We have developed an information sharing system for databases. Today, it is difficult to select appropriate databases which satisfy users' needs and to grasp available databases, because a lot of various databases are available. We classified information about databases into two categories. One is fundamental information which has enough information for users to select databases depending on their own needs. We designed 21 items as fundamental information and have developed the system where users are able to browse and add fundamental information. Another information is auxiliary information, which is comprised of users' know-how and/or grouping information from various viewpoints etc. In our system users are able to browse and add auxiliary information. We have used 3,614 records of databases in Japan, derived from Database Daicho Souran, as a sample data set of our system. The system allows users share information about databases, easily discover suitable databases and use them.

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　Objectives: To elucidate the medical investigators' view on the recognition of structured abstracts, their advantages, and their adoption by medical journals published by Japanese societies. Methods: A questionnaire consisting of 6 major items and 24 minor items was sent to medical investigators in Japan in June 2003, and the replies came from 129 of them (valid reply rate: 43%). Statistical tests were used to compare the view on structured abstracts among different groups in the responders. Results: Of the 129 responders, 101 (78.3%) knew structured abstracts, and 96 (74.4%) accepted affirmatively them as their readers. Sixty-six (51.2%) replied that they themselves had ever submitted using a structured abstract. Adoption of structured abstracts by Japanese medical journals was expected to spread by 79 respondents (61.2%). The usefulness of structured abstracts was more highly perceived by investigators in clinical research than by those in basic medical research, and more highly by investigators who had submitted using a structured abstracts than those who never had. Conclusions: A preference for structured abstracts over traditional ones was confirmed by Japanese medical investigators. Structured abstracts are expected to become increasingly adopted by medical journals in Japan.

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　Now, EAD, Encoded Archival Description and EAC, Encoded Archival Context are known as de-facto International Standard of archival electronic finding aids. This article surveys the path to application experiment of EAD and EAC for the Japanese archives. And it shows the possibility of EAD and EAC that the use of XML clarifies. As a result, we will realize the following: The archival data constructed along EAD/EAC function as not only the finding aids but also basic information resources or "real" archival descriptions. Those data will be variously reused with the aid of elementary XML technology.

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　We present an outline of our developing database system of priests in Heian and Kamakura Periods, and then, we report an activity over the last year in which we attempt to display the genealogical tables using SVG. In developing the database system, we have focused on (1) how to register and retrieve literature information, (2) how to register and retrieve person information, (3) how to find and display the human relationship between two persons, and (4) how to make up genealogical trees. By using this system, the re-searchers can register, search, and browse the records efficiently, while they will find novel human relationships behind the genealogical trees. In contrast to the expectations, the displayed genealogical tables have some problems and limitations due to the implementation with Java. To make the tables easy to read and use, we consider and partially implement the visualization system with SVG. We attempt to realize the representation of Chinese characters by embedding the glyph data in the generated SVG files.

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