Library Technology Guides

Document Repository


Volume 10 Number 05 (May 1990)

RISC

RISC (Reduced Instruction Set Computing) is currently one of the hottest buzz words in the computer industry. Several vendors of automated library systems are touting the advantages of the new technology, but without much explanation. The editors offer the following:

Generally, a RISC processor uses no microcode and attempts to execute instructions at a rate of one per clock cycle. With very few exceptions, RISC machines are microprocessor-based. RISC machines are fast, and being microprocessor-based, are substantially cheapet to build than an equivalent discrete-logic CPU system. They are fast because they are hardwired, and the rate at which instructions are executed approaches the system clock speed. The objective of RISC design is to reduce the number of machine cycles per instruction. The fewer the cycles per instruction, the fewer cycles (wait states) that occur while the CPU does nothing. To minimize cycles per instruction, computer architects have designed RISC systems to execute instructions in parallel or concurrent fashion, a technique known as pipelining. Pipelining is a technique of decomposing a repeated sequential process into subprocesses, each of which can be executed efficiently on a special unit (pipeline stage) that operates in parallel with others.

Some kind of pipelining is implemented in virtually all modern computers, but one of the major reasons RISC systems deliver higher performance is the increased efficiency of RISC pipelining techniques. By eliminating complex instructions and exposing pipeline stages to software compilers, modern RISC machines dramatically increase overall system performance.

Much of the performance of any RISC machine is going to be tied to how well its compilers take advantage of its features. Sophisticated RISC compilers recognize stalls and disruptions in the pipeline and reshuffle and reorganize the instructions for maximum pipeline efficiency.

The major options in the RISC market are the AMD 29000, IBM 6000 (or Rios) , Sun SPARC, Motorola MS8000, and MIPS R2000/ R3000 processors.

CLSI president resigns

Michael J. Timbers, President of Information Handling Service Group, Inc., the TBG Company of which CLSI is a part, has announced that he has accepted the resignation of James K. Barrentine, president of CLSI.

CLSI 's day-to-day responsibilities will be assumed by Carl P. Fisher, who has been named the company's acting president. Fisher is a former vice president of development for Mead Data Central, where he was involved in the start up of the Lexis, and Nexis systems. For the past seven years, he has worked in both full time and consulting positions with IHS Group.

TBG's press release asserted that the company is deeply committed to CLSI and the library market and will continue to make significant investments in CLSI to ensure that it remains the preeminent provider of library automation systems. In that regard, a major financing package has been negotiated with three major financial institutions to ensure that CLSI will have significant working capital to support increased development efforts.

Gateway software targets K-12 schools

School library automation generally has been limited to software on PCs. The only major turnkey vendor of multiuser systems with several school library installations is INLEX. However, one software only vendor considers the K-l2 school library market its niche. The Gateway Software Corporation's LMS (LIBRARY MANAGEMENT SYSTEM) claims to combine the ease of use of PCs with the power and reliability of midrange computers to create a state-of-the-art and fully integrated library automation system. While the promotional literature appears to imply a distributed system in which part of the functionality is on PCs, the fact is that there is no file transfer possible between PCs and the AS400; instead, the PCs emulate "dumb' terminals. The user merely has the freedom of switching from the automated library system to standalone applications, and to download screens.

The system is written exclusively for the AS/400 and utilizes the full range of AS/400 functions. It offers screen design and a user interface which comply with IBM/s System Application Architecture. Action bar, pop-up windows and pull-down menus are featured. Online documentation is accessible via IBM's OfficeVision/400 word processing.

The multiple library functions use c common data base and a unified set of cons mands and menus. A major claimed accomplishment of the software is the minimizing of transactions by eliminating the pressing of the "enter" key, thus reducing keystrokes. This improves efficiency both for the operator and for the AS/400, resulting in improved response time. There also is extensive use of function keys, which allows many functions to be performed with a single keystroke. A "Fast Path" option permits experienced users to navigate through the applications without displaying menus. Pop-up windows display lists of values when and where they are needed so that the operator will not be forced to exit a function to hunt for necessary information.

The software is "table driven" allowing each school district to define and customize system function. District-defined menus for individual users or groups of users are available. District- defined "Tasks" are available from every action bar customized for individual users or group of users. Online help may be customized by the district using OfficeVision/400.

LMS utilizes BiblioFile, a product of the Library Corporation to supply MARC (Machine Readable Catalog) records for the bibliographic data base. Selected fields from these records then are used for the union catalog to which individual holdings may be attached. The library may grant staff access to update and change any of the twenty-two (22) fields in the records. Conversion programs using other data bases will be made available as the needs arise. Acquisitions are maintained online from the time inventory is taken and the shortages are automatically entered into the acquisitions program work file. A report to show shortages can be printed. Proposed acquisitions and shortages can be added, deleted, or modified in the work file. If the library allows access, each staff member can enter items in the work file. After editing is complete, reports can be generated by vendor and ISBN. These reports could be attached to the purchase order.

The system provides automated circulation through the use of barcode readers. Check-out may be accomplished by library staff or self-charging may be offered.

When the patron is checking out an item, a message, showing the name of the patron, the title of the item being checked out, and the date it is due back in the library, will be displayed. The online public access catalog is designed for K-12 use. Color coded keys may be utilized for simplicity. The system allows each library to specify whether patrons may search the holdings of other libraries, including qualification for the skill level of materials. Each library may specify if the online catalog will display in catalog card or MARC format.

Patrons may search by title, author, subject, call number, and keywords. The keyword file includes all of the words in each title, title responsibility, and subject field, except those words entered as exceptions by the library. The keyword search may be enhanced by a "see/see also file" created by the library. The library can limit the number of hits for searches to prevent one patron from monopolizing the entire system with a search that is too general.

The interlibrary loan program keeps records for reporting purposes of all loaned and borrowed items for all libraries. An item on loan will be tracked online from the time the item leaves the library until it is returned.

The software has been installed at the Pattonville Schools. District in St. Louis County, Missouri, and the Fort Thomas Board of Education in Cincinnati, Ohio. A third installation is in progress on Long Island, New York. The package also has been selected by a major Kansas school district.

The price of the bundled LMS software package is $10,800 to $39,800 depending on the specific hardware platform used. Instruction and training will be at the customer's site or at Gateway Software Corporation's training center in Billings, Montana. Support will be as needed, either at the customer's site or by telephone. The $3,500 installation and training fee (exclusive of travel expenses) is nonrefundable even if all of the 60 hours of training included in the price have not been fully utilized.

The first year's software maintenance is included in the price. The vendor will offer customers the option of obtaining an enhancement release for 15 percent of the purchase price of the initial software package.

The company also has a TEXTBOOK MANAGEMENT program for assigning textbooks to schools, classrooms, and even individual students. It is presently in the final stages of designing and the first stages of developing a complete STUDENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM. This new application comprises the following files: basic student records, academic achievement, scheduling, attendance, and special programs.

[Contact: Gateway Software Corporation, 1645 Avenue D, Billings, MT 59102; (406) 256-9716.]

Gaylord update

Gaylord is now installing GALAXY at the rate of two systems a month. In early April the company claimed a total of ten installations, with another six scheduled through June.

Gaylord has also added several new staff members to the sales and marketing group which now consists of Doug Livsey, formerly of Dynix, in the Western Region (801-944-8445); Jewel Harris, long-time Gaylord employee, in the Central Region (216-321-6912); Sandy Schulman, formerly of PBR Consulting, in the Northeastern Region (215-625-2876); and Robyn Dudley, formerly of Faxon, in the Southeastern Region (301-870-2678).

Those modules now completed include cataloging, circulation control, online public access catalog, electronic mail, and report generation. Gaylord also has completed development of an electronic ordering interface, using the standard BISAC format, to Baker & Taylor's book ordering system; BLINK, an electronic interface between SuperCAT and other local systems, using the MARC II Communications Format and the X Modem Transmission Protocol Standard; and a new portable unit, called Portable GALAXY, which triples as battery-powered inventory control system, back-up device, and bookmobile terminal.

Currently under development and scheduled for completion this summer are authority control, OCLC interface, reserve book room, and networked GALAXY systems. Full functional specifications have also been completed for the acquisitions module, and work has begun on the serials control module specifications.

The system runs on the full line of Digital (DEC) computers, including VAXes from supermicros to superminis.

[Contact: Gaylord Bros., Box 4901, Syracuse, NY 13221-4901; (315) 457-5070.]

muItILIS distributes release 10.5

multiLIS distributed Release 10.5 of its software in April, the third general release in the past year. Release 10.5 is the last of a series designed to standardize the product. Significant new features in Releases 10.3 to 10.5 include access to the authority files within the OPAC by means of windowing, tailorable OPAC search and display screens, improved calendar management for circulation, batch loading of circulation transactions from a PC or portable terminal, and faster indexing.

[Contact: multiLlS, Sobeco Group, Inc., Edifice Sobeco, 505 Dorchester Blvd. West, Montreal, Quebec H2Z lY7; (514) 878-9090.]

NSC, inc., announces A/V booking

Media booking is finally getting off the drawing boards. The majority of vendors plan to release a module in the next 18 months. The latest to reach general release is NSC's A/V Booking. The module will be part of the company's AARCS System. It provides for reservation, checkout and check-in of media and equipment, scheduling of production facilities and technical staff. Subsystems exist for picking list generation of specific events, rental fees assignment, production of labels for material identification and shipping, and preventive maintenance/repaid scheduling with on-screen reminders.

A/V Booking supports advanced and regularly scheduled booking of items, multiple bookings per day, and retrieval of multiple available booking intervals for user selection, as well as the inclusion of average transportation/turn-around time in projected item availability. A/V booking can function ttstandalone,t or can be integrated with NSC, Inc.'s AARCS to provide a complete booking module within an automated library system.

[Contact: NSC, Inc., 428 West Ryan, Brillion, WI 54110; (414) 756-5305 or (800) 624-5720; fax (414) 756-2359.]

Preconference on acquisitions standards

A preconference on standards in the automated acquisition of books and serials is being cosponsored by the National Information Standards Organization (NISO) and the Book Industry Study Group (BISG). The all-day meeting will be in Chicago on June 22, 1990, immediately before the ALA Annual Conference.

Meeting sessions will cover the acquisition and order acknowledgement formats developed by the Book and Serials Industry Systems Advisory Committees. (BISAC and SISAC) of BISG, the apparent conflict between the general standards developed for Electronic Data Interchange and the use of MARC-like standards for such communications, and an overview of Open Systems Interconnect and its relationship to the acquisitions process.

Program participants include Sally McCalltn, Library of Congress; Kathy Bales, Research Libraries Group; Ed Buchinski, National Library of Canada; Paul Peters, New York Public Library; Clifford Lynch, University of California; and Keith Schmeidl, Coutts.

The registration fee for the preconference is $90 for members of NISO, BISAC, or SISAC and $100 for all others.

[Contact: Patricia Harris, NISO, P.O. Box 1056, Bethesda, MD 20827; (301) 975-2814.]

What is EDI?

One of the major topics on the Acquisitions Preconference announced in this issue of LSN is EDI, Electronic Data Interchange. The emergence of this widely used alternative to the approach libraries and publishers have been taking for electronic ordering came to the attention of the library community only a year ago. At the May 19, 1989, meeting of the Book Industry Systems Advisory Committee (BISAC), Russell J. Balletto, BISAC Chairperson, announced that the two major bookstore chains, Walden Books and B. Dalton, will be working with wholesalers Ingram and Baker & Taylor to develop a network and formats for telecommunications with their trading partners. Their plans include surveying their top 300 to 400 vendors to determine their computer and telecommunication capabilities. They also announced that they would select among several organizations offering third-party electronic data interchange (EDI) networking capabilities which conform to the Accreditation Standards Committee (ASC) X12 Business Data Interchange formats. This approach, they argued, was more economical than the BISAC formats previously developed.

Waldenbooks and B. Dalton currently send orders to many publishers and receive invoices from them on computer tape in the computer-to-computer formats developed by BISAC. Waldenbooks also has online telecommunications with Random House and Harper & Row. Waldenbooks, B. Dalton, Ingram and Baker & Taylor have expressed interest in taking advantage of comparable savings with their other vendors within and beyond the book industry.

One of the concerns of librarians is that these major vendors will pursue EDI at the expense of the BISAC formats in which the library community has made a significant investment. In this article the editors will describe EDI and its applications so that librarians can better evaluate this option.

EDI is the flow of routine transactions between organizations without human intervention being required in the process. It typically involves requests for quotes, purchase orders, shipping notices, invoices, and payments. The information is moved in standard formats that allow the data to be processed directly by the application software of the receiving organization without any human intervention and without the need for paper. EDI eliminates time wasted on such tasks as manual sorting, matching, filing, reconciling, and mailing of routine paper documents.

In the United States alone, over 10,000 companies, in a wide range of industries, already routinely use EDI. In the automotive, chemical, pharmaceutical, and rail industries, EDI has been established as a prerequisite for doing business. Several other major industries also have a large number of companies using EDI: textiles, retail, electronics, health care, and petroleum. In addition, the U.S. government has become actively involved in EDI.

EDI standards fall under the auspices of the American National Standards Institute (ANSI), which chartered the Accredited Standards Committee X12 (ASC X12) in 1979. The ASC X12 Committee's objective is to develop uniform standards for interindustry electronic interchange of business transactions. Briefly, the Z12 Data Interchange Standards consist of:

  • Transaction Set Standards: these define the procedural format and data content requirements for specified business transactions, e.g., purchase orders.
  • Data Dictionary and Segment Dictionary: these define the precise content for data elements and data segments used in building transaction sets.
  • Transmission Control Standards: these define the formats for the information required to control the data interchange.

It is not necessary that an organization have EDI capability in its automated system. It can rely on a third-party value-added network (VAN) carrier to provide them with access to EDI. VAN suppliers such as Tymnet and Telenet Communications can assume the responsibility for providing the data carrier service. They can also reformat data messages to the specific requirements of various groups.

In summary, libraries have to decide whether they wish ordering standards to be specific to the library community or whether general business standards are acceptable.

Library of Congress withdraws MARC licensing proposal for U.S. subscribers

Librarian of Congress James H. Billington has withdrawn the Library's licensing proposal as it pertains to the distribution of MARC records to U.S. subscribers. With respect to foreign distribution of MARC records, the Library will review existing arrangements and make recommendations during the coming year. The decision was announced in a letter from Henriette Avram, the Library's Associate Librarian for Collections Services, to MARC Distribution Service subscribers. The decision is a response to the library community's strong negative reaction to the proposal.

Avram said that LC will continue to work with the ad hoc groups appointed by several major library organizations to devise ways of dealing with the larger, more central problem of how to sustain the Library's national bibliographic program during an era of declining resources. In the meantime, because the licensing plan was not carried out and usage fees were not implemented in 1990, the subscription price has been increased to cover costs, plus ten percent.

RLG developing interlibrary loan workstation

The Research Libraries Group is implementing a workstation-based interlibrary loan system. The project is being funded with a $120,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Education's College Library Technology and Cooperation Grants Program (Title II-D). Earlier funding supported the design phase of the project. The latest grant allows RLG to complete the programming, documentation, and initial installation of an application that will enable RLG members to take a major step in improving ILL services.

The ILL workstation is an enhanced interlibrary loan system that will operate on an IBM PC/AT-compatible personal computer. Based on the Common Command Language (NISO standard Z39.58), the workstation will be able to interface with other systems, allowing library staff to log on, search for needed materials, and perform ILL transactions not only in RLIN (the Research Libraries Information Network) but also on other ILL networks.

[Contact: The Research Libraries Group, Inc., 1200 Villa Street, Mountain View, CA 94041-1100; (415) 962-9951.]

Pioneer shows CD-ROM mini-changer

Pioneer has announced a six-disc CD-ROM mini-changer. It has a seven-second maximum disc-to-disc change time and can daisy-chain up to seven drives using a SCSI interface for a total playback capacity of 42 discs. The mini-changer is designed for playback of multivolume data bases or to act as a CD audio jukebox. The price of the hardware is $1,395.

[Contact: Pioneer Communications of America, 600 B. Crescent Avenue, Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458; (201) 327-6400.]

Photo clip art available

Libraries that have a MAC available may wish to investigate a CD-ROM file of photographs. Discimagery Inc. has released the first volume of The Professional Photography Collection, a $149 CD-ROM offering 100 photographs for use by communications departments and graphic designers. In a break from standard photo-agency policy, Discimagery grants buyers the right to unlimited usage. Most agencies charge a one-time use fee or allow in-house use only. The collection also is available as color prints or as 35mm slides, but at a higher cost. By offering photographs in a variety of formats with unlimited reproduction rights, the photographs are as easy to use as clip art.

The disc includes a demo version of PhotoMac, the color photo retouching program from Avalon Development Group of Cambridge, Massachusetts, and a coupon to buy the $795 program for only $495.

[Contact: Discimagery Inc., 18 B. 16th Street, New York, NY 10003; (212) 675-8500.]

LITA CD-ROM preconference

The Library and Information Technology Association (LITA) will sponsor a preconference from 9:00 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. on June 22, prior to the ALA Annual Conference in Chicago. The topic will be "Networking CD-ROM Technologies." Sessions will include CD-ROM networking and copyright law; a publishing industry update, featuring representatives from Information Access Company, SilverPlatter Information, Bowker Electronic Publishing, and H.W. Wilson Co.; case studies of actual CD-ROM networking experiences in academic and public libraries; and vendor demonstrations. Registration fees are $60 for LITA personal members, $85 for ALA personal members, and $110 for others. Registration is limited to 250 participants. Advance registration deadlines for all workshops is 31 May 1990. Cancellations in writing will be accepted through 31 May 1990 but are subject to a $25 cancellation fee.

[Contact: LITA, SO E. Huron Street, Chicago, IL 60611; (312) 280-4270.]

National Fax Directory available

The 1990 edition of The National Fax Directory has been announced by General Information, a subsidiary of Gale Research. The publishers claim to have listings for the fax numbers of more than 80,000 businesses and organizations in the Directory 's 1,700 pages. There are alphabetical, geographic, and classified sections. The price is $49.95.

[Contact: General Information, Inc., 401 Park Place, Kirkland, WA 98033; (800) 722-3244 or fax (206) 827-8562.]

Technology's impact on resource sharing

Administrators and interlibrary loan libraries interested in the impact of information technologies on resource sharing should look at Research Access through New Technology, edited by Mary E. Jackson for AMS Press. The ten chapters range from a broad perspective to reports on specific applications. The price is $32.50.

[Contact: AMS Press, 56 East 13th Street, New York, NY 10003; (212) 777-4700.]

PC software best sellers

Lotus 1-2-3 (Releases 2.2 and 3.0) continues to be the most popular software package for PCs in a business environment. WordPerfect (Release 5.0) is right behind, distancing Word for Windows by 6 places. Fastback Plus, IBM-PC-DOS 3.3, Norton Utilities Advanced, PC Tools DeLuse, IBM Fixed Disk Organizer, and dBase IV round out the top 10.


Publication Information


PublisherLibrary Systems Newsletter was published by the American Library Association.
Editor-in-Chief:Howard S. White
Contributing Editor:Richard W. Boss
ISSN:0277-0288
Publication Period1981-2000
Business modelAvailable on Library Technology Guides with permission of the American Library Association.