The truest meaning of public service was that, although never used by all citizens, it was still available for any citizen. Whether public service in America can survive in the next decade, and maintain its basic altruistic concepts, will be the concern of all librarians. (Author/NH)

This booklet, one of a series of background papers for the White House Conference, explores the potential of new technologies to improve library services while reducing library costs. Separate subsections describe the application of technology to the following library functions: acquisitions, catalogs and cataloging, serials control, circulation…

The introduction to this addendum (the Action Plan is LI 004 521) discusses the present use by libraries of information-handling technology and identifies some of the trends taking place in performing essential library services. While some limited inroads have been made in automating certain public library functions, the bulk of services is still…

This report reviews the background and rationale for a cooperative authority file building system and describes the services, products, and operation of the new Name Authority Cooperative (NACO). The document defines the relationship between NACO, other Library of Congress (LC) cooperative projects, and the Linked Systems Project (LSP). The…

The 10 papers included in this volume consider how professional roles and responsibilities have been and are being affected by technological change and what competencies are important in filling these roles. In addition, approaches to training and education to develop competencies--which are defined as knowledge, skills, and/or attitudes--are…

This document contains the full transcript of a 2-day workshop on library automation. The first day of the workshop was devoted to a review of the state-of-the-art of library automation and the second day included presentation of testimony by Maine librarians. The transcript of the first day includes discussions of the historical development of…