Communications - note In 30 editions of 36.

three major data centers - which provide colocation, telecommunications, cloud services, and content ecosystems - compete to be called the world's biggest in terms of physical space occupied:

no. 1. - a data farm in Langfang, Hebei Province, China, identified as the Range International Information Group, claims to be the largest with 585,000 sq m (6.3 million sq ft),

• no. 2. - a data farm in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, known as the Switch SuperNAP data center, comes in second with over 325,000 sq m (3.5 million sq ft);
• it intends to expand to over 1.615 million sq m (17.4 million sq ft) by 2020,

• no. 3. - a data farm in Ashburn, Virginia, USA, referred to as the DFT Data Center, is a transit point for 70% of the world's Internet traffic;
• it includes 150,000 sq m (1.6 million sq ft) spread out over six separate buildings

• one of the largest and most famous libraries in the ancient world was the Great Library of Alexandria in Egypt (founded about 295 B.C., it may have survived in some form into the 5th century A.D.);
• seeking to resurrect the great center of learning and communication, the Egyptian Government in 2002 inaugurated the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, an Egyptian National Library on the site of the original Great Library, which commemorates the original archive and also serves as a center of cultural and scientific excellence

• the University of al-Quarawiyyin Library in Fez is recognized as the oldest existing, continually operating library in the world, dating back to A.D. 859;
• among its holdings are approximately 4,000 ancient Islamic manuscripts (2018)

• Ascension Island hosts one of four dedicated ground antennas that assist in the operation of the Global Positioning System (GPS) navigation system (the others are on Diego Garcia (British Indian Ocean Territory), Kwajalein (Marshall Islands), and at Cape Canaveral, Florida (US));
• South Africa maintains a meteorological station on Gough Island in the Tristan da Cunha archipelago

has an automated meteorological station

has one or more meteorological stations on each possession

Diego Garcia hosts one of four dedicated ground antennas that assist in the operation of the Global Positioning System (GPS) navigation system (the others are on Kwajalein (Marshall Islands), at Cape Canaveral, Florida (US), and on Ascension Island (Saint Helena, Ascension, and Tristan da Cunha))

• the Austrian National Library contains important collections of the Imperial Library of the Holy Roman Empire and of the Austrian Empire, as well as of the Austrian Republic;
• among its more than 12 million items are outstanding holdings of rare books, maps, globes, papyrus, and music;
• its Globe Museum is the only one in the world

• the Vatican Apostolic Library is one of the world's oldest libraries, formally established in 1475, but actually much older;
• it holds a significant collection of historic texts including 1.1 million printed books and 75,000 codices (manuscript books with handwritten contents);
• it serves as a research library for history, law, philosophy, science, and theology;
• the library's collections have been described as "the world's greatest treasure house of the writings at the core of Western tradition"

• the British Library claims to be the largest library in the world with well over 150 million items and in most known languages;
• it receives copies of all books produced in the UK or Ireland, as well as a significant proportion of overseas titles distributed in the UK;
• in addition to books (print and digital), holdings include: journals, manuscripts, newspapers, magazines, sound and music recordings, videos, maps, prints, patents, and drawings (2018)

note 1: The Library of Congress, Washington DC, USA, claims to be the largest library in the world with more than 167 million items (as of 2018); its collections are universal, not limited by subject, format, or national boundary, and include materials from all parts of the world and in over 450 languages; collections include: books, newspapers, magazines, sheet music, sound and video recordings, photographic images, artwork, architectural drawings, and copyright data

note 2: Cape Canaveral, Florida, USA, hosts one of four dedicated ground antennas that assist in the operation of the Global Positioning System (GPS) navigation system (the others are on Ascension (Saint Helena, Ascension, and Tistan da Cunha), Diego Garcia (British Indian Ocean Territory), and at Kwajalein (Marshall Islands)

automatic weather stations on many of the isles and reefs relay data to the mainland

Kwajalein hosts one of four dedicated ground antennas that assist in the operation of the Global Positioning System (GPS) navigation system (the others are at Cape Canaveral, Florida (US), on Ascension (Saint Helena, Ascension, and Tristan da Cunha), and at Diego Garcia (British Indian Ocean Territory))

satellite-based local phone service and broadband Internet connections available in all homes