From: "Swisher, Bob" <bswisher@ou.edu>
To: "'it-fyi@listserv.ou.edu'" <it-fyi@lists.ou.edu>
Subject: it-fyi: Two Big Libraries Abandon Home-Grown Software (Chron of H
Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1999 11:48:08 -0500
Wednesday, April 14, 1999
Two Big Libraries Abandon Home-Grown Software for Commercial Products
By VINCENT KIERNAN
The sun is setting on home-grown library software: On Monday the
National Library of Medicine abandoned its pioneering cataloguing
software, originally developed about 25 years ago, and started using a
new catalogue based on commercial software.
The Library of Congress, not to be left behind, is planning to switch to
the same product in August.
The medicine library, in Bethesda, Md., calls its new catalogue
LOCATORplus (http://www.nlm.nih.gov/locatorplus/). Open to any Web user,
the catalogue describes the library's 5.3 million books, journals, works
of art, and other holdings.
Any Web user can consult the catalogue.
With LOCATORplus, a user can easily search several separate data bases
at once, such as those describing books and periodicals, says Dianne
McCutcheon, the library's coordinator for implementation of the
integrated library system. The previous on-line catalogue -- which the
library itself had developed -- could not handle simultaneous searches
of multiple data bases.
Moreover, the new catalogue can include links to Web sites, she says.
The new on-line catalogue is based on Voyager, a set of
library-management applications that have so far been sold to about 350
other libraries by Endeavor Information Systems of Des Plaines, Ill.
Medical-library workers can use Voyager to order new books and journals,
catalogue them when they arrive, and track their usage by library
patrons, says Ms. McCutcheon.
The system is also free of year-2000 problems, she says.
The library spent $1.3-million on the software, its installation by
Endeavor, and training of library personnel who will use it, she says.
She adds that it was more cost-effective to purchase the software than
to have the library's staff develop improved versions of its previous
programs.
The Library of Congress, which has been using software that it started
developing in 1968, is planning to start converting its operations to
Voyager in August and finish by October, says Barbara B. Tillett,
director of its integrated-library-system program. Operations will be
converted in stages, starting with cataloguing and later incorporating
circulation, reference, book acquisition, and finally checking in newly
arrived periodicals, she says.
Ms. Tillett says she hopes the new system will streamline library
operations. For example, the current software doesn't list an item's
location, so workers must consult a file of 12 million cards to pinpoint
where a specific book or journal is stored. Library workers will be able
to use Voyager to do that more quickly and easily, she says.
The Library of Congress is spending $3.6-million for the Voyager
software, she says.
Like the medical library's old on-line system, the Library of Congress's
current on-line catalogue separates holdings into different systems. For
example, books acquired since 1975 are in one data base, books acquired
from 1950 through 1974 are in another, and books acquired before 1950
are in a third. Some searches also require use of obscure commands.
"It's very confusing for users," says Ms. Tillett. The new Web system
will permit a single search through all the library's holdings.
Copyright © 1999 by The Chronicle of Higher Education