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The reviews in Choice are known to influence book selection, particularly for academic library collections. An investigation was made of how many books that were reviewed over a seven-year period in Choice Reviews (the CD-ROM version of Choice) were subsequently received or purchased at Cain Library of California State University Dominguez Hills (CSUDH), as well as by a large number of other libraries across the country. All of the books mentioned in Choice Reviews were purchased by one or more libraries, while the majority of books were purchased by several hundred libraries These findings were further tested to determine the extent to which they could be incorporated into an academic approval program. Two notification-slip approval plans were created for new titles from the presses and publisher of the best-received books. Notification-slip titles were searched shortly after they appeared or were profiled by the vendors, and a correlation was found between the later review holdings and these early approval holdings.

An analysis of 205 records selected at random from the OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Inc. Online Union Catalog showed considerable overlap (duplication) among the subject access points provided by the title, subject heading, and classification number fields. Little more than four unique (unduplicated) access points were found, on average, per record. While title and class number fields do add some access points not provided by subject headings, the increase is less than many librarians might have expected. It is suggested that the online catalog might outperform the card catalog more in precision than in recall.

Designed for librarians, Question Master (QM) (at http://purl.org/net/Question_Master) is a decision-support system automating some of the more routine, fact-type reference questions encountered in libraries. A series of Web pages guides librarians through a set of clarifying questions before making recommendations of an appropriate electronic or relevant print resource from WorldCat, the OCLC Online Union Catalog. The goal is to improve the accuracy of reference transactions, which in turn should lead to increased end-user satisfaction. Based on usability studies of QM’s biographical module, this study found that although the system already was easy to use, its usability could be improved in several ways. Its ability to answer questions was 100 percent, with an accuracy rate of 66 percent compared to Weil’s 64 percent accuracy. In addition, QM accuracy was substantially better than most reported studies of real reference environments and certainly better than the Internet results of 20 percent for HotBot and 30 percent for AltaVista.

Responding to the fact that the library community has long recognized the need for improved efficiency and reliability in subject authority control, we explored the feasibility of automatically creating a subject heading validation file by scanning the OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Inc. Online Union Catalog (OLUC). The premises were, first, that although the file would not be exhaustive, it would contain the majority of frequently used headings, and second, the predicted level of accuracy in the file would be high. In approach, we focused on finding the density and distribution of assigned headings and the relationship, if any, between density and error rate. We analyzed a sample file of Library of Congress-assigned headings from the OCLC Subject Headings Corrections database. The results of the study showed that (1) frequency of use and number of headings at a given rate of use are in inverse relationship; (2) a small number of headings with high frequencies of use accounts for a majority of total use, while a large proportion shows very low frequency of use; (3) topical headings account for about two-thirds of assigned headings; and (4) error and obsolescence rates are both low, and both are in inverse relationship to the frequency of heading use. We concluded that an automatically generated subject heading file is indeed feasible. Such a file would be useful for various purposes: to verify subject heading strings constructed by catalogers, to update subject, headings in catalog maintenance, and to validate subject headings during retrospective conversion.

PurposeTo describe the development and versatility of “Bibliotek”, the Norwegian database for national ILDS management.Design/methodology/approachHistorical narrative.FindingsThere has been a poor response by the 1,300 libraries that use the system to enter their ILDS policies on the web site.Practical implicationsHighlights some of the difficulties in building an effective infrastructure for resource sharing both nationally and internationally.Originality/valueLessons to be learnt from one country's attempt to develop an effective infrastructure for ILDS.

Profiles the project OhioLINK which is an online state‐wide project to provide centralized access to bibliographic databases held at different library locations and its subsequent conversion to a World Wide Web site. Discusses the original goals of the project, the design issues and technical limits encountered. Considers future areas for development.

The UK's National Art Library holds a major collection of serials in the fine and applied arts subject areas, and has recently transferred the records for its serials to a computer system. In conjunction with the Art Libraries Society, the NAL is engaged in a project to use these records to create an online union list of the art, architecture and design serials held in a wide range of libraries in the UK and Ireland.

OhioLINK, the ambitious and distinctive network of libraries from over fifty Ohio colleges and universities, is maturing. The year 1997 marks the ten-year anniversary of the “Red Report” from the Ohio Board of Regents to the General Assembly as the state's initial response to its library funding crisis. This year is also the fifth year since the first six libraries were brought online. Building on the linking of individual catalogs to form the Central Catalog of over 6 million titles, OhioLINK has greatly expanded its scope to provide related services economically and efficiently as a way to maximize the state's available resources. This article describes OhioLINK's beginnings, its objectives, the added services it provides, and its future development.

Places present day UK culture and society in a postmodern context and considers their impact on libraries and cataloguing, concentrating specifically on the concepts of globalization and the death of tradition. Moves on to discuss how libraries can continue to provide high quality, structured access to their collections and the need for strategic management of this process. Emphasizes the importance of defining what the library wants to achieve, setting objectives, and maintaining the capacity for flexible response to changing conditions, using as a case study the development and implementation of the British Library cataloguing strategy.

Despite witnessing the enormous success of cooperative cataloging programs in Europe and North America, the libraries in Saudi Arabia and other Arabian Gulf states have made no concerted efforts in initiating similar programs. The author emphasizes the need for cooperation in cataloging—especially of local materials. Due to unavailability of cataloging copy from the Library of Congress and other sources for a high percentage of imprints from Arab countries, and in the absence of bibliographic cooperation, libraries are doing redundant cataloging and thus wasting both time and money. The author reviews the current state of bibliographic cooperation, discusses prospects for further cooperation, and highlights difficulties in cooperation. The author concludes with recommendations that King Fahd National Library develop a national cooperative cataloging program with specific goals, set guidelines, and prepare rules and procedures for participating libraries to contribute in various cooperative cataloging programs in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

A comparative analysis of choice and form of main entry in the monograph cataloging of the Library of Congress (LC) and that of the British Library and the national libraries of Canada and Australia in 1982 and 1989, examining the extent to which LC practice and that of the other agencies was consistent and, when it was not, the apparent reasons for the inconsistency. Part 1 provides a general introduction and background to the study, along with an analysis of broad patterns and patterns affecting the choice of main entry. Part 2 will provide an analysis of patterns affecting the form of main entry headings (personal and corporate names), choice and form of uniform titles and titles proper, and miscellaneous descriptive cataloging elements, as well as overall conclusions and recommendations.

The National Inventory of Documentary Sources in the United States (NIDS-US), produced by Chadwyck-Healey, Inc., provides distribution on microfiche of manuscript collection and archival finding aids, known as registers and inventories. These publications are “tables of contents” to large collections of original documents, which were available from most repositories only on-site or on request. Chadwyck-Healey's on-going publication on microfiche of thousands of registers and inventories from some 300 repositories, with accompanying indexes, has been enhanced by the issuance of compiled indexes to NIDS-US and its companion NIDS-UK on a searchable CD-ROM. The company is now producing ArchivesUSA. which will combine on one CD-ROM the NIDS index, the National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections, and information on the general holdings information about some 4,000 archives and manuscript repositories in the United States. The use of NIDS-US is discussed.

The opportunities afforded by the Internet and online commerce are molding a traditional union catalog project into a publication that, before they became widely available, could not have been conceived. The project, the Image Directory, is creating new alliances between the editorial, production, and marketing departments of Academic Press. It is encouraging image owners, who are providing data for the catalog, to enter into the electronic publishing medium either for the first time or beyond theft own Web pages or CD-ROM productions. Finally, it is also holding out the potential for scholarly benefits, not only to the image owners, but also to students, researchers, and professionals interested in arts images. Whilst the concept of creating a union catalog of information about arts images is not new, without the capabilities offered by electronic publishing the project could not come into existence. Electronic publishing has introduced two significant ingredients to the art museum community that are making this project work. The first is the potential that it offers for the management of image collections. In the era when information about images and art objects was recorded on cards, museums created idiosyncratic vocabularies and formats that were incompatible with those of other museums. Because collections differ and because museums are by nature competitive, vying with each other for unique objects, there were few incentives to combine data. Collections management software and the introduction of standardized vocabularies and controls, such as the Getty' s Art and Architecture Thesaurus, have provided the tools for significant inventory projects.The second is the fear of losing control of data that electronic publishing creates among curators and trustees. With the diminishment of grants and federal funding, museums are coming under increasing pressure to generate revenue. Looking for ways to generate revenue from their assets, they host block-buster exhibitions, sell coffee cups with paintings printed on them, and market themselves in ways that are succeeding in increasing attendance numbers. But electronic publishing and, in particular, the World Wide Web, offer pirates the opportunity to steal high resolution images, violating copyright rules and depriving museums of revenue that would naturally come through the sales of reproduction rights. Along with developments in image watermarking and the new envelope-locking technologies, museums need other ways to mark their assets as their own. The Image Directory directly addresses both of these aspects. The project is based on the information that image owners have already created for their collection management databases. Academic Press will add no new data to those records, but will standardize them so that idiosyncrasies among records are bridged but not erased. Scholars will be able to search the world for the location of and information about images and museums will have a central, definitive source in which to publicise their holdings and to list rights and reproductions information. The Image Directory will offer a leveling factor into the hierarchical world of museums, making records from the largest, best endowed museums equally accessible to those of small ones. And it will offer image owners the ability to sell images through the database architecture, potentially opening a new revenue stream for them. The Image Directory is an excellent example of an electronic publishing project crystallizing social and financial trends. There is every possibility that it will not only facilitate new scholarly discoveries, but it will increase the presence of different types of art in mainstream culture.

Technology does not develop independently of its social context. Rather, it is constituted through the linking of people, practices and places. This paper draws from the current work within the social shaping of technology literature to examine the concepts of boundaries and negotiation inherent in the construction of any socio-technical systems. As case study of the social shaping of the national union catalog (NUC) in four countries...

Summary of Conference Presentation: Midsize academic libraries face many unique challenges, particularly in the greyer areas of collection management. This presentation addresses these challenges faced by libraries in midsize institutions and how they differ from those at larger research institutions. It focuses on the presenters’ study of midsize library attitudes toward retaining or weeding the iconic National Union Catalog, Pre-1956 Imprints and the reasoning behind each. The generations of librarians who used the NUC and other analog sets are passing from the scene in academic libraries, and the incoming digital native librarian knows little or nothing about them. The fate of the NUC is examined. The example of de-selection decisions regarding voluminous paper sets of pre-digital finding aids is also discussed. Ultimately, the presentation aims to discuss the ways in which midsize libraries can find in building midsize library collections, which will balance out the research needs against the demands of limited space and budgets.

This article discusses the metadata records aggregated by the Sheet Music Consortium using the Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting. The consortium's website serves as a union catalog for more than a quarter of a million records, harvested from 27 providers. During a recent period of revision, the consortium decided to experiment with normalizing data and publishing authority data related to sheet music. A pilot project focused on sheet music publishers is discussed and the results are presented.

Outlines the development of the Unity System and the combined regions database. Describes the involvement of eight regional library systems in the Unity Database, and the development plan, including the regional variations made possible by the flexibility of the system. Explains the coverage of the Unity Database, which is based on British Library data, plus the catalogues of member libraries, both public and academic, which provide records for all interlending materials. Includes the Pilot Interlending Project for Share the Vision, which incorporates the National Union Catalogue for Alternative Formats into the Unity Database and is developing a model for interlending of alternative formats. Discusses the role of the Unity System in the future development of interlending in Britain, and its potential application internationally.

It is possible to obtain some insights into searchers’ judgments by using transaction log analysis to associate online catalog search methods with decisions to retrieve location information, The Mainframe Interface to Libraries Online (MILO) is cm interface to the Illinois Library Computer Systems Office online union catalog for 45 academic libraries. MILO provides access to a bibliographic database and directly links to another database with circulation and location records. Because the latter database only provides location and circulation Status, searchers’ decisions to make links to such data are seen as an indication that the records being linked represent potentially useful material, Via a transaction log analysis, the linked location records were associated with the access points used to retrieve them in order to analyze the value and problems of searchers’ uses of specific access points. Transaction logs were analyzed for a 38-day sample of the 1994 logs. Counting records retrieved through the use of multiple access points (making the total greater than 100%), subject fields were used to access over 30%, author fields to access over 19%, and title fields to access over 51 % of all records linked to location information. Other fields were used to retrieve very small percentages of linked records.

Describes the Slovenian co‐operative online bibliographic system and services (COBISS), a development of a shared cataloguing system based on a network of 99 co‐operating libraries and linked with the Institute of Information Science union catalogue (COBIB). Demonstrates how this network of electronic catalogues enables effective online public access and allows co‐ordinated collection development policies and interlending based on the use of electronic mail. Anticipates further development of interlending and document supply functions in the immediate future.

Thc National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (NLS), Library of Congress maintains a union . catalog of braille and recorded books that contains 150,000 bibliographic records representing approximately 15,000,000 copies. These rccords come from many sources, including foreign libraries. This catalog is available on microfiche, as a database on BRS, on CDROM, and as part of the Library of Congress Internet access. The CD-ROM and Internet versions have enabled patrons to use adaptive equipmcnt to find materials on their own. The Library of Congrcss welcomes further listings as long as they are held in a specific location and are available for loan, exchange, or purchase.

In the Netherlands, cooperation among libraries has been common for many years. By sharing a common catalog and collaborating in the interlibrary loan system, libraries have a tradition of working together to give their users better service.

From its small beginnings in 1981 of six pilot users and the National Library of Australia (NLA), the Australian Bibliographic Network (ABN) has grown to be a truly national system, with 1,315 users at May 1995. The National Bibliographic Database has expanded to over 11 million records and 22 million holdings statements. It includes records from the USA, the UK, Canada, New Zealand, Singapore and Vietnam. It has come to be the single union list of holdings of Australian libraries, and the first point of reference for the majority of interlibrary loan transactions. The ABN is seen as both an NLA business and a cooperative undertaking of Australian libraries. Management consists of a Network Committee, which advises the Director General of NLA on all aspects of operation, and a Standards Committee, whose role is to make recommendations to NLA on cataloguing standards for the network. Annual Users' Meetings are held. Since 1987 NLA has been developing a database host for Australian libraries called OZLINE, in parallel with ABN. In 1990 it was decided to go for complete redevelopment using a text retrieval product and an industry standard Relational Database Management System. Following discussions with the National Library of New Zealand, which had indicated broadly similar requirements, it was agreed that the two libraries would jointly seek a system. The Australian service is to be known in future as WORLD 1.

PromptCat is a new service offered by OCLC, in conjunction with monograph materials vendors, that provides libraries with a full bibliographic record from the OCLC Online Union Catalog (OLUC) simultaneous to the supply of materials from a vendor. The library's holdings are set automatically on the OLUC record. Because PromptCat eliminates the need for libraries to do individual title-by-title searching and record selection when materials are received, it will streamline local cataloging activities. It may also provide an impetus for libraries to reevaluate local editing practices and determine whether materials can be processed quickly upon receipt in acquisitions rather than in copy cataloging. This article addresses issues relating to PromptCat, including tests of the service conducted at The Ohio State University (OSU) and Michigan State University (MSU), an estimated cost/benefit analysis based on OSU's approval plan, and issues including coordination between OCLC, materials vendors, system vendors, and the library as well as workflow, organizational implications and staffing issues.

The New Hampshire library community has been involved with statewide multi‐library automation and connectivity initiatives since 1982. In that year, the New Hampshire Library Association appointed an automation task force to look into the possibility of automating the union catalog maintained by the New Hampshire State Library. The task force also recognized the more general objective of strengthening cooperation and communication among New Hampshire libraries. This objective has remained the guiding principle for statewide automation initiatives ever since. Based on the recommendations of the task force, the state legislature enacted legislation in 1983 to establish an automated data processing and information retrieval system and a statewide information network. The system came to be known as the New Hampshire Automated Information System (NHAIS).

The automation of the card catalog and major internal library processes was the paradigm of research libraries’ planning and vision for the period 1970–1990. This vision, of the “automated” library, in which redundant and detailed paper-based processes were converted to electronic form, was the culmination of a set of achievements, the object of which was to make universal bibliographic access a reality. It was an initiative as vast, and as visionary, as the Public Library Movement of the early Twentieth Century, or the great union catalog and interlibrary loan efforts which helped to shape the directions of librarianship in the years before and after the Second World War. Equally important has been the development of the Anglo-American Cataloging Rules which set standards for card catalog production that enabled the union catalog and interlibrary loan initiatives.

Reviews the progress of the Nineteenth‐century Short Title Catalogue project and describes the imminent publication of the final two volumes of the second series. Discusses the plans for the third phase of the project.

Describes the circumstances surrounding, and difficulties in, the publication of the original edition of the Directory of Rare Books and Special Collections in the United Kingdom and Ireland in the early 1970s. Explains the need for a revised edition and describes work in progress to update the information, as well as the problems involved in the revision. Indicates the likely publication schedule of the new edition.

Furthering access to the world's information and reducing information costs are the major goals of Online Computer Library Center, (OCLC) a nonprofit library computer service and research organization based in Dublin, Ohio. OCLC pioneered the computer revolution in libraries in 1971 when it introduced a computer system that enabled libraries to catalog books and order custom-printed catalog cards rapidly and efficiently. Today, OCLC provides a spectrum of services for libraries and their users. OCLC systems in cataloging, interlibrary loan, document delivery, reference, and electronic publishing provide an integrated approach to navigating the sea of knowledge for libraries and their users.

In Finland an integrated network called LINNEA (Library Information Network for Academic Libraries) has been set up to facilitate the automation of academic libraries. The goal of the LINNEA network, with headquarters at the Helsinki University Library, is to become an open national bibliographic resource. The Finnish union library catalogue, called LINDA, was established in 1993. It is based on the catalogues of twenty university libraries, the national bibliographic database Fennica, and Finuc-S (the Finnish Union Catalogue-Serials). At the moment, the LINDA database includes some two million records for monographs and serials. The host of the database is the Helsinki University Library, which is officially the National Library of Finland with a vast range of responsibilities. One of them is the standard numbering of Finnish publications. The 1994 ISSN meeting with the Nordic countries was held in Finland in order to discuss common problems.

Some Library of Congress Subject Headings have the potential to be used for either subject or form/genre access. A selection of LCSH, cognates with terms from Moving image materials: Genre terms, was searched in OCLC's Online Union Catalog to determine the degrees to which they were used for each of these two types of access. It was discovered that the set of "subject headings" under study was used for form/genre access between 6% and 99% of the time, with a mean average of just over 50%. The guidance provided to catalogers by information contained in Library of Congress authority records is also discussed.

Most of the 2,600 libraries in the Netherlands are now automated. Pica, founded as a centre of library automation and networking in 1969, provides services directly to about 500 libraries and indirectly to over 1,600. These comprise central services – a Shared Cataloguing Service, a Union Catalogue with interlibrary facilities, and access to centrally stored reference databases – and services concerned with the development and exploitation of local library systems; Pica has a programme to integrate the central and local systems into a single library network. It is also trying to establish online information services aimed at end users; these include RAPDOC, a system for the supply of journal articles in electronic form. Pica is also involved in the EC-sponsored EDILIBE (Electronic Data Interchange for Libraries and Booksellers in Europe) project, the E-doc project for the development of tools for cataloguing and accessing electronic documents, and the VISAGE project for storing and accessing electronic full colour pictures through local OPACs. Its future strategy assumes the need to expand into other countries, and a start has been made with the German-speaking parts of Europe.

Options in classification available through modern information technologies are explored and discussed in terms of system design options and user searching options. The integrated subject tool will give options for the simultaneous presentation of the types of catalogs desired-dictionary, divided, or classified, as well as the concurrent consultation of multiple classification systems. The problems of electronic union catalogs, including a "virtual union catalog" in particular, are considered and enhancements made possible through classification are explored. The combined system of subject headines and classification is presented as the model of the integrated subject searching tool, which will meet individualized learning styles and user responsive vocabulary. The integrated subject tool box (including classification) for an effective modern subject system is discussed in particular as a searching tool to assist "shelf browsing" of virtual reality (VR) objects.

Many approaches have been taken by different groups to collect, organise, archive, disseminate and preserve electronic resources on Internet. Some projects, such as WebCrawler, Lycos, etc., purport to index or organise the electronic resources automatically. Another approach, led by the Clearinghouse for Subject‐Oriented Internet Resource Guides, involves human intelligence to identify and compile Internet resources by subjects for public access. The third category is the traditional library cataloguing approach. This paper demonstrates the benefits of the MARC formats, the importance of the integration of information resources, and the guarantee of public access as the major reasons for using the traditional cataloguing approach to organise Internet resources. Since cataloguing the Internet is a huge project, and various groups are involved in this process, the roles of each related group are discussed.

The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) Library recently participated in two new “Just-in-Time” acquisitions programs, both of which employed Patron Driven Acquisitions (PDA). The first study was jointly run with the Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois (CARLI) and built on the success of CARLI’s robust resource sharing program. The purpose of this study was to begin to bridge the gap on title availability due to lack of purchase or the in-use status of high-demand materials. UIUC and CARLI worked with YBP to load 16,000 records into the CARLI I-Share union catalog, making these titles available to all the CARLI members’ libraries for easy requesting. This study focused on print books and resulted in the on-demand purchase of 190 books in five weeks; books were rush ordered and delivered to requestors (on average) within three business days. The second study was a local (UIUC) ebook pilot program that provided access to 6,000 ebooks and coincided with the launch of a mobile device web site to facilitate access to full text. Users accessed 677 titles (11% of available titles), prompting the purchase of 238 ebooks in approximately four months. In a time of great budget constraints and yet great expectations for access, libraries can experiment in multiple ways to continue to provide great service.

A Virtual union catalog is a possible alternative to the centralized database of distributed resources found in many library systems. Such a catalog would not be maintained in a single location but would be created in real time by searching each local campus or affiliate library’s catalog through the Z39.50 protocol. This would eliminate the redundancy of record storage as well as the expense of loading and maintaining access to the central catalog. This article describes a test implementation of a virtual union catalog for the University of California system. It describes some of the differences between the virtual catalog and the existing, centralized union catalog (MELVYL). The research described in the paper suggests enhancements that must be made if the virtual union catalog is to become a reasonable service alternative to the MELVYL® catalog. RESUMO Um catalogo de uniao Virtual e uma alternativa possivel para o banco de dados centralizado de recursos distribuidos encontrados em muitos sistemas de bibliotecas. Este catalogo nao seria mantido em um unico local, mas seria criada em tempo real, pesquisando cada campus local ou catalogo da biblioteca da filial atraves do protocolo Z39.50. Isto eliminaria a redundância de armazenamento registro, bem como a custa de carga e manter o acesso para o catalogo central. Este artigo descreve uma implementacao de teste de um catalogo uniao virtual para o University of California sistema. Ela descreve algumas das diferencas entre o catalogo virtual e o existente, catalogo uniao centralizado (MELVYL). A pesquisa descrita no artigo sugere melhorias que devem ser feitas se o catalogo virtual e a uniao para se tornar uma alternativa de servico razoavel para o catalogo ® MELVYL.

In modem, shared computerized cat aloguing, the interrelationship of types of record usage means that the quality of the source bibliographic records, and any changes made to them after initial creation, can affect users, sometimes in significant and unforeseen ways. Reports on a research project, carried out by the UK Office for Library and Information Networking (UKOLN), Bath University, using bibliographic records on the BLCMP Database, to investigate record quality. The tech nique used to measure the quality of the database was a simple count of the number of records edited. Overall, the standard of records available to member libraries in this large shared cataloguing database was found to meet the needs of the majority of member libraries, with records found for approximately 90 per cent of items, and around 80 per cent of the records found, being used without editing. As more libraries automate, and with the increasing ability for users to search catalogues of institu tions other than their own over net works, the quality of retrospectively converted records needs to be addressed.

The current resurgence of cooperative cataloging initiatives requires that the Online Union Catalog (OLUC) search keys evolve to allow more precise searching. OCLC has made great strides recently in ways to search the OLUC (the scan title search being a tremendous improvement). Two recent events, combined with the cooperative cataloging activities, prompt this call for accelerated change in OLUC search mechanisms. Phrase searching, until now not available (the scan search is only partially there), must be brought into existence soon to support and promote the renewed emphasis on cooperative efforts. In doing so, we will all benefit. OCLC will get a more dynamic, cleaner database to market and, increasingly, to repackage and sell. Catalog departments worldwide will have a better source database and have an easier time making greater contributions in cooperative programs. As for the derived search keys, they don′t really need to die – withering from disuse would be fine.

University libraries in Saudi Arabia have wasted much time and money in carrying out automation activities on their own. Four of the seven universities have acquired the same library application software, DOBIS/LIBIS, which has an excellent network capability waiting to be exploited. The paper presents a conceptual model based on the network structure of DOBIS/LIBIS. The infrastructure of the network, for the most part, already exists and can greatly help in the realization of network goals. The King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals Library has the necessary resources and capabilities to become a central node in the network and to host a union catalog of participating libraries.

Three thousand six hundred twenty-four western series fiction titles were checked against OCLC and NUC. Of this number 662, or 18.3% were not found. A further sample of those listed in OCLC revealed that 9.7% of them had not been listed by a library in the United States, 62.2% were listed by fewer than 10 libraries, and 36.7% were listed by public libraries only.

The Internet has provided OCLC with another delivery mechanism to support its chartered public purpose of ex- access to the world's information and reducing rising information costs. This network of networks has helped OCLC and its member libraries reach electronically a new audience of end users with new products and new technologies designed especially for them. OCLC offers three reference products via the Internet: The First - Search Catalog, the EPIC service, and The Online Journal of Current Clinical Trials. All can be accessed using the Internet from an enduser's home, office, dorm room, laboratory, hotel room-or any other location with a modem nearby-as well as from a library. FirstSearch is a new online information service designed for library patrons, with an end-user interface that allows patrons to move through the online search process in just a few simple steps, without special training or online searching experience. The EPIC service is an online information service with a command interface ...

This article describes a project to create a bibliographic control system for archival quality video and audio recordings of political commercials. The project objectives are to (1) design a local computer-searchable database, (2) prepare item-level records for the local database, and (3) prepare collection-level records for the OCW Online Union Catalog. The collection-level records are intended to alert scholars, researchers, and other potential users to the existence of the archive and to direct them to it for more powerful item-level searching in the local database. Some of the cataloging problems discussed are: choice of cataloging tools and MARC format, organization of the collections around the political candidate, and name authority.

Archivists have talked at length about the virtue of contributing records to a national bibliographic utility to provide enhanced access to collections. There has been little discussion, however, of the difficulties of finding materials in such large database environments. This article discusses a retrieval study that focused on collection-level archival records in the OCLC Online Union Catalog, made accessible through the EPIC search system. Data were also collected from the local OPAC at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill (UNC-CH) in which UNC-CH-produced OCLC records are loaded. The chief objective was to explore the retrieval environments in which a random sample of USMARC AMC records produced at UNC-Chapel Hill were found—specifically, to obtain a picture of the density of these databases in regard to each subject heading applied and, more generally, for each record. Key questions were (1) how many records would be retrieved for each subject heading attached to each of the records and (2) what was the nature of these subject headings vis-à-vis the number of hits associated with them. Findings show that large retrieval sets are a potential problem with national bibliographic utilities and that the local and national retrieval environments can vary greatly. The need for specificity in indexing is emphasized. This article is based on a paper given at the Society of American Archivists' 1992 annual meeting in Montreal. OCLC supported this research. The author wishes to thank Patricia Haberkern, who did much of the searching.

In this contribution the construction and organisation of the Co‐operative Online Bibliographic System and Services (COBISS) in Slovenia is described. It is dealt with in segments, covering the communication infrastructure, products and services of the central bibliographic utility and information retrieval services of the COBISS system, online public access local library catalogues and databases and the union (co‐operative) database. The organisation of the management of the development of the COBISS system as an association of members (libraries/information centres) is presented, and a model of co‐ordination between the COBISS system as the basis of the library information system and the system of scientific information and communication on the national level is considered.

The authors trace the history and development of the name authority and subject work compnents of the National Coordinated Cataloging Operations (NACO) and characterize the growth of its membership and activity scope, file breadth and size, quality and quantity standards, and governance. Summary statistical tables and lists of all participating libraries with their authority record (National Union Catalog) symbols accompany the text. Also included are reflections on the benefits of participation and speculation on future directions cooperative authority work could take.

Cataloging of newspapers under the auspices of the National Endowment for the Humanities-funded United States Newspapcr Program began in 1983. Bibliographic records created by USNP participants are maintained as a subset of the CONSER Program database on OCLC, and holdings records are created and maintained in the OCLC Union List Subsystem. As of October, 1992, the database contained over 100,000 bibliographic records, and over 350,000 holdings records. This paper reviews the progress of the cataloging program through the past decade, with particular emphasis on the attempts to find workable and economic solutions to as yet unresolved bibliographic problems while proceeding with the task of completing project work.

This paper presents a systematic investigation of cooperative cataloging outside North America. Since cooperative cataloging requires a certain level of telecommunications and computerization, most networks are found in Europe and in the Pacific Rim. With information taken from secondary sources, details relevant to cooperative cataloging are given for each network that provides this service 10 its members. With increased attention to document delivery and information retrieval, cooperative cataloging is less important in network formation than in the past.

In October 1991, the Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) introduced FirstSearch, an online reference product designed for the end‐user. Through a menu interface, which features extensive online help, more than thirty databases, covering a range of subject areas, are currently available. Among these are three unique to OCLC: WorldCat (the OCLC online union catalog), Article1st, and Contents1st. The latter two offer bibliographic citations to articles in more than 11,000 journals, primarily in the English language, in the areas of science, technology, medicine, social science, business, the humanities, and popular culture. Several authors have described the searching, printing, and pricing options available for the system.

Budget constraints, the geometric rise in available volumes, and the clientele's demand for instant access to all sources constitute the main issues confronting technical services in the final decade of the twentieth century. Cooperative cataloging not only nationally but also internationally offers the means to address these' realities successfully. Such ventures can be achieved if directors of libraries mandate working logether and provide the means to bring these massive efforts to fruition. True coomration requires difficult team work and the ability to accommodate genuine personal and institutional differences-tasks not always congenial to the personality of most librarians. A small-scale precedent has been established bv CORMOSEA. the Southeast Asian studies librarians of ten maior universities. The challenge lies in pursuing the precedent to the directors' level and beyond.

The State Normative Document, adopted in 1986, determines the main objectives, the tasks of the state system of union catalogs, the nomenclature of the main catalogs within the system, and the path of its formation. The hierarchy of union catalogs parallels the political hierarchy-all-Union, Republic, territorial, regional, district, and city. The union catalogs are intended to cover all materials in all formats. The eventual goal is an automated mode; but union catalogs now appear in card, book, and machine-readable formats. The recent political change away from centralization has made the task more difficult. Three union catalogs are planned at the national level: retrospective catalog of serials in Russian, retrospective catalog of serials in foreign languages, and catalog of foreign serials currently received. At other administrative levels, only union catalogs of currently received serials are planned. Prime attention will be paid to foreign serials as a scarce resource. Several large union catalogs ...

The study consisted of two interrelated parts: (1) a quality analysis of the Chinese-language records in the OCLC database, with emphasis on identifying errors in member-contributed records; and (2) the development of a rule-based data validation system for quality control of Chinese-language records in the OCLC database, with emphasis on establishing a set of production rules for such a system. One thousand three hundred six member-contributed Chinese records were randomly selected from the OCLC database and were examined by the researcher. Commonly occurring errors were identified and were categorized into three classes: format errors, content deficiency and inconsistency errors, and typographical errors of editing and inputting. The relationship between the number of times a record had been enhanced and errors still occurring in it was also studied.