In his article "The McDonaldization of Academic Libraries?" Brian Quinn explores to what extent and to what effect academic libraries have become "McDonaldized," according to the concept developed by sociologist George Ritzer. Quinn identifies a number of ways in which the four dimensions of…

When an institutional program review determined the Hillsborough Community College Libraries Web site was out-of-date, lacked resources, and was in desperate need of a makeover, the authors embarked upon a redesign project. The article describes the challenges and considerations that contributed to the authors' decision-making and design…

In these difficult economic times, everyone is on the lookout for savings. This author, an adult services librarian at New City Library in New York, has spent the last two years implementing small-scale open source and freeware replacements where proprietary or paper solutions once ruled. While none of these projects is individually revolutionary,…

This article discusses best practices for evaluating open source software for use in library projects, based on the authors' experience evaluating electronic publishing solutions. First, it presents a brief review of the literature, emphasizing the need to evaluate open source solutions carefully in order to minimize Total Cost of Ownership. Next,…

This paper reports on a questionnaire survey of 16 national libraries designed to clarify how national libraries attempt to justify their web archiving activities. Results indicate they envisage that a) the benefits brought about by their initiatives are greater than the overall costs, b) the costs imposed on libraries are greater than the costs…

Two models for circulation systems (manual and automated) costing are presented. Validation tests for the model assumptions are devised and explained. Use of the models for cost effectiveness comparison and for cost prediction are discussed and examples are given showing their application. (10 references) (Author/SJ)

Twenty-three scholarly papers and twelve abstracts comprise the content of the eleventh annual Brick and Click Libraries Symposium, held at Northwest Missouri State University in Maryville, Missouri. The peer-reviewed proceedings, authored by academic librarians and presented at the symposium, portray the contemporary and future face of…

A study of the applications of computer to libraries and information systems carried out with the support of the Council on Library Resources is reported. The report presents recommendations derived from the synthesis of facts, views, and opinions obtained from sources such as: visits to selected projects and installations, published and private…

This article introduces the types of systems operating in the individual provinces and explains their purposes. Also covered are automated cataloging through library networks, and the beneficial and detrimental aspects of cooperative cataloging support systems. The University of Guelph system of automated cataloging, circulation, and acquisition…

The May 1971 issue of "College and Research Libraries" featured an article by Dr. Ellsworth Mason which constitutes an all-out attack on the application of computer technology to library systems. Dr. Mason views the computer-based technology to library systems developed to date (at least the ones he has studied) as unqualified disasters from a…

This paper describes an automated card catalog system, developed for the Dartmouth Regional Library in Nova Scotia, which uses records of selected fixed-length fields; it is proposed as a prototype for a system meeting the needs of a public library system with a collection size of about 100,000 items. The costs of operating a catalog system based…

An evaluation of the Ohio College Library Center's (OCLC) proposed Serials Control Subsystem was undertaken to determine what effect the system would have on the operation of the Serials Department at the University of South Florida (USF) Library. The system would consist of three components: 1) claiming--identifying missing issues and generating…

Too little is known generally about the cost of the various operations carried out in libraries. At present, new techniques are being devised using computers to store, sort, file and reproduce data formerly dealt with by traditional manual methods. Computer time, however, is expensive, and the computer programs to handle bibliographic data are…