Libraries and Mainframe Computers, or When Do You Need a 747?

Shaw, Debora

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/1262 Copy

Description

Title

Libraries and Mainframe Computers, or When Do You Need a 747?

Author(s)

Shaw, Debora

Issue Date

1989

Keyword(s)

• Machine-readable bibliographic data
• Database management
• Libraries --Data processing

Abstract

"In consideration of the long-standing title of these meetings as ""clinics on library applications of data processing,"" we should remind ourselves that data processing is a means of improving the work of libraries as information-handling systems. Information has been defined as ""data placed in context"" (Loomis, 1987, p. 3) with the database as one part of the context, and the library another. We are also concerned with data from the system's viewpoint, noting that one goal of database management has been to ""create more independence of the data from the programs that access them"" (Lucas, 1986, p. 220). These quotations highlight important aspects of how databases and their associated software have evolved, and how they are viewed by current developers and knowledgeable users. Data are an essential component of information, and hence of information systems, including libraries. Because of their enormous processing power compared with manual filing and retrieval systems, computers can be used to create a revolution in library services. It is therefore incumbent on librarians and information specialists to understand and make the best possible use of computer power in information handling."

Publisher

Graduate School of Library and Information Science. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Series/Report Name or Number

Clinic on Library Applications of Data Processing (26th : 1989)

ISSN

0069-4789

Type of Resource

text

Language

en

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http://hdl.handle.net/2142/1262

Copyright and License Information

Copyright owned by Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois. 1989.

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