Having had more recent experience with the AGI, and other Hispanic archives,
than many I thought I'd repeat and expand on my reply to J. Luis Salvador on
the accessibility of the AGI via internet or modem.
 
      The AGI is, to the best of my knowledge, not accessible via modem or
internet and according to an interview I had with the Director about two
years ago had no plans to provide access. The AGI did plan on providing
access to documents that have been scanned into the computer files in Seville
with an outlet at the Archivo Historico Nacional in Madrid but at that time
that was the only outlet (other than in the AGI) under consideration.
 
     There at least two repositories with major holdings of colonial Hispanic
material that are currently provided computer related access to documents.
 Their approach is somewhat different.
 
      The intention of the AGI is to ultimately access all its holdings only
through computers.  Documents are being scanned and provided with an
abstract.  The abstracts is accessible through a boolian search procedure.
 Given the huge size of the collections at the AGI one should not expect to
find all documents to be accessible in this manner in the very near future.
 An important criteria for scanning has been use, those documents most often
requested by investigators are the ones given greatest priority.  Often this
means that the earliest documents are scanned first.  Secondly, and most
useful, Americas related documents at other Spanish national repositories
(especially the Archivo General de Simancas and the Archivo Historico
Nacional in Madrid) are being scanned so that they will be accessible in
Seville.  The investigator should be cautioned that again, only the most
often used Americas documents at these other repositories have been or are in
the process of being scanned.  In terms of use, it can be much easier to read
scanned documents (the process can be manipulated to remove ink blots etc.)
and obtaining photocopies of selected documents is certainly much faster.  On
the other hand it can be (depending upon the nature of the search) much
faster and more rewarding to search actual boxes of documents rather use
scanned documents on a computer.  Turning pages on a computer screen is
slower than turning them in real life and the prepared abstracts can omit the
information sought by the investigator.
 
     The other major repository engaged in providing computer access is the
AGN in Mexico City.  Here the focus is on providing abstracts, on the
expediente (document) level, of documents in its holdings for the colonial
period.  This data is accessible via a boolian search on a CD-ROM  that
available for sale at the archive.   As of about a year ago they had somewhat
more than half of the colonial documents accessible in this manner.  Because
some colonial documents are mixed with more recent material appear to be
excluded at this time, I don't expect that they will achieve with the current
project more than a catalogue of about 98% of their colonial holdings.  But
within these limits the catalogue is very useful.  And this is a catalogue
that one can buy and take home.
 
           L. H. Feldman