NHB was formed in 1993 through the amalgamation of the National Archives and Museums. The Board currently has 170,000 digitised artifacts, 1.5 million digitised archival records and 1.6 TB of digitised information. It also manages the individual web sites of various museums and heritage galleries under
its purview.

MyHeritage Portal supports single sign-on access to these resources through NHB's e-services such as the Singapore Family Tree, Singapore Collections Online and Singapore Cultural Resource Online. Users can also discover cultural heritage assets throughout NHB and other government agencies using an enterprise search facility on the portal.

Mr Chua: What we want the portal to do is not just present government information but also collate and present information from the people.

However, unlike "traditional" web sites which tend to feature one-way communication without taking in any feedback or contributions from users, MyHeritage Portal is also about using social networking tools to allow users to co-publish content, said Mr Philip Chua, Chief Information and Technology Officer of NHB's Strategic Technology Office.

"A lot of cultural heritage information comes from the people, for example, from photo albums and traditional games. What we want the portal to do is not just present government information but also collate and present information from the people," said Mr Chua.

Schools and community centres will be encouraged to set up virtual communities to share memories, while NHB museums will contribute exhibition archives. Individual will also be encouraged to contribute personal collections of images, videos, and other artifacts.

On MyHeritage Portal, citizens can log in to use an assortment of community networking services including instant messaging, forums, picture/video sharing, private email, document storage, as well as personal profiling to support special interest groups and to encourage community building. Users can personalise the portal to match their profiles and preferences. They can also choose portlets from "a smorgasboard of cultural heritage content" to populate the personalised site.

According to NHB, MyHeritage Portal is expected to help realise savings mainly through a reduction in the administrative costs of operating NHB's e-services, including content management and manpower costs. This is being achieved through the consolidation of all the individual static web sites and databases into one place so that all the information can be easily accessed through the unified portal.

At the same time, the implementation of MyHeritage Portal is aimed at increasing the public's awareness of NHB's online resources and help from networks of creative communities using the portal to engage with others in the region. A third desired outcome is to improve NHB's profile as a thought leader in the museum IT arena in Asia.

"Potentially all Singapore citizens, residents and overseas friends stand to benefit from the project. The portal's impact is set to grow with the number of users across all age and ethnic groups in Singapore," said Mr Chua.