Library Automation in Norway — some main projects
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/eb044590 |
| Date | 01 January 1983 |
| Pages | 69-82 |
| Published date | 01 January 1983 |
| Author | Ingeborg Sølvberg |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management,Library & information science |
THE
ELECTRONIC
LIBRARY
Library Automation
in Norway — some main
projects
Ingeborg Sølvberg
Most librarians associate the phrase 'library automation' with a computerised sys-
tem to be used as a tool in the daily work within a library. Because data processing
and telecommunication are being more commonly used for collection, storage and
distribution of published information, the meaning of the phrase 'library auto-
mation' will have to change.
1.
Kinds of information
Information can be divided
into
private information and public information.
Private information is created and used by a subgroup of
the
population whose
members are collaborating in order
to
perform a job or task, e.g. administrative in-
formation needed to run an office, accounting, ticket-reservation, or information
for specific groups of professionals within a company such as salesmen or engineers.
Public information, on the other hand, is available to society as a whole — it
includes books, laws and regulations, and standards.
Private information is usually both created and used by the same end user group.
For example, travel agents are both recording bookings and checking if flights are
already fully booked. Public information can usually only be changed by authorised
personnel e.g. journalists, encyclopaedia
writers.
Both public and
private
information
is stored in several types of databanks, each type serving a specific need.
The main types of
public
information banks are:
— reference/location databanks
— full-text (source) databanks
— knowledge-based information bank (expert systems).
So far library automation projects have mostly dealt with the first type of information
banks,
the reference/location databanks.
The publishers, newspaper organisations, and, recently, also functional pro-
fessionals, e.g. scientists, using text-processing when writing reports are the main
producers of information which is stored in the full-text, or source, databanks.
Vol. 1, No. 1, January 1983 69
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