this work provides a blueprint for cultural heritage organizations desiring a fuller-featured, lower cost environmental monitoring system for archival collections.

This research takes a novel user-centered, open-source, IoT approach to construct an environmental monitoring system that is designed directly from archivists’ requirements and is extensible for future needs.

Past e‐service research has largely concentrated on customer responses to online retailers. The present study sheds light on the determinants of customer loyalty to a content‐based service, a healthcare Web site. Content‐based service providers must build a loyal customer base in order to attract advertisers and sponsors. Lack of trust has been one of the most important reasons for consumers not adopting online services involving financial exchanges, but trust appears to be equally important to exchanges that require divulging sensitive information, such as health issues. Results reveal that loyalty to the health site is satisfaction‐driven, but that trust is the main antecedent of satisfaction. Need fulfilment, responsiveness, security and technical functionality of the Web site are shown to influence trust. Managerial implications are provided.

Traditional evacuation drill is monotonous. Therefore, evacuation drill should be diversified to get more people interested in disaster prevention. Our idea is game-based evacuation drill using real world edutainment (RWE). This paper aims at clarifying how RWE-based evacuation drill is realized.

RWE provides experiential learning as the integration of edutainment and the real world. An RWE system works on a tablet PC and presents digital contents associated with learning scenes (e.g. real world locations) according to a branched storyline.

Story (branched storyline), indirect/direct competition, and augmented reality content provide multi-ending and flexible instructional support and are helpful for diversifying evacuation drill.

RWE-based evacuation drill could be accepted by more people, but a branched storyline should be carefully refined to achieve maximum effect.

RWE-based evacuation drill could open up diversification of disaster prevention education.

The originality of this study is to integrate edutainment, the real world, and evacuation drill. In the long run, this study could be helpful to save lives when a natural catastrophe (e.g. large earthquake) occurs.