The concept of HowNet is National Knowledge Infrastructure (NKI), which was put forward by the World Bank in 1998. CNKI project is an information construction project aimed at realizing the dissemination, enjoyment and value-added utilization of knowledge resources in the whole society. Initiated by Tsinghua University and Tsinghua Tongfang, it was established in June 1999.
With the strong support of the party and state leaders, the Ministry of Education, Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China, the Ministry of Science and Technology, the General Administration of Press and Publication, the National Copyright Administration and the National Development and Reform Commission, and with the close cooperation of academia, education, publishing and library and information circles, and under the direct leadership of Tsinghua University, CNKI Engineering Group has worked hard for many years.
With self-developed and internationally advanced digital library technology, the "CNKI Digital Library" with the largest full-text information in the world has been built, and the "China Knowledge Resource Library" and the CNKI grid resource sharing platform have been officially launched. Through industrial operation, it provides the richest knowledge information resources and the most effective knowledge dissemination and digital learning platform for the efficient sharing of knowledge resources in the whole society.