Provides statistical data from MARC-II bibliographic files to be used in the design of a nationwide authority file. The data include information on characteristics of headings and on expected sizes and growth rates of various authority file subsets. Although the data are system dependent, some general implications are derived. (RAA)

The Information Retrieval Research Laboratory of the University of Illinois regularly calculates certain statistics associated with the MARC II data base. Statistics pertaining to data element occurrence, data element length, and distribution of records by Dewey Decimal division and Library of Congress class code are given. (Author)

A union catalog of 1,100,000 books on computer output microfiche (COM) in twenty-one Louisiana libraries is described. The computer programs, the data bank, and output are described. Also described are the statistical tabulations which are a by-product of the system and which provide a rich source for analysis. (8 references) (Author)