ACRL College & Research Libraries News

College & Research Libraries News

NEW TECHNOLOGY

•The American Society for Information Science and Knowledge Industry Publications, Inc., are offering a new Data Base User Service. The service has four components: an annual Data Base Directory, containing extensive descriptions of many types of databases, arranged alphabetically and indexed by producer; Data Base Alert, a monthly newsletter; Data Base Online Access, an online version of the directory; and Data Base Hotline, telephone access to the editorial staff for personalized information. The $185 annual cost entitles first-time subscribers to one free hour of search time. The complete service will be available in January. Contact Knowledge Industry Publications, Inc., 701 Westchester Ave., White Plains, NY 10604; (914) 328-9157.

•Compre Comm, Inc.,a designer and manufacturer of data communications equipment, has introduced the Library Statmaster statistical concentrator series for automated library information systems. When installed at each side of a point-topoint data communications link, the system will allow up to four or up to eight (two models) remote asynchronous terminals to interact with a computer over a single shared phone line. This allows for reductions in phone line costs, modem costs, and datacom equipment maintenance costs. The system requires a mini-computer with standard RS-232C communications port interface, and is priced from $1,095 for a four-channel version to $1,695 for an eight-channel version. Contact: Wayne Wilson, Compre Comm, Inc., 3200 N. Farber Dr., P.O. Box 3570, Champaign, IL 61821; (217) 352-2477.

•The Faxon Company and GEAC Computers International of Ontario have announced a series of cooperative efforts which will link Geac’s integrated systems with Faxon’s LINX Network for online searching, tape exchange, and communications. Future services will include: transfer of holdings from the LINX serials check-in system into the Geac local catalog, ending the need for duplicate data entry; loading of Faxon subscription information into Geac’s fund accounting system for local manipulation; online access for Geac users to the LINX databases; and electronic mail for Geac and LINX users.

Geac has also signed a contract to install its information system in the Smithsonian Institution and its 15 branch libraries. The project will be phased over a three-year period commencing in April 1984.

•KPG Inc., Atlanta, is marketing a stand-alone system for small libraries, the Telepen Library Circulation System. The hardware consists of a “telereader” terminal, disk drive, printer, and keyboard, and can be purchased (with software included) for $13,700. The system is based on an alphanumeric, dot matrix bar code for book labels and borrower cards. Contact: KPG Inc., Cosmopolitan Center, Suite 204, 6075 Barfield Road, N.E., Atlanta, GA 30328; (404) 252-7366.

•The National Commission on Libraries and Information Science has established a Blue Ribbon panel to assist the Department of Commerce in developing policy guidelines on the archiving of data from weather and land-sensing satellites. The activity is an outgrowth of a Presidential initiative directing the Secretary of Commerce to explore the issues in transferring the current operational civil remote sensing systems to the private sector. The Secretary established a Source Evaluation Board chaired by Raymond G. Kammer Jr., deputy director of the National Bureau of Standards, to look into the matter.

One of the problems facing the Board and NCLIS is that the data stream produced by the satellites is immense. Meteorological satellites alone generate data that produces 3,000 computer tapes, 15.000 images, and 150 videocassettes each month. The archiving today is done by the Federal government on a decentralized, ad hoc basis. The NCLIS Blue Ribbon panel, chaired by Richard C. Atkinson, chancellor of the University of California, San Diego, and former director of the National Science Foundation, has provided the Source Evaluation Board with guidance on information policy issues relating to the archiving. The panel held its first meeting on September 12 and reported its findings to the Board in November.

•Stanford UniversityLibraries went online in September with Socrates, a database with over 920,000 records of items cataloged since 1972, as well as all of Stanford’s serials holdings and everything housed in the Meyer Undergraduate Library. The library plans to add an automated circulation system, complete retrospective cataloging, and outside reference databases to Socrates over the next few years.

The system can be accessed by any terminal linked to the University’s IBM 3081. Information can be called up by author, title, partial title, subject, call number, ISBN number, or shelf position (roughly equivalent to browsing). Using the Socrates system in the library is a free service to patrons. However, the system can be accessed for a fee by any individual or department having an account with Stanford’s Center for Information Technology. There is even a group rate for dormitories and departments who wish to purchase a month of use (300 hours) for $1,000.

•University Products, Inc.,is serving as U.S. agent for the British manufacturer of tissues precoated with acrylic adhesive to simplify laminating techniques used for conservation. Crompton laminating tissue may be used for full or localized repair and for protecting bound volumes, documents,and charts. The material is a 10 gram/meter² long fibered tissue with neutral pH, coated on one side only and can be removed easily. Pure acrylic can also be obtained as an unsupported supple film used as a fixative or material adhesive for remounting book plates, mounting prints and drawings, and restoring split textiles. Contact University Products, Inc., P.O. Box 101, South Canal St., Holyoke, MA 01041; (800) 628-1912.

•Users of the UTLAS system can now have online access to R.R. Bowker’s Books in Print database of over 150,000 titles which are out-of-print and out-of-stock indefinitely. Under a new agreement the database was loaded into the UTLAS system and made available in September. Libraries may eliminate unnecessary orders by determining the unavailability of titles at the pre-order stage. The Bowker database is retrospective to 1979 and is kept current by monthly updates. ■ ■