Automated Library Cataloging
This is an excerpt from the paper...
The purpose of this research is to examine automated library cataloging, commonly referred to as the system of the Online Computer Library Center (sometimes wrongly referred to as Ohio Computer Library Center), or OCLC, which originated in the 1960s with research done at the University of Connecticut, and which seeks to standardize automated cataloging services for libraries (Zeidner, 1976; Calabrese & Acker, 1987). The plan of the research will be to set forth the principal features of OCLC, including the origins and need for the system, the use of and accessibility to automated catalogues, and current trends in automated cataloging. As appropriate, there will also be discussion of advantages and disadvantages of OCLC, methods and ranges of OCLC searching, and differences between that system and commercial bibliographic databases.To discuss the origin of and need for the OCLC system it should be necessary only to discuss the phenomenon of the Information Age, which has arisen, with the Computer Age, from the 1960s. The explosion of printed matter and the constant improvements and increase in the storage of research materials would by itself have been meaningless had the information so stored not also been retrievable, accessible. And as a practical matter, the sheer mass of information could hardly have been retrievable or accessible had it not been indexed on a computerized database. Conventional card cataloging had long been available, it is true; however, it is one thing
. . .
y be an important difference between a search for books written by one Wells, Herbert George or Wells, H.G. In one case, the search for, say, The Time Machine, may be successful, whereas in another the search may be unexpectedly unsuccessful. Similarly the case of an organization known variously as International Business Machines or IBM or for that matter I.B.M. Baer and Johnson cite a history of accessibility problems related to lack of standardization of naming of subjects, persons, or organizations. In a report on a wholesale data conversion, from physical card catalogues to an online system, Asher (1982) notes such issues as subject standardization on the front end of the conversion project to the ability to formulate access-search strategies on the back end.
Related to the question of authority control for the content of catalogues is the question of idiosyncratic computer systems that house the catalogues. McAninch (1986) asserts that efficient online library cataloging is a function of efficient computer hardware and software. However, the technology is so complex and varied that intralibrary and interlibrary computer communication may suffer. McAninch cites the use of "patch" programs that supposedly control everything fro
. . .
Some common words found in the essay are:
Library Congress, Baer Johnson, Catalog Various, Computer Age, Meanwhile Dawson, Calabrese Acker, Abstracts International, Los Angeles, King Gazder, University Illinois, online systems, automated cataloging, interlibrary loan, et al, university libraries, special collections, management studies, office management studies, office management, research libraries, association research, education delft netherlands, user education delft, crowe et al, seminar online user,
Approximate Word count = 3399
Approximate Pages = 14 (250 words per page)
More Essays on Automated Library Cataloging
|
Customer Service
to Over
32,000 Professionally Written Papers!!!
